Attractions of Chernihiv region

Chernihiv Val is the oldest part of the city, a hill on the high bank of the Desna River, where the prince's palace and a complex of city defense structures (Dytynets) were located.

Remains of princely temples and boyar residences were discovered here. Two churches of the XI-XII centuries, the later building of the Collegium (1700), the Regimental Office (XVIII century), known as the "Lyzohub stone house", other buildings of the XVIII-XIX centuries have been perfectly preserved.

After the liquidation of the Chernihiv fortress in the 19th century, the defensive rampart over the river was turned into a park area, and monuments to Taras Shevchenko and Pushkin were erected. There are 12 cast-iron bastion cannons of the 17th century on the rampart, which are considered the hallmark of the city.

The Chernihiv Regional Universal Scientific Library named after Volodymyr Korolenko is located in the former building of the Noble and Peasant Land Bank in Chernihiv.

The building was built by the provincial engineer Dmytro Afanasyev according to the project of the architect Oleksandr Fon-Hohen. A two-story brick house in the Northern Art Nouveau style.

Since 1974, the Chernihiv Regional Universal Scientific Library has been housed in the former premises of the Noble Land Bank. About 30 different clubs operate on the territory of the library, literary evenings, exhibitions, presentations and conferences are constantly held.

On March 30, 2022, during the Russian-Ukrainian war, the building was heavily damaged as a result of shelling by Russian troops. The roof was broken, the windows were broken, cracks formed in the walls.

Yuryeva Bozhnytsia in Oster - the eastern part of the Saint Michael's Church, preserved from princely times. It is located on the remains of the settlement of the historic Horodets on Vostri.

The temple was probably founded by Prince Volodymyr Monomakh of Kyiv at the same time as the founding of the city in 1098. It was rebuilt in 1152 under Prince Yuriy Dolhoruky, thanks to which the popular name "Yuryeva Bozhnytsia" took root.

It suffered from Tatar raids, and in 1753 - from a lightning strike, at the beginning of the 19th century, most of the volume was dismantled due to its state of disrepair. Only the altar part - the apse and a fragment of the wall - has been preserved.

At the beginning of the 20th century, restoration and research works were carried out. An ancient fresco "Eucharist" was discovered on the wall, probably made by Kyiv masters in the 11th-12th centuries.

The openwork building of the Chernihiv Collegium with a high bell tower is located on the territory of the Chernihiv Dytynets (Val).

It was once part of the cathedral Saints Borys and Hlib Monastery - the residence of the Chernihiv archbishops.

The construction of the monastery refectory was probably started at the end of the 17th century by Archbishop Lazar Baranovich. In its current form, the building was erected in 1700-1702 by Archbishop Ioann Maksymovych with the support and funding of Hetman Ivan Mazepa, as evidenced by the board of the bell tower with the coat of arms of Mazepa, which is now exhibited in exhibition halls.

Later, the refectory began to be used as one of the premises of the Chernihiv Collegium - the first higher educational institution of the Left Bank of Ukraine, which operated from 1700 to 1786. Latin and other languages were taught here, as well as poetics, rhetoric, philosophy, mathematics, geography, and so on. The college trained church figures, civil servants, translators, writers, and physicians.

Now the Chernihiv Collegium houses a museum that covers the history of the school. The class of the college has been reconstructed, an exposition of icon painting has been exhibited, and the exhibition "Chernihiv and Chernihiv People 100 Years Ago" is open.

The administration of the National Architectural and Historical Reserve "Ancient Chernihiv" is also located here.

The Kozelet Museum of the History of Weaving of the Chernihiv Region was opened in 1988 in the premises of the Resurrection Church, in 2017 the museum finally got its own premises.

In the exposition, in addition to carpets, embroidered fabrics and towels, you can see photos of old Kozelets and a family tree of the Rozumovskys.

A centuries-old monastery oak in the village of Rykhly, a botanical landmark of nature of local importance, is called "King Oak". Its age is estimated at 800 years.

According to legend, during the Northern War with Sweden (1700-1721), the scouts of Peter I watched the maneuvers of the troops of the Swedish king Charles XII from the top of this huge tree, which towers over the entire forest massif.

The trunk of the monastery oak reaches 1.8 meters in diameter and 24 meters in height. In 2010, at the "National Tree of Ukraine" competition, the Rykhly "King Oak" took 3rd place in the "Aesthetically valuable trees" nomination.

Another long-lived oak tree with a huge hollow in its trunk grows nearby.

The Pryluky Museum of Local Lore named after Vasyl Maslov occupies a restored two-story mansion built in the 19th century for the mayor Mykola Kyslovsky in the very center of the city.

Its history begins with the Museum of Natural History, opened at the end of the 19th century. It reached its peak in the 1930s under the leadership of the famous scientist Vasyl Maslov (a monument has been installed at the entrance to the museum). The collection of masterpieces of world art and Cossack relics of the famous public figure and philanthropist Hryhoriy Galagan became the basis of his collection.

Since then, the museum has formed interesting art collections, a large collection of decorative and applied art, and opened a department of Pryluky history. The most interesting exhibits: the saddle of Hetman Danylo Apostol, a model of the Pryluky fortress, a fragment of the fortress palisade.

Employees of the local lore museum conduct tours of the city and its surroundings.

Saints Borys and Hlib Cathedral was built in Chernihiv in the 12th century on the foundation of an older stone building of the 11th century, and was rebuilt several times.

During the restoration in the middle of the XX century the buildings returned to the old Rus forms. The interior has preserved ancient frescoes, inlaid floor.

A museum of architecture has been opened in the church, which is part of the National Architectural and Historical Reserve "Ancient Chernihiv".

The administration of the reserve is located in the adjacent building of the Collegium (1672), which in the XVII century was part of the Saints Borys and Hlib Monastery - the residence of the Chernihiv metropolitans.

The Chernihiv Historical Museum is named after Vasyl Tarnovsky, a landowner, businessman and philanthropist from Kachanivka, who in 1902 organized the first Museum of Ukrainian Antiquities in the city. The exposition is based on his personal collection of Cossack-Hetman's antiquities and relics.

Today the museum is located in the former governor's house on Val (XIX century).

The collection includes more than 130 thousand exhibits belonging to different periods of Chernihiv region's history from ancient times to the present. The decoration of the exposition is a rich collection of archeological finds, old prints, rare documents, objects of the Cossack era.

Of particular interest is the diorama "Mezyn settlenent", which gives an idea of ​​the life of primitive man in the late Paleolithic era on the basis of archaeological finds in the village of Mezyn in Chernihiv region.

For almost three centuries, the Sedniv estate was the main residence of the Lyzohub noble family, which came from a Cossack sergeant in the time of Bohdan Khmelnytsky.

The first known member of the family was a simple Cossack Kindrat Lyzohub from Zolotonosha. His sons, Ivan and Yakiv, advanced from ordinary Cossacks to sergeants during the hetman's strife of the "Ruins" period. Yakiv became a colonel of Chernihiv and settled in Sedniv, and his descendants continued the arrangement of the estate he had begun.

The great reconstruction was carried out in the 19th century by brothers Andriy and Illya Lyzohub. They expanded the park and built a new manor house, and the old stone house (Kamyanytsa Lyzohub) was stylized as a small Gothic castle and converted for household needs. In their estate the brothers received the poet Taras Shevchenko, the biker Leonid Hlibov, the artist Lev Zhemchuzhnikov and other famous cultural figures of the time (monuments were erected).

In Soviet times, the manor house housed a high school (now - in a new house next door), and in another part of the manor was opened the House of Artists. Shevchenko's 600-year-old linden tree and Hlibov's romantic gazebo, in which the lyrical poem "Kruchyna" was written, have been preserved in the park.

In front of the entrance to the estate there is a monument to the former owners, art lovers and patrons Andriy and Illya Lyzohub.

Mena Zoo is the only one in Ukraine located in a small town.

Founded in 1977 by local nature lover Hennadiy Polosmak. The former police sergeant organized a zoo corner in his house, which later grew into a private zoo, and then into a national zoo.

Today, the Mena Zoo occupies an area of almost 9 hectares. 560 animals of more than 120 species live here. Visitors are most interested in primates (monkeys Vasyl and Nina), tiger, lion, brown bears, bison, Nimogau antelopes, camel, crocodiles, pythons.

Historical and cultural center-museum "Maclay's Sails" (Vitryla Maklaya) was opened in Baturyn in 2014 for the 168th anniversary of the birth of the outstanding scientist-traveler Mykola Mykluho-Maklay.

This is the third museum created by the descendants of the scientist Oleksandr and Nadiya Mykluho-Maklay.

Mykola Mykluho-Maklay himself was not directly related to Baturyn, but he was a descendant of the Zaporozhzhian Cossacks, and his patron was Count Oleksiy Tolstoy, the great-grandson of Hetman Kyrylo Rozumovsky, who spent his best years in Baturyn.

In the second half of the 19th century, Mykluho-Maklay studied the indigenous population of Southeast Asia, Australia and Oceania, wrote many works on zoology, zoogeography and physical geography.

The museum presents a gallery of portraits of Maklay and members of his family, a family coat of arms, materials from ethnographic expeditions, models of ships, statuettes of island natives, maps, and more.

In one of the rooms of the museum, there is a corner where you can try on 19th century costumes and take a picture near the ship's helm.

The Maklay Sails Museum in Baturyn is part of the hotel and restaurant complex of the same name.

The All Saints Cathedral is the main church of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine in Nizhyn, the spiritual center of the city's Greek community. Located in the territory of the "Greek Quarter" next to the Greek Church of Saint Michael.

The All Saints Church was built in 1782 by the Nizhyn Greek brotherhood on the site of an earlier wooden Greek church. It was originally made in the archaic Balkan style. At the end of the 19th century, it was partially rebuilt, the facades were supplemented with classical porticos, which gave the church features of classicism.

The Church of All Saints stands on a basement, the vault of which rests on a central pillar. In the interior, you can see a carved linden iconostasis, made by modern Nizhyn masters based on sketches by the artist Oleksandr Koshel.

The oldest religious building in Liubech is an underground temple, excavated in the 11th century by monk Antoniy Pecherskyi.

The founder and first abbot of the Kyiv-Pechersk Monastery was born in Liubech in 983. According to legend, from here he went to Palestine, received tonsure on Mount Athos, and, returning a few years later to Rus, began to found cave monasteries - in Bukovyna, Kyiv and Chernihiv region.

He went to Chernihiv after a conflict with the Kiev prince, and spent the last years of his life in his homeland - in Lyubech, where he founded his last cave monastery. Antoniy's Monastery existed until 1786, when it was closed by order of Empress Catherine II.

The Far Cave, located in the forest on the southern outskirts of the village, has been preserved in its original form.

Recently, the cave was discovered in the center of the village, next to the Polubotko tenement house (excavations are underway).

A large settlement of ancient people of the Late Paleolithic era was discovered near the village of Mezyn by Fedir Vovk, a Ukrainian scientist and associate professor of the St. Petersburg University in 1908.

Archaeologists have excavated dwellings made of mammoth bones covered with bison hides. The Mezyn settlement lot gained worldwide fame thanks to unique finds, among which were rare examples of ancient art: figures of bird women made of mammoth tusk and decorated with carved ornaments, as well as iconic bracelets. Later, the oldest musical instruments and the lunar calendar were found.

Part of the archaeological materials is stored in the Mezyn Archaeological Museum, created in 1965 on the initiative of the local historian Vasyl Kurylenko.

The museum is located on the site of an archaeological excavation in a wooden house of the 18th century.