Attractions of Ternopil region

The Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Ternopil is an architectural monument of the late European Baroque.

A large Roman Catholic church with two elegant towers was built in 1749-1779 in the historic center of the city according to the project of the architect Avhusta Moschynskyi (according to other sources - Yan de Vitte) on the site of an ancient Rus Orthodox church. At the same time, a two-story cell block of the Dominican monastery was built. Between them is the so-called "Italian courtyard", currently not accessible to tourists.

The Dominican church was badly damaged during the Second World War and was restored in 1953. It was used as a picture gallery of the Ternopil Regional History Museum, and the archive is still located in the monastery building.

In 1992, the building was restored and handed over to the Greek Catholic community. The interiors were not preserved.

A monument to Metropolitan Yosyp Slipiy was erected next to the cathedral, and a monument to Prince Danylo Halytsky in the square opposite the church.

The historical and memorial museum of political prisoners is located in Ternopil in the basement cells of the temporary detention center of the former Ternopil detention center of the NKVD-KGB department.

The exposition tells about the struggle of Ukrainian nationalists against the communist regime, the repressive methods of the Soviet secret services and the lives of convicts in the Gulag camps.

Prison conditions were reproduced in 28 pre-trial detention cells. Visitors can see the dungeon, instruments of torture, clothing and household items of prisoners. Models of the Siberian concentration camp and a "calf" car were also exhibited.

The Castle Church of the Ascension of the Lord was built in 1530 as the family tomb of the Vyshnevetsky princes. Ivan Vyshnevetskyi, Dmytro Bayda's father, was involved in its construction.

About 20 representatives of the Vyshnevetskyi family are buried in the church, including the Ovruch mayor Mykhaylo Vyshnevetskyi and his wife Raina Mohylyanka.

The temple has the shape of a ship and is distinguished by excellent acoustics. Inside are religious figures made by folk craftsmen.

In 1872-1873, major repairs were carried out, new bells were cast, and the iconostasis was gilded. Two icons of the Holy Mother of God, made in the ancient Rus and Byzantine styles, were donated by princes Kostyantyn and Mykhaylo-Servatsiy Vyshnevetskyi.

During the struggle against Orthodoxy, the Ascension Church remained the only Orthodox church in the entire district. In 1963, the church was closed and looted, only 26 years later it was returned to the Orthodox Church.

Currently, the Church of the Ascension of the Lord belongs to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.

The Roman Catholic Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary was built in Yahilnytsia by the Polish magnates Lyantskoronsky.

The stone building in the Baroque style was erected in the 19th century on the site of the first wooden church, founded in 1478. The facade is decorated with the coat of arms of the Lyantskoronsky family.

In Soviet times, a gym was located here, then a warehouse.

In 1992, with the assistance of the Karolina Lyantskoronska Foundation, the church was revived.

The Empire-style palace with an original colonnade and wing was built in Zalishchyky in 1831 by Baron Ignatius Brunytskyi on the site of the Ponyatovsky hunting castle.

Austrian Emperor Franz II stayed here during his trip to Galicia. A 5-hectare park was also laid out, where more than 400 trees of 40 species and forms are growing.

The palace has been preserved to this day, until recently it housed the department of the district hospital.

Zalishchyky Park is part of the protected zone of the regional landscape park "Dniester Canyon"

The huge church of Saint Anthony, which is the central building of the Bernardine monastery, is clearly visible from the castle hill.

The monastery was founded by Prince Yuriy Zbarazky in 1627, the construction of the original complex was completed in the 1650s by the efforts of Yanush Korybut-Vyshnivetskyi and his wife Yevheniya. In its current Renaissance-baroque form, the church was rebuilt in 1723-1755 at the expense of the Kyiv voivode Yuzef Potoski (architect Yan Hants). A philosophical school, then a gymnasium, and a hospital worked at the monastery.

During Soviet times, the complex was abandoned, but in 1990 it was returned to the Bernardine family. Restoration is underway, services are held.

The interior contains altars with sculptures by Anton Osinsky (18th century), fragments of frescoes from the 18th-19th centuries.

The elegant palace of the Badeni count family was built in Koropets at the beginning of the 19th century.

It was originally made in a classical style.

In 1906, Count Stanislav Badeni rebuilt the old palace in the Viennese Renaissance style. The facade of the house is decorated with three risalites and porticoes. The middle part of the palace on the first floor was decorated with frescoes. The pediment is decorated with a decorative relief. In the central part of the palace there was a vestibule, and on the side of the garden - a large hall for balls. The lobby was surrounded on three sides by a gallery, from which an oak staircase descended. There was a black marble fireplace in the hall. The upper part of the walls was covered with three rows of portraits of Polish kings. To the left of the royal hall was the dining room, and behind it - the library. In the ballroom stood a marble table with carvings in the style of Louis XVI. The palace was surrounded by a landscape park.

During the First World War, the palace was damaged, but the Badeni managed to restore it before the Second World War.

Currently, a children's boarding school is located on the territory of the manor, and a music school is located in the premises of the palace.

Stone Kremenets Castle on the site of an ancient Rus settlement was built in the 12th century on the top of Castle Hill (Bona). In the 15th century, by order of the Grand Duke Vitovt of Lithuania, it was strengthened with defensive walls.

The prosperity of Kremenets Castle is connected with the name of the Neapolitan princess Bona Sfortsa, the wife of Polish King Syhizmund I, who gave her Kremenets in 1536. A relative of the Roman emperor, Bona strengthened the castle, which at that time had three towers, high walls and a garrison armed with cannons. The castle yard housed barracks, a powder cellar, a siege well (80 meters) and a palace, which Bona turned into a luxurious residence. Although there is no reliable information about the stay of Queen Bona in Kremenets, since those times there have been legends about her beauty, temperament, experience in intrigues, but also about her extreme cruelty.

In 1648, the Kremenets Castle was stormed and completely destroyed by the Cossack detachment of Maksym Kryvonos. A tower with a gate and defensive walls have been preserved.

Excursions are conducted by employees of the Kremenets-Pochaiv state historical and cultural reserve.

The open-air museum of the Camp UPA Volyn-South was founded in 1992 in the Dihtyarnya tract near Antonivtsi, where the headquarters of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army military district operated in 1942-1944.

Under the pseudonym "Kruk", which became famous for a number of successful combat operations against the Nazis. The camp withstood the blow of General von dem Bach's SS division with the support of the air force in 1943. In 1944, the largest battle in the history of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army took place in the Hurba tract, with 5,000 insurgents In memory of these events on the territory of the Antonivtsi camp the UPA memorial was created, the objects of the camp were recreated: the headquarters of the military district "Volyn-South", summer class officers' schools, a camp chapel near the spring, a bunker-hideout.

In 2008, the regional program for the creation of the spiritual and cultural museum complex "Antonivetska Respublika" was approved. Reconstruction of the open-air museum "Camp UPA Volyn-South" has started.

Borshchiv's most prominent building is located in the center, in the pedestrian zone.

The Ukrainian society "Rusky People's House" was founded in 1908 on the initiative of lawyer Mykhaylo Dorundyak and professor Mykhaylo Hrushevsky. At the same time, a building with two towers in the form of domes, typical of Rus Orthodox architecture, was built at the expense of the public according to the project of Galician architect Vasyl Nahirny.

The "Rusky People's House" was the center of development of ancient Ukrainian (Rusyn, not Russian) culture, which is reflected in the name. An honorary member of the "People's House" was Mykhaylo Hrushevsky, who often visited Borshchiv and monitored the construction.

Currently, it is also the cultural center of the city - there is a museum of local history, as well as a museum of Taras Shevchenko with an art gallery - the first in the western part of Ukraine. In particular, the exhibition presents the famous borscht embroidery in black and white.

The Dominican Church of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary and Saint Stanislav in Chortkiv was built in the Neo-Gothic style at the beginning of the 20th century according to the project of the architect Yan Karol Sas-Zubzhytskyi on the site of the old cathedral, built in 1610 by the master of the city Stanislav Holsky as his burial place.

Initially, the church was part of the defensive Dominican monastery complex, surrounded by walls with towers and loopholes, but before the First World War it was completely rebuilt (a fragment of the defensive wall remained on the back side).

The Dominican church in Chortkiv is considered one of the most beautiful neo-Gothic buildings in Ukraine. The architect Sas-Zubzhytskyi, being a supporter of historical stylizations, vividly embodied in this church the characteristic features of his own architectural style of "Visualian Gothic". The lower part of the church is made of stone, and the upper part is made of red brick. The figures of the saints were made by sculptors Cheslav Stovp and Diaman Stankevych.

Since 2009, the temple has been a sanctuary (holy repository) of the icon of the Mother of God of the Holy Rosary (Theotokos of Chortkiv).

During the Soviet rule, the church was closed, but in 1989 it was returned to the Dominicans.

The sculptural composition, crowned with the figure of Saint John Nepomuk, was installed in Buchach at the crossroads of the roads to Ternopil and Chortkiv in 1750.

It was one of the early works of the outstanding sculptor Ivan Pinzel. Prague priest John Nepomuk was martyred in 1393, refusing to reveal the secret of the confession of the wife of Emperor Wenceslas IV of Luxembourg. The cult of the saint was widespread in the 18th century. Ian Nepomuk's roadside sculpture was ordered by Count Mykola Pototskyi to Pinzel, as evidenced by Pototskyi's "Pilyava" coat of arms on the pedestal.

During the Soviet era, the sculpture was destroyed. Restored in 2007 in the former place (now the road fork is located a little higher), the author of the copy is Roman Vilhushynskyi.

The Verteba gypsum cave in Bilche-Zolote is one of the largest in Europe. The length of the underground passages is 7820 meters.

The cave consists of wide galleries separated by narrow bridges. The walls are smooth and dark, on the vaults there are carbonate formations in the form of crusts, less often - small stalactites. The average annual temperature in the cave is 9-10 degrees with a relative humidity of 92-100%.

In the V-IV millennium BC, the Verteba cave was used by people as a shelter in case of danger.

In the 19th century, when these lands belonged to the Sapehy princes, more than 300 whole ceramic jugs and a huge number of figurines, sherds, stone and bone tools belonging to the Trypillya culture were found in the cave. Most of them settled in various Polish museums, but some items can be seen in the Borshchiv Museum of Local Lore.

A cave-museum of Trypillya culture has been opened in Verteba, where a collection of sculptures and ceramics in the Trypillya style is exhibited.

A luxurious palace in the style of classicism with elements of the French Renaissance was built in Vyshnivets by the last of the Vyshnevetsky family, the great Polish tycoon Mykhaylo Servatsiy.

Ukrainian, Polish and French architects worked on the construction for 30 years. The palace is based on the foundations of the medieval Vyshnivets Castle, which has been repeatedly rebuilt and expanded since the 17th century.

The Vyshnevetsky Palace consists of several volumes, united during the reconstruction at the end of the 18th century into a symmetrical U-shaped composition with axial and corner risalites. On the first floor, there was an 80-meter-long hall of mirrors - an exact copy of the Hall of Mirrors of Versailles, the main hall was decorated with white ceramic tiles with a blue pattern. 3 cascades of gardens descended from the palace to the river.

In 1744, the estate passed to the Mnisheks, relatives of the Vyshnevetskys. They turned the Vyshnevetsky Palace into a first-class tycoon's residence in the late Rococo style with a magnificent art gallery. The palace was considered the most luxurious in Volyn. Honoré de Balzac, who visited Vyshnivets in 1848, called it "small Versailles".

The last owners took little care of the monument, and it was especially damaged during the Second World War. Restored in 1950, but without interior decoration. Various institutions were located here.

Today it is a branch of the "Castles of Ternopillya" nature reserve. Since 2005, a complete reconstruction has been carried out, an exhibition is already placed in the restored halls, and excursions are held.

Ternopil Castle was founded in 1540 by the Grand Crown Hetman Yan Tarnovskyi on the site of the ancient Rus settlement of Sopilche (Topilche) to defend the Polish borders from the Tatars.

In the 17th century, the Grand Crown Chancellor Tomash Zamoyskyi significantly expanded the fortifications, but in the following years they were repeatedly destroyed. In particular, the castle was almost completely dismantled by the Turks after the capture of the city in 1672.

At the beginning of the 19th century, Count Frantsishek Korytovskyi built a palace in its place, for which the surviving fortifications, towers and gates were demolished, and the building was surrounded by an ordinary fence. Some castle elements have been preserved.

During the First World War, the palace was burned and was in ruins for a long time. Renovated in 1951, it houses exhibition halls and a training and sports center.

From the street the building looks inconspicuous, but from the side of the lake its fortification character is well visible.

The "Museum of the City of Ternopil" was opened in the dungeons of the castle.