Attractions of Ternopil region

The cave monastery in Monastyrok was founded in the 9th-10th centuries by hermit monks on the site of an ancient Slavic pagan temple.

It is noticeable that human hands put effort into the arrangement of the natural cave. A huge stone overhanging the entrance to the cave is supported by several columns made of flat stone blocks.

In the temple there is an image of Jesus, which, according to legend, came to the monks in the form of a play of light and shadow. They drew this image with paint and got what we can see now.

An ancient altar is also preserved in the cave, which is still used for its intended purpose. It is decorated with icons and lamps. Archeologically, it has been proven that the temple was lined with wood, had a wooden floor and may have been heated.

At the end of the 17th century, the temple was destroyed by fire, and in the 18th century it was destroyed by an earthquake.

Back in the 16th century, the Basilian Monastery was founded nearby. The complex includes the Ascension Church (XVI-XVIII centuries) and monastery cells. Near the entrance to the cave lies a stone with a cross carved on it, which is called the "stone of Dovbush". Perhaps it was a pagan altar.

The early Christian cave temple near the village of Stinka in Ternopil region belongs to the 12th-13th centuries.

The natural cave of karst origin is located on the left bank of the Dniester at an altitude of 15 meters. On the second level, an artificial room measuring approximately 8 by 9 meters was cut out of the travertine rock. In the center of the eastern wall is an altar with a solar sign in the form of a swastika. Crosses and other Christian and pagan symbols are depicted on the walls.

Probably, the temple existed even in pagan times, and with the advent of Christianity it became a cave monastery.

The Chortkiv Museum Residence (formerly the Chortkiv Local Lore Museum) has been located in the building of the former children's library, not far from the Chortkiv Castle, since 2022.

The residence was founded in 1976 as a non-profit local history museum. Initially, the institution was located in a building from the first half of the 20th century on Zelena Street. The museum's main collections include over 10,000 items.

The Chortkiv Museum Residence features exhibitions dedicated to different periods of the region's history. In particular, various archaeological materials tell about the life of people in ancient times, about ancient crafts and industries.

The history of the Ukrainian army and the national liberation struggle in the Chortkiv region is highlighted. A separate exhibition tells about the consequences of the Bolshevik terror and the expulsion of the Nazi occupiers.

The nature department of the museum displays the flora and fauna of the region.

The Church of the Resurrection of Christ was built in Zbarazh in the 18th century at the expense of the burgher Hryhoriy Hymonyuk, the construction was completed by Count Mykola Potoski.

Made in the Ukrainian Baroque style. It was preserved in a slightly modified form as a result of large-scale restoration works in 1879-1933.

Today, the Church of the Resurrection of Christ is active and belongs to the Greek-Catholic community of the city.

The remains of the fortification of Danyliv Hrad with a stone church of the 13th century are located on the steep Stizhok (or Trinity) mountain on the eastern outskirts of the village of Stizhok.

The city was surrounded by three concentric circles of earthen embankments, fortified with wooden and later stone walls. The Trinity Church, located in the center, also performed defensive functions. According to legend, the fortress was founded in 1201 by Prince Roman Mstyslavych, who named it in honor of his son Danylo, but according to other sources, the city existed even earlier - from the 10th century.

In 1240, Danyliv Castle was among the three Volyn cities that Khan Baty was able to attack. However, in 1261, according to the agreement between the Volyn prince Vasylko Romanovych and the khan's jailer Burunday, the fortress was demolished, and since then it has not been restored.

Only the Trinity Church has survived. In 1551, it was reconstructed. Saint Iov of Pochayevskyi gave her special patronage. On the eastern side of the mountain, the remains of an ancient hermit cave monastery of the 10th-12th centuries, contemporaneous with the princely castle, have been preserved.

The Denysiv Museum of Local Lore was opened in the village of Denysiv in 1967 on the initiative of the writer and prominent public figure Ivanna Blazhkevych, who donated a large number of folk embroideries, household items, paintings and a collection of ancient coins to the museum.

From the beginning, the exhibition was located in the building of the Denysiv School. In 1984, the museum was moved to the house of the prominent musical and cultural and public figure of Galicia, Father Yosyp Vitoshynsky.

In 1989, the Denysiv Museum of Local Lore was granted the status of a folk museum, and in 1993 - a state museum.

Over seven thousand exhibits of the museum are located in nine exhibition halls. These are objects of decorative and applied art, valuable documents, rare books and manuscripts, a collection of numismatics, including Ukrainian jubilee and commemorative coins, old and valuable photographs, a considerable number of tangible objects, works of fine art, archaeological finds, technical equipment, etc.

All of them are thematically divided into separate expositions: "For the Cossack family - no translation", "Interior of a peasant hut of the late 19th century", "The First World War", "Ukrainian Sich Riflemen", "Ukrainian People's Republic", "Activities of the OUN-UPA", "The Second World War", "Diorama: Ukraine rebelled on June 30, 1941", "UGD UNA", "Repressed and rehabilitated", "Literary and artistic Denysiv", "Post-war decades: the establishment of a collective farm, the evacuation of people from Lemko, Kholm, Posiannia, Poliashsha", "Education. Culture", "Political parties and cultural and public organizations", "Our glorious diaspora".

The local history museum has its branch - the museum-house of the writer Ivanna Blazhkevych.

In 2002, the Denysiv Museum of Local Lore was recognized as the best rural museum in the Ternopil region.

The Dniester Canyon National Nature Park was created in 2010 to preserve valuable natural and historical-cultural complexes and objects of the forest-steppe zone in the middle course of the Dniester River.

It occupies an area of ​​10,000 hectares within the Chortkiv district of the Ternopil region. There are layers (walls) containing ancient fossilized remains of flora and fauna, which are about 500 million years old.

The pride of the Dniester Canyon National Nature Park is travertine rocks with caves and grottoes. About 50 large and small caves are known, including some of the longest in the world: Ozerna (105 kilometers), Optymistychna (230 kilometers).

A large number of rare plants, animals, and birds can be found on steep rocky shores and picturesque islands. Relict forest, rocky and alkaline-steppe vegetation has been preserved.

Popular tourist routes to the Dzhurynskyi Waterfall and in the "Hlody" tract to the "Farinnikova Krynytsia" spring.

The Museum of the History of Education "Volyn Athens" was established in Kremenets in 2024. It is a structural unit of the Taras Shevchenko Kremenets Regional Humanitarian and Pedagogical Academy.

The museum includes: "Museum of the History of Education", "Scientific Laboratory "Creativity of Ulas Samchuk and Borys Kharchuk: Artistic Chronicle of the 20th Century", "Mazurok Educational and Methodological Center", "European Linguistic and Didactic Educational Hub for the Study of Languages ​​and Cultures", "Gallery of the Founding Fathers of Educational Institutions of the City of Kremenets", etc.

The museum exposition reflects all stages of the history of the Academy.

The Kremenets Orthodox Epiphany Monastery, founded in the 17th century, now occupies the premises of the Catholic monastery of the reformers built in 1760 by Stanislav Potocki.

It was at the Epiphany Monastery in 1633 that the first school, printing house and hospital were created in Kremenets. The monastery received the blessing of Metropolitan Petro Mohyla. In 1638, the brother's printing house published one of the first Church Slavonic textbooks - "Kremenetska Grammar". Later, the school was transformed into a Jesuit collegium, and the Epiphany Monastery received its current premises after the liquidation of the Greek-Catholic Union in 1832.

At the beginning of the 20th century, a three-tier bell tower was erected over the Holy Gate. The fraternal Saint Nicholas church-parochial school operated at the monastery. In 1959, the monastery was closed, and in 1990 it was revived as the Epiphany Convent of the Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate.

"Heritage" ethno-gallery was founded in Ternopil in 2016 by the family of entrepreneurs Taras and Iryna Demkur on the basis of their private collection of authentic Ukrainian national clothing, embroidered towels, adornment and household items.

The gallery space is located in the "Atrium" business center in the city center. About 5,000 rare examples of applied folk art from all over Ukraine are presented here. These are ethnic Ukrainian costumes, ancient women's adornment, collectible towels, Cossack and painted household icons, clay products, rare documents and much more. There are also artifacts of Trypillya culture, the Cossack era and the liberation movement of Ukraine.

The special pride of the "Heritage" ethno-gallery is the collection of Borshchiv embroidery, embroidered with black threads on white canvas. In 2020, Borshchiv folk embroidery was included in the National List of Intangible Cultural Heritage.

It is possible to visit the gallery with a tour.

The Church of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross of the Lord in Kremenets is located opposite the Epiphany Monastery.

It was built in the 19th century without a single nail in the so-called "Volyn" style. The fire of 1942 almost completely destroyed all the wooden houses and shrines of Kremenets. Only the Orthodox Church of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross survived.

The Church of the Ascension belongs to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.

The Church of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross in the village of Khmelyska was founded in 1897 as the Catholic chapel of Saint Yakub.

The temple was built by the Polish community of the village on land allocated by the landowner Rozenstok. In 1905, a parish house was built nearby. The chapel was damaged during the 1911 earthquake.

In 1931-1938, a new stone church of the Ascension was built according to the project of the architect Yan Karol Sas-Zubzhytskyi, the author of the Dominican Church in Chortkiv. Neo-Gothic influence is visible in the architecture.

In Soviet times, the church was closed and used as a warehouse.

Now the Church of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross has been revived.

The wooden church of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross of the Lord is located in the southern part of the city of Kopychyntsi, in the former suburb of Kutets.

It was built in 1630 (legend attributes the construction to Ukrainian Cossacks, although the city was under the control of the troops of Bohdan Khmelnytsky a little later - in 1648-1652).

There is a small wooden bell tower nearby.

God's Mountain is called Ostanets Mountain, which is located near the village of Velyki Berezhtsi near Kremenets on the territory of the Medobory Reserve, but is separated from the Kremenets Ridge by the Ikva River.

The height of the God's mountain above sea level is 366 meters. The mountain is covered with a forest with abundant vegetation. A path of health leads to the mountain, where there are several shrines. Under the very top is the Life-giving Spring, transformed into a well.

According to legend, in ancient times there was a monastery on this place. When the Tatars covered it, and the defenders of the shrine began to suffer from thirst, an image of the Mother of God appeared to them, and a healing spring gushed out of the ground at this place. Near the source is the hermit monk's cave with healing clay, over which the wooden church of the Icon of the Mother of God is built.

At the highest point of God's Mountain, on the site of the chapel with the footprint of the Mother of God, which was destroyed in the 1950s, a wooden church of the Holy Trinity and a platform for viewing the surroundings were recently built. Under the temple there is a system of caves of the 13th century monastic Siktus.

A 400-year-old linden tree (Golden Linden) growing near the road to the Zolotyi Potik is a witness to a historical event - the signing of the Buchach Peace Treaty with Turkey in 1672, which was humiliating for Poland.

The day before, the Turkish army captured Buchach and began to threaten the central regions of Poland from here. According to the peace treaty, the eastern part of Ukraine with Podillya was declared an independent state under the protectorate of Turkey.