From an Ancient Settlement to the City of Vologda

15 points2 km4 hours

This route takes you deep into the city's history, from the first settlements to the heyday of merchant Vologda. Along the way, layer after layer of the city's past is revealed: traces of fortifications, the sites of former squares, and corners with carefully preserved wooden houses and carved front gardens that tell of the everyday life and tastes of Vologda's people through the ages.

Route author

Vologda Tourism

Things to do

📜 Learn the city's history
🌆🌿 Soak up the atmosphere
🍲🎶 Local culture

Route points (15)

Panteleev House in Vologda

Point on route “From an Ancient Settlement to the City of Vologda”

Point 7

Panteleev House

🏟️ Architectural landmark • 🏛️ Museum

Historical Background

The house of the merchant Dmitry Nikolaevich Panteleev in Vologda is a cultural heritage site of federal significance. It is a two-story wooden mansion in the late Classical style with a cross-shaped attic story and a balcony. Panteleev, a merchant of the second guild, traded in haberdashery. He had 17 children, a record of sorts for that time. The family occupied the whole house until the October Revolution of 1917. After Soviet power was established, the house was nationalized and turned into communal apartments, and the Panteleev family was exiled to the Kola Peninsula. According to family tradition, Dmitry Nikolaevich died there.

Architectural Features

The mansion follows the traditions of late Classicism. The main volume is topped by a cross-shaped attic story, each of whose four sides ends in a gable with an unusual little window in the tympanum. The upper floor has molded pilasters, decorative rosettes in the arched windows and cornices over the rectangular ones. The attic story is decorated with carved balusters and twisted columns.

A New Life

In 1974 the house was listed as a cultural heritage site and placed under state protection. Since 1991 it has belonged to the Vologda State Museum-Reserve and houses one of its branches, the World of Forgotten Things museum. On the ground floor the rooms of a well-to-do townsman's home have been recreated: the drawing room, study, dining room and nursery. The study is set up as an exhibition about the writer P. V. Zasodimsky. The upper floor displays 18th–19th-century paintings from noble country estates.