Literary Pages of Tver

16 points4 km4 hours

Join us for a walk along the embankment and the central streets, and recall how great and forgotten poets, prose writers, and publishers of other centuries saw this beauty: Alexander Pushkin, Alexander Ostrovsky, Ivan Turgenev, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and many others. They declared their love for “dear,” “beautiful” Tver and dedicated their finest lines to it.

Route author

Tver Tourist Information Center

Things to do

📚🎬 Recall films and books
📜 Learn the city's history

Route points (16)

Magistracy Building in Tver

Point on route “Literary Pages of Tver”

Point 9

Magistracy Building

🏟️ Architectural landmark • 📜 Historic site

Historical Background

From 1778 to 1783 I. A. Krylov had to go into service at the Tver magistracy. When the future fabulist was 10 years old, his father died, leaving the family without means. Krylov's mother petitioned for a pension, submitting requests and asking that her husband's “irreproachable” service be taken into account, but all in vain. Given the family's desperate situation, Krylov, while still a child, was placed as a “sub-clerk” in the same governorate magistracy where his father had served.

Architectural Features

The magistracy building, together with the House of the Nobility, a school, and a salt store, formed a single complex with identical massing and facades. All of them were designed by M. F. Kazakov. The magistracy was built in forms transitional from Baroque to Classicism. Its construction was completed in 1774.

What the Magistracy Housed

In 1799 the building housed the Assembly of the Nobility, then in 1811 the military department, and in the second half of the 19th century the city council, the city bank, the public library, and other institutions. In 1811 the former magistracy building was handed over to the 8th Moscow Grenadier Regiment, and its hall was turned into the regimental church. Since 1958 it has been home to the Young Spectators' Theater.