Chamber of the Palace of the Appanage Princes

A unique monument of civil architecture at the end of the XV century, it was part of the huge complex of the princely palace built in the Uglich Kremlin.

During this period, the younger brother of Grand Duke Ivan III, Andrei Bolshoy, ruled here. He made Uglich one of the leading cultural centers of Russia. They minted their own coin in the city. The famous icon painter Dionysius worked at the princely court. Correspondence and book design were conducted.

It was an exceptional event in the history of the state. After all, only Andrei's elder brother, Grand Duke Ivan III, could afford stone construction, in addition, the stone palaces of Moscow began to be built a little later than those of Uglich.

After the disgrace and death of Andrei the Great, Uglich princes and governors lived here during the 16th century, and from 1584 to 1591, Tsarevich Dimitri.

During the Polish devastation of the early 17th century, the palace was burned down. Its ruins were dismantled into bricks for the construction of a new Transfiguration Cathedral. Only the Chamber, the front and main part of the palace, miraculously survived. According to legend, the craftsmen climbed the walls of the Ward three times to beat off the bricks, but some force threw them down, and they stopped working in fear.

In the 18th century, a new roof was installed on the dilapidated building, and at the beginning of the next century, through the efforts of the Uglich merchant A.V. Kozhevnikov, it was repaired and thereby saved from destruction. A hundred years later, in 1890-1892, on the tercentenary of the death of Tsarevich Dimitri, on the initiative of the townspeople and Yaroslavl governor A.J. Fride, the Chamber was restored according to the design of architect N.V. Sultanov, and the first Uglich Museum was opened in it in June 1892.

Now the former throne Room on the top floor houses the exposition of the museum "Treasures of Ancient Uglich". It includes the best examples from a rare collection of wooden sculptures from the 16th to 19th centuries; works by silversmiths: altarpieces and pectoral crosses and icons, Eucharistic vessels, salaries for the Gospels, some of which are contributions from royalty, members of their families, Moscow princes, and the highest clergy; works of facial and ornamental embroidery. The exhibition features luxurious icon frames sewn with pearls, beads and glass beads, made in the workshop of the Epiphany Convent. And the founder of women's needlework in Uglich in the XVI century was the mother of Tsarevich Dimitri, Maria Nagaya, who was herself a skilled embroiderer. Forced to leave Moscow and move to Uglich, she, as was then customary, took her craftsmen with her. Here, in their new place, they continued to work on decorating the Kremlin and parish churches of Uglich with sewn swaddling clothes.

On the lower floor of the Chamber there is an exhibition reflecting the medieval and Peter the Great period of the history of Uglich. Among the historical relics presented here, the hammered shop signs of Uglich artisans, exemplary measures of bulk volume and weight, as well as the original coat of arms of Uglich are extremely rare. The exhibition also features very interesting weapons of the XVI- XVII centuries, and items of folk costume: a kokoshnik, a kichka, soul jackets, a shugan, golits, morocco boots, sundresses.