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The Solovetsky Islands, the archipelago in the vicinity of Polar Circle, are often called the fairy-tale of the North. The Archipelago comprises 6 large and about 200 small island of total area 347 square km.
The inimitable natural environs serve as a foreground for numerous monuments of history and culture which embrace a huge period of time – from the 3d millennium BC to our era. Tourists and pilgrims from all over the world come here to see the mysterious Neolithic structures – piles of stones, barrows, dolmens, labyrinths, figures on the ground made of boulders lookinh like huge spirals. Specialists say these are cult and burial complexes belonging to the 2d-1st millennium BC where the ancient dwellers of the White Sea area had their rites of magic to obtain luck in fishing, where they buried their dead.
The pride of the Solovki is a grandiose and unique ensemble of military, defense, cult, civil and hydro-technical constructions scattered across several islands; each of the monuments has a value of its own, its architectural appearance being in rare harmony with nature, each of them is a result of unique interaction of man and the world around.
The core of the Solovetsky historical and cultural ensemble is the Kremlin, the embodiment of fine artistic taste and outstanding artistry of northern architects. Greatly impressive is the Refectory of the Uspenskaya (Dormition) Church (the 16th century); it is the only chamber in the ancient Russian monasteries built with a single supportive column in the middle.
The Spaso-Preobrazhensky (Transfiguration of Our Saviour) Cathedral is a grand monumental church which, according to its creators’ intension, was to strengthen spiritual and political authority of the Solovetsky Monastery, the largest cloister in the North.
The architectural ensemble of the Solovetsky historical and cultural complex is listed by UNESCO as a world cultural heritage.
Solovki are associated with the most tragic pages of the Russian latest history. Up to 1939 here there was SLON, a concentration camp of special designation of the Stalin era.
Today the remarkable monuments of the past and the nature landscapes are being preserved by the State Museum-Reserve of History, Culture and Nature.
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Monastery
