3-065-657 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Sketches in Moscow, by our special artist: the Sacred Gate of the Kremlin, 1874. View of '...the Spass Vorota, or Saviour's Gate, one of the entrances to the Kremlin palatial precinct, with its picture of our Lord and a burning lamp fixed above the doorway in the gate-tower...the Kremlin, which is the palace precinct of Moscow, in the centre of the city,...is surrounded by walls from 30 ft. to 50 ft. high, and 12 ft. or 16 ft. thick, with battlements and embrasures, many towers, and five principal gates. Within this inclosure are the restored old palace of the Czars and the new palace, rebuilt after the burning of Moscow in 1812, when the Russians set fire to their noble old city because Napoleon had captured it. It is a city of picturesque and striking aspect, with its numberless towers and cupolas, its gilded bulbs, crescents, and crosses above the roofs, and the green colour of buildings, as they are painted'. The Spasskaya Tower was built in 1491 by the Italian architect Pietro Antonio Solari. From "Illustrated London News", 1874.