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Kizhi Pogost
Site number:
544
Type of site: Cultural
Date: 18th-century
Date of Inscription: 1990
Location: Eurasia, Russian Federation, Karelian Autonomous S.S.R., Medvezhjegorskij Region
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Description: On one of the many islands in Lake Onega, in Karelia lies the pogost of Kizhi (i.e. the Kizhi enclosure). The site boasts some unusual constructions: two 18th-century wooden churches, and an octagonal wood clock tower, built in 1862. Carpenters created this bold visionary architecture, perpetuating an ancient model of parish space which they placed in harmony with the immediate landscape. --WHMNet paraphrase from the description at WHC Site, where additional information is available.
  Kizhi (Russian: Ки́жи) is an island on Lake Onega in the Republic of Karelia (Medvezhyegorsky District), Russia with a beautiful ensemble of wooden churches, chapels and houses. It is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Russia and a World Heritage Site. The island is about 7 km long and 0.5 km wide. It is surrounded by about 5,000 other islands, most of which are very small—some of them are about 2x2 meters, though some are as big as 35 km long. Kizhi Pogost, as the whole area is known in Russian, is an old settlement which united more than 100 villages in the 16th century. The jewel of its architecture is the 22-domed Transfiguration church (1714), with a fine baroque iconostasis. The nine-domed Intercession church was built nearby in 1764, and a belltower was added in 1874. The most impressive thing about these structures is that they were erected without any nails or other metal ties--even the joints were made from wood. A museum of Russian wooden architecture was created in Kizhi by Soviet authorities in 1960. Minor wooden structures were transported here from various parts of Karelia, notably the 14th century St. Lazarus church from the Muromsky Monastery, which is the oldest wooden church in Russia. Other notable specimens of Russian wooden architecture may be found in Kondopoga and Kem'. --Wikipedia. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.
Source: http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/544
Reference: 1. UNESCO World Heritage Center, Site Page.
 
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