Chudov Monastery

General view of the Chudov Monastery in 1883.

The Chudov Monastery (also known as Alexius' Archangel Michael Monastery) was founded in the Kremlin in 1358 by metropolitan Alexius.

The construction of the monastery together with the cathedral was finished in 1365. The cathedral was replaced with a new one in 1431 and then once again in 1501-1503. It was traditionally used for baptising the royal children, including future tsars Feodor I, Aleksey I and Peter the Great.

The monastery's abbot was considered the first among the hegumens of all the Russian monasteries until 1561. Alongside Simonov Monastery and Troitse-Sergiyeva Lavra, the Chudov Monastery was the biggest center of the Muscovite book culture and learning. Prominent monks of the monastery, who dedicated their lives to translating and correcting ecclesiastic books, include Maksim Grek, Yepifany Slavinetsky and Karion Istomin. Patriarch Hermogenes was starved to death by the Roman Catholics in the monastery vaults in 1612. The Time of Troubles over, they opened the Greek-Latin School with support from Patriarch Philaret. In 1744-1833, the cloister accommodated the Moscow Ecclesiastic Consistory.

As the time went by, new churches were added to the monastery complex. These included the Church of St Alexius the Metropolitan and the Church of Annunciation (both built in 1680) and the Church of Saint Andrew (1887). In 1918, the Chudov Monastery was closed down. All of its structures were dismantled in 1929. The Soviets erected the Red Commanders School, named after the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and built on the spot of the Chudov Monastery and the nearby Ascension Convent. All of the monastery's manuscripts of 11th-18th centuries were transferred to the State Historical Museum.