Address: Nizhny Novgorod Kremlin, between Ivanovskaya and North towers
Coordinates: 56 ° 19'43.4 "N 43 ° 59'56.5" E
Content:
Brief history and description
The Clock Tower rises above the steep of the Volga bank. The fortress wall, adjacent to the tower, descends in huge ledges along the slope of the Kremlin hill. The inclined brick laying as if repeats the relief of the area, giving this section of the Kremlin a special picturesqueness.
Located at the highest point of the fortress, The clock tower served as the main guard post and was probably the center of command of the fortress garrison... The Nizhny Novgorod ethnographer Nikolai Khramtsovsky can find an explanation for the name of the tower: in the 16th century, at the expense of the sovereign's funds, the main city clock and alarm bells were installed on the structure, the ringing of which called the defenders of the citadel to defense.
View of the tower from Kremlin Boulevard
The clock mechanism was located at the top of the tower, inside a wooden clock hut, made in the form of a pentahedral frame. In accordance with the daily count of Ancient Russia, the dial had 17 divisions, according to the number of hours of the longest summer day.
The day and night hours were counted separately: the first hour of sunrise marked the first hour of the day, and the hour of sunshine marked the first hour of the night.
View from the Ivanovskaya tower
In the 18th century, after reconstruction, the clockwork began to beat off a fraction of an hour, as evidenced by the inventory of 1703, made by the Nizhny Novgorod governor. A specially trained "watchmaker" served at the tower, who monitored the accuracy of the clock. From the watchtower of the Clock Tower, they watched the approach of the enemy along the Volga and overland. The fortification did not have gun mounts and cannons, but gunpowder and food supplies were kept in the tower cellar. During a fire in 1807, the Clock Tower lost its stone vaults, and through cracks appeared on the walls. In 1954, restorers revived the structure from the ashes, restoring the vaults, battlements, fragments of damaged masonry and a wooden setting.
View of the tower from the side of the Eternal Flame
During the Great Patriotic War, anti-aircraft machine guns, which served as air defense, were on the upper platform of the Clock Tower. Nizhny Novgorod. Since the 1970s, the tower has housed post # 1 at the eternal flame, where in Soviet times schoolchildren-Komsomol members carried the guard of honor.
