Museum-memorial complex of the museum-reserve "Kulikovo Field" in Monastyrshchino

Monastyrshchino village is one of the historical places of Kulikovo Field. According to a legend, Russian soldiers killed in the Battle of Kulikovo were buried at this site. The confluence of the Nepryadva and Don Rivers is situated just 1 kilometer from the temple-monument. The legend says that Russian soldiers crossed this place just before the battle. In the vicinity of Monastyrshchino village there is the Wood of Green Oaks, a legendary forest, where the Ambush Regiment of Russian warriors who decided the outcome of the battle was biding its time. In the Wood of Green Oaks there is a big white cross that stands to mark the location of the Ambush Regiment. The memorial cross also marks the confluence of the rivers Don and Nepryadva that is about 600 meters away from the museum complex. It was that geographical landmark which a chronicler pointed out narrating about the Battle of Kulikovo. The Memorial in the village of Monastyrshchino is composed of the Museum of the Battle of Kulikovo, the temple of Nativity of the Virgin Mary, the monument to Dmitry Donskoy, and the Unity and Memory Alley. Nowadays, the Museum of the Battle of Kulikovo is the biggest museum devoted to a medieval battle in Russia where the exposition “The Great Origin of Russia” is located. It was opened on June 11, 2005 on the eve of the Russian Independence Day in the year of the 625th anniversary of the Battle of Kulikovo. The name for the exposition is very symbolic. The Battle of Kulikovo had started the unification of Russian princedoms under the leadership of Moscow. According to L. N. Gumilev ‘Russians went to the Kulikovo field as citizens of various principalities and returned as a united Russian nation…It was the beginning of their awareness of themselves as a single nation’.