Staritsky quarries

From the 12th century to 1928, artisans of miners mined limestone in the quarries - “Staritsa white stone” or “Staritsa marble”. The extracted building material went to the buildings of the city of Tver , the Church of the Savior-Kamensky Monastery on Lake Kubensky (since 1550), the fortress walls of the city of Smolensk (since 1596) and to other places ^[3] . Presumably, the Staritsky quarries represented a single system with the underground passages of the Staritsky Holy Assumption Monastery ^[4] .

In 1941, weapons depots for underground workers were built here. Partial stone mining was resumed at the end of World War II (mainly for the production of lime for the needs of the local population).

In 1947, the entrances to some dungeons were blown up by the authorities. Down the Volga, near the villages of Zmeevy Gorki and Verkhny Spas, the development of stone was continued by the artels of the surrounding peasants of 6-8 people until 1953. The extracted stone was taken out by water. The development of quarries was closed, including due to the shallowing ^{[5] of the} Volga ^[3] .

Since the 1970s, unorganized tourism has developed ^[6] .

The caves are located on two banks of the Volga from the village of Molokovo downstream to the village of Nizhny Spas over a 40 km waterway. Thus, the territory of the city of Staritsa falls into this strip.

Subsystems

There are dozens of large workings. Most often they are named after toponyms located near their entrances, or they have original names ^[7] .

The entrance to the most visited cave - “Ledyanaya” (also called Nizhnetolpinskaya-1, -2 ^[4] ) is located in a ravine of 5 meters depth on the banks of the Volga in the vicinity of the villages of Chukavino and Tolpino (on the side of Tolpin). The cave is relatively convenient, since it is not the hole that leads to it, but the entrance, and you can move in the cave to its full height ^[4] .

Other well-known subsystems:

• "Trap" ^[4] (near the village of Staro-Yamskaya) ^[7] ;
• “Chanterelle” ^[8] (aka “Srednetolpinskaya-1” ^[4] );
• “Parabellum” (aka “Srednetolpinskaya-2”) ^[9] ;
• Srednetolpinskaya-2a;
• Kamenka river valley (from Staritsa 6.5 km upstream of the Volga along the right bank) ^[10] ;
• “Badger” (aka “Dyshlo Barsuchye”) ^[11] (located from Staritsa 12 km upstream of the Volga on the left bank, two entrances near the village of Fedurnovo) ^[10] ;
• “Seltsovskie caves” ^[12] (another name is “Seltsovskiye Zolomki” ^[13] ; the total length of the passages is 5 km; from Staritsa bus station is 15 minutes; it is located almost in the city, on the right bank of the Volga just below the bridge behind the Assumption Monastery ) ^{[ 10]} ;
• Verkhnechukavinskaya-1a ^[4] ;
• "Vekhnechukavinskaya-2" ^[4] ;
• "Nizhnetolpinskaya-3" ^[4] ;
• "Terraced-1" ^[4] ;
• "Fox" (near the village of Kaloshino ) ^[7] .

There are colonies of bats ^[1] .

• Guryevsky quarries (Tula region)
• Quarries near Moscow (Moscow region)
• Pyatnitsky quarries (Oryol Oblast)
• Nolkin Stone (Mari El)
• Quarries near Kaluga
• Quarries near Ryazan
• Dungeons of Nizhny Novgorod
• Dungeons of the Samara region

• Abandoned quarries in Staritsa - maps, schemes