Museums. Monuments. Well-know Figures

14/03/2013 11:03

Culture establishment «Brest Museum of Regional Studies»
(224646, Brest, K. Marksa Str., 60).

Director of the museum: Novikova Taisia Nikolayevna, honored culture worker of the Republic of Belarus. Tel. +375 162 23-31-00, 23-08-10.

Brest Museum of Regional Studies operates since 1950 and is the largest museum of the region. The first constant exposition of the museum was opened on 22nd June, 1957. At present about 160 thousand museum objects of the basic fund and more than 54 thousand of the science-subsidiary funds are kept in the museum. There are unique collections among fund collections: the collection of customs earnings, ethnographical, archaeological, numismatic collections, hand-written and ancient published books, treasures, found in excavations time etc. Rarity are kept not only in funds but are also presented in expositions.

Numismatic collection has more than 14 thousand objects. Treasures, found on the territory of the Brest region, are of special interest. In 1974 during works in the village Lyschitsy of the Brest district is found the treasure of antique coins, among them Roman dinar, belonging to the Іst-ІІnd centuries of our era. Among awards is the award of Saint Apostle Andrey Pervozvannyj. These award is the oldest of Russian awards, was the highest award in the tsarist Russia. The motto of the award is «For faith and fidelity».

Ethnographic collection counts more than 2 thousand objects. All local regimes of traditional clothes, prevailing on the territory of the Brest region at the end of ХІХth century and at the beginning of XXth century, are presented here. Kobrin and Malorita districts had unique elements of a costume, a cut; here have been used rich ornamental fabrics, headdresses. Interesting are objects of pottery, especially notable is the black-glossy ceramic of A. Tokarevskiy.

Brest museum of regional studies has 5 branches.

In 1960 was opened the first branch - "Kamenets Tower". This is a unique monument of the defense architecture at the end of ХІІІth century. According to the Ipatyevskiy chronicle the Kamenets tower is built between 1276 and 1288 by the architect Oleksa on the river Lesnaya near Kamenets. Now the tower has restored and work under creation of exposition is continuing till opening in September, 2005 to the republican holiday of the Belarusian written language.

The archaeological museum "Berestye" is the unique museum of medieval east-Slavic city in Europe. The museum was opened on 2nd March, 1982. It is located on the territory of the Volynsk fortification of the Brest fortress, on the place where the city arose. Basis for museum’s creation was constructions of XIIIth century, opened in 1968-1981 by archeologists of the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Belarus. The main exhibit of the museum is the archeological excavation by the area of 1000 m2.

At a depth of 4 meters is placed a part of handicraft block of XІІІth century - 30 inhabited and economic constructions and two streets. Two inhabited constructions were kept on 12 logs that is a big rarity in the Slavic archeology. The exposition is located in 14 halls of museum pavilion. The archeological finds telling about life of Berestye inhabitants are exhibited. Among unique finds in halls are a comb beginning of XІІІth century with graven letters of Cyrillic alphabet, a metallic shank for drawing letters, a diploma is a wooden cerate small board plate for writing, book fasteners.

A branch "Saved Artistic Valuables" is opened on 4th February, 1989. The museum was placed in 1987 in a restored building that is a monument of architecture beginning of XXth century. The building is constructed in 1925-1927 on the project of polish architect J. Lisetskiy in so-called «national style», united features of the Renaissance, Baroque, Classicism and Modern in the Polish variant. About 300 works of art and objects of antiques, confiscated by workers of the Brest customs in time of attempt of illegal export abroad, are represented on the exposition. The most spacious in this unusual assembly is the collection of icons. The earliest icons are dated by XVIth century. The museum collection counts about 500 icons in silver frameworks.

Museum of the City History is located in one building-monument of architecture beginning of XXth century and constructed also on the project of polish architect J. Lisetskiy. This museum is opened in 25th July, 1998. Among exhibits of the museum of special interest are: a fitting board and a casket with the coins, designed in the foundation of the first building of Brest - Lithuanian fortress on 1st June, 1836 and found in 1953 on the territory of the Fortress, a Brest hours made in 1767 by watchmaker Johan Gottfried Schmidt; an extract from master’s book of Brest-Lithuanian (1638) and a map of Novogrudskiy, Podlyashskiy and Brest - Lithuanian Voevodships, published in Venice in 1771.

Artistic Museum was opened on 17th May, 2002 in the southern part of a defensive caserne of Brest Fortress. Works of painters and masters of decorative-applied art - natives of the Brest region and living in Brest are exhibited there. In 2002 the album - catalogue «Painters of the Brest region » was published, which prepared for publication by the Brest Regional Organization of Public Association «Belarusian Union of Painters».

Annually Brest Museum of Regional Studies and its branches accepts more than 300 thousand visitors, organizes up to 25 new exhibitions, carries out more than 4 thousand excursions, and also museum and musical evenings, Days of Regional Studies, organizes traveling museums.

The museum is open daily, from 10-00 to 18-00. Free days: Sunday, Monday. The last Wednesday each month is the day of free visiting.

Except for the Brest Museum of Regional Studies, there are 10 state museums in the region:

Baranovichi Museum of Local Studies:
225320, Baranovichi, Sovietskaya St., 72. tel.: +375 163 42 11 00;
Bereza Museum of Local Studies:
225210, Bereza, Lenina St., 67. tel.: +375 1643 2 27 71;
Gantsevichi Museum of Local Studies:
225440, Gantsevichi, Oktyabrskaya Str., 2;
Museum of People’s Creativity “Bezdezh Apron”. tel.: +375 1644 7 49 99,
225848, Drogichin District, v. Bezdezh, Pionerskaya Str., 9;
Ivatsevichi Historical Museum of Local Studies:
225250, Ivatsevichi, Dzerzhinskiy Str., 18;
Kobrin A.V.Suvorov Military and Historical Museum:
225860, Kobrin, Suvorova Str., 16. tel.: +375 1642 2 37 94;
Luninets Museum of Local Studies:
225650, Luninets, Sovietskaya Str., 16. tel.: +375 1647 2 19 97;
Pruzhany Museum-Palace:
225140, Pruzhany, Sovietskaya Str., 52. Contact tel. numbers: +375 1632 2 03 06;
Stolin Museum of Local Studies:
225510, Stolin, the Park “Mankovichi”. tel.: +375 1655 2 43 67;
Motol’s Museum of People’s Art:
225822, Brest region, Ivanovo district, v. Motol. tel.: +375 165 22 87 51.

In 2004 in a tract Merechevschina of Ivatsevichi district is reestablished the House-Farmstead of Tadeush Kostyushko. The project was worked up by the RUE “Brestrestorationproject”. (chief architect of the project is W. Kazakov).

Museums of republican submission are of interest too: the memorial complex “Brest Fortress-Hero”, the Museum of History of Belarusian Polessye (Pinsk), the nature museum in the State National Park “Belovezhskaya Pushcha” (v.Kamenyuki, Kamenets district), departmental museums: the Museum of Railway Technique (Brest) and the Museum of History of Baranovichi Branch of Belarusian railway (Baranovichi).

The centuries-old history of the Brest land has been reflected in 280 archaeological monuments, 300 architectural monuments and 1222 historical monuments. They include Kossovo Palace in the Ivatsevichi district, a manor and a park complex in the village of Skoki of the Brest region, the Franciscan cloister in Pinsk, the memorial complex “Brest Fortress-Hero” and others.

You can find more detailed information in the book “Digest of Historical and Cultural Monuments of Belarus: Brest Region” (Minsk, 1990), as well as in the “Memory” published in each district of the region, and in the book by L.M. Nesterchuk “Castles, Palaces and Parks of the Berestye Land of the X-XXth Centuries” (Minsk, 2002).

Such names as Afanasiy Filippovich, Kazimir Lyschinski, Julian Niemcewicz, Tadeusz Kosciuszko, Romuald Traugutt, Juzef Kraszewski, Adam Mickiewicz, Napoleon Orda, born in the Brest region, are well-known in the world. A. Shakhovskoy, A. Griboyedov, P. Shpilevskiy, F. Reshetnikov, E. Ozheshko, F. Dostoyevski, A. Blok, Y. Kolas were living and creating their masterpieces on the territory of the Brest region during long periods of their lives.