Of the Old Town on the hills above, there remains the Golden Gate, a ruin of the I 1 th century earthen ramparts, bastions and gates. The gate was built in 1°37, but only the side walls, en closed by a railing, now remain. Near it is the theatre in which Stolypin, the prime minister of Russia, was shot in 1911 and which is now a forum for congresses. The cathedral of St. Sophia, the oldest in Russia, built in the 11th century, has been rebuilt so many times that its original form is lost, and only a few of its 19 domes date back to mediaeval times. The golden cupola of its four-storeyed campanile is visible for many miles across the steppe. The interior of the cathedral has beautiful 11th century frescoes and mosaics, covered with whitewash during the Uniat occupation of the cathedral in the 17th century and re discovered in 1842. They are the oldest monuments of Russo Byzantine art and represent hunting scenes, gladiatorial combats, games and dances. The church of St. Andrew, rebuilt in florid style (1744-67) stands on the spot where, according to Russian tradition, that apostle stood and declared that the hill would become the site of a great city. The monastery of St. Michael, sometimes called of the Golden Heads, because of the 15 gilded cupolas of the original church, was built in 11°8 and restored by the Cossack chieftain, Bogdan Chmielnicki, who released the city from Polish rule in 1651, when it came under the rule of Moscow. Near it is a column of the Irene monastery, built in the 11th century, which was discovered during street levelling operations in the 19th century. The Decimal Church (1842) stands on the site of a loth century church destroyed by the Tatars, in the environs of which were the market and palaces. Foundations of the palace of the Grand Dukes were discovered in its churchyard. The Andreas Church, built by Rastrelli in 175o, is picturesquely situated on the edge of a cliff overlooking the Dnieper and the Podol quarter of the town. Upon the Perun hill, where stood the ancient temple of the pagan god Perun, is the dome-crowned church of the Three Saints (1640).
On the Pechersky hill was the famous Pechersky (Cave) mon astery; in the 18th century a fortress was erected here, and its arsenal was the scene of desperate fighting during the 1917-20 civil wars, when much of the district was reduced to ruins. The monastery or Lavra was an ancient and very sacred spot. The hetman Mazeppa replaced the wooden 12th century building by imposing towers and stone walls. In pre-revolution times it was visited annually by 250,000 pilgrims, its Cavern monastery, with its caves and catacombs where the bodies of the monks were buried, was a special object of pilgrimage. The foundation of the i monastery is ascribed to the nth century saints Anthony and Hilarion, and by the middle of the 12th century it had become wealthy and beautiful. Completely ruined by the Mongol Batu and his hordes in 1240, it remained deserted for two centuries. The present building dates from the time of Peter the Great, a fire hav ing destroyed a previous building. Among the more notable names of the saints buried in the catacombs are Nestor the Chronicler and Iliya of Murom, the old Cossack of the Russian epics. Under Soviet rule the monastery has been converted into a home for disabled soldiers, with workshops. The printing press, founded in the Lavra in 16or, became in the 17th century the centre of Ukrainian cultural achievements. When the Russianizing of the
Ukraine became a policy of the tsarist Government, only books of a religious character were allowed to be printed here. At the present time the press is in the hands of the Ukrainian academy of science.
The school of painting and engraving organized by the mon astery was famous throughout the empire; it is now a workshop for the production of ikons. A museum of religious cults has been formed since the revolution from the collections of the Ecclesi astical academy, the Bratsky monastery and the Pechersky Lavra itself and is situated in one part of the Lavra. The Nikolaiev cathedral, built by the hetman Mazeppa, was completely de stroyed by bombardment in 1919. Near its ruins is the former graveyard of the Kiev nobility, with a chapel in classical style built on the supposed site of the grave of Askold. In the former Bratsky monastery is the cathedral of the Baptism of Christ (1695), typical of Ukrainian baroque, with grape vine decoration. The Academy of the Bratsky monastery was in the 16th century a school in which Ukrainian scientists, artists and statesmen were trained. Later it became a theological seminary. Its rich library was handed over to the Ukrainian science library of ter the 1917 revolution. The buildings of the Bratsky monastery are now partly the headquarters of the local Communist party and partly a medical school. Within the Florus monastery, a church of the Resurrection was built in 1920. Opposite the entrance to the Florus monastery is the former Catholic Dominican Church, erected during Polish rule in the 16th century, destroyed by the Cossacks under Bogdan Chmielnicki and transformed into the Greek Orthodox Church of Peter and Paul by Peter the Great. The former Pokrovsky monastery has been converted since the revolution into a Workers' Home, School, Club and Hospital.
The city has several theatres, including a Jewish state theatre. Of the museums, the All-Ukrainian historical museum is specially valuable for its rich archaeological exhibits, and the Zoological for its collections of insectivore. The State art museum contains fine examples of Dutch and Flemish schools, paintings by Spanish masters, Gobelin tapestries and Persian ceramics. Its former university is now an academy of science, and there are art, medi cal and agricultural institutes. An interesting experiment in the reclamation of homeless children is the Children's City, in which there are approximately i,000 children, who cultivate their own fields and have workshops of their own.
BIBLiocRAPmr.—The Russian literature concerning Kiev is volumi nous. Its bibliography will be found in the Russian Geographical Dic tionary of P. Semenov, and in the Russian Encyclopaedic Dictionary, published by Brockhaus and Efron (vol. xv., 1895). Among recent publications are: Rambaud's La Russie epique (Paris, 1876) ; Avenar ius. Kniga o Kievskikh Bogatuiryakh (St. Petersburg, 1876), dealing with the early Kiev heroes; Zakrevski, Opisanie Kieva (1868) ; the materials issued by the commission for the investigation of the ancient records of the city ; Taranovskiy, Gorod Kiev (Kiev, 1880 ; De Baye, Kiev, la mere des villes russes (1896) ; Goetz, Das Kiewer Hohlenklos ter als Kulturzentrum des vormongolischen Russlands (Passau, 1904). See also Count Bobrinsky, Kurgans of Smiela (1897) ; Guide to the Soviet Union (Moscow, 1925).