Anatoly Moskvin — a Nizhny Novgorod local historian and necropolist, philologist, and translator, author of essays on the history of urban and rural cemeteries.[1][2][3] In early November 2011, police discovered mummified bodies in his apartment that had been removed from graves; Moskvin was charged under Article 244 of the Criminal Code — desecration of the bodies of the deceased and their burial sites.[3][4] The court relieved him of criminal responsibility on grounds of insanity and in 2012 committed him to compulsory psychiatric treatment, which has since been extended every six months; the most recent extension was issued on July 31, 2026.[4][5]

Local historian and necropolist

Moskvin was born in 1966 in Gorky, graduated from the Gorky Pedagogical Institute of Foreign Languages and completed postgraduate studies at Moscow State University in the Department of Germanic and Celtic Philology; until 1997 he taught Celtic studies at the Nizhny Novgorod Linguistic University.[3] He was fluent in thirteen languages, compiled dictionaries, translated books, and from 1997 published the electronic almanac "Celtic Dawn", and from 2005 the internet almanac "Memory of the Earth".[3]

He had been engaged in necrolistics — the study and description of cemeteries — since his school years. By his own account, he began walking through city cemeteries in seventh grade, and by 2000 knew all the city's cemeteries and many of those in the surrounding districts.[1] Moskvin began a systematic survey of the entire Region on July 18, 2005: over two and a half seasons he inspected 752 cemeteries across thirty-five districts and transcribed nine hundred verse epitaphs.[1][3] He traveled on foot, covering an average of thirty kilometers a day, and slept in apartment building entryways, haystacks, and cemetery watchmen's huts.[1]

He published essays on Nizhny Novgorod necropolises in the local press and was compiling them into a book — a guidebook to the cemeteries of the Nizhny Novgorod region — that never appeared.[2] Moskvin traced the beginning of his interest in the subject to an incident in 1979: as a twelve-year-old schoolboy he found himself at the funeral of a girl who had been killed by an electric shock, where the adults forced him to kiss the deceased and repeat an incantation. He recounted this story in the Nizhny Novgorod newspaper Nekrolog on 26 October 2011 — one week before the search.[6]

Working method

Moskvin described his method of surveying cemeteries as follows: he would arrive on summer evenings, when the graveyard was already empty, and work with a notebook until dark; guards at Nizhny Novgorod cemeteries, he said, were only introduced around 2005.[1] He processed the material from his surveys himself and used it to compile a guidebook to the cemeteries of the Region.[1]

The mummies case

Police came upon Moskvin while investigating a series of grave desecrations at Nizhny Novgorod cemeteries. In early November 2011, officers from the Center for Countering Extremism came to the apartment where he lived with his parents and discovered there mummified bodies that had been removed from graves and dressed in clothing taken from tombs.[3][7] The number of bodies was reported variously: the case materials mention between 26 and 29 "dolls" made from human remains.[3][4]

Moskvin was charged under Article 244 of the Criminal Code.[4] He described himself as a researcher: both during the investigation and many years later he referred to what he had done as scholarly work.[5][7]

Trial and Compulsory Treatment

A psychiatric evaluation established that Moskvin has paranoid schizophrenia.[7] The court relieved him of criminal liability and ordered compulsory treatment; since 2012 he has been held in psychiatric hospital No. 2.[4] Moskvin was later declared legally incapacitated and assigned guardians.[8]

The term of compulsory treatment is extended every six months upon the hospital's petition. In October 2025 a transfer to outpatient supervision was discussed, but the court maintained the inpatient regime.[7] On 15 December 2025, the Leninsky District Court of Nizhny Novgorod extended the medical measures until mid-June 2026,[4] and on 31 July 2026 extended them by a further six months: according to the attending physician's conclusion, the patient continues to regard his actions as scientific work.[5]

Publications

Moskvin's cemetery essay cycle, published before 2011, remains accessible today.[9][10][11]

  • "Jewish Cemeteries of Nizhny Novgorod"[9]
  • "The Nagornoe Cemetery near the Village of Vyazovka"[10]
  • "The Lutheran Cemetery of Nizhny Novgorod"[11]

See also

Sources

  1. kokina.ru — Tatyana Kokina-Slavina — Interview with Anatoly Moskvin (archive)
  2. kokina.ru — Tatyana Kokina-Slavina — Anatoly Moskvin: Russia's Only Necropolist
  3. news.ru — The scholar who lived with a collection of mummies: who is Anatoly Moskvin (archive)
  4. Kommersant (Volga Region) — Kommersant-Privolzhye, 15 December 2025 — Compulsory treatment of Nizhny Novgorod necropolist extended until June (archive)
  5. gazetametro.ru — Metro, 1 August 2026 — Moskvin's treatment extended by six months (archive)
  6. kokina.ru — Tatyana Kokina-Slavina — Anatoly Moskvin's dead "bride": reprint from the newspaper Nekrolog, 26 October 2011 (archive)
  7. nn.aif.ru — Argumenty i Fakty — Nizhny Novgorod — Necropolist Moskvin may be released from psychiatric hospital (archive)
  8. Kommersant (Volga Region) — Kommersant-Privolzhye, 8 August 2022 — Necropolist Anatoly Moskvin to remain in psychiatric hospital (archive)
  9. kokina.ru — Anatoly Moskvin — Jewish Cemeteries of Nizhny Novgorod (archive)
  10. kokina.ru — Anatoly Moskvin — The Hilltop Cemetery near the Village of Vyazovka (archive)
  11. kokina.ru — Anatoly Moskvin — The Lutheran Cemetery of Nizhny Novgorod (archive)