Nikolai Ivanovich Khramtsovsky (15 December 1818 — 1890) was a Russian historian and archeographer, the founder of Nizhny Novgorod local history studies.[1] His works were the first systematic descriptions of Nizhny Novgorod and its streets and remain, to this day, a source base for the study of the city's history.

Main work

Khramtsovsky's principal work — "A Brief Sketch of the History and Description of Nizhny Novgorod" — was published in 1857–1859. In it, the historian systematically described the streets, buildings and institutions of his time. In particular, the sketch contains a mid-19th-century drawing of the building of the Mariinsky Institute for Noble Maidens, made by D. Ya. Bystritsky, along with early information about that institution. The work was reissued in 1998 and is still used by researchers as a historical source.[2]

Describing Ilyinskaya Street, Khramtsovsky characterized it as quiet and sedate — "like a merchant's wife out visiting or strolling."[1] He singled out the estate on Ilyinka among the street's "newest buildings," particularly noting its "solid mirror-glass windows" and "bronze, partly gilded railing" — the only ones, by his account, in the entire city at that time.

Historiographical significance

Khramtsovsky's judgments on the dating of Nizhny Novgorod's church-architecture monuments repeatedly served as a starting point for later researchers. Thus, regarding the Church of Cosmas and Damian on Rozhdestvenskaya, he held that "the cold Kozmodemyansky church was built at the beginning of the 17th century," and pointed to its architectural resemblance to the later Church of Sergius of Radonezh (Nizhny Novgorod) — a view later disputed by Archimandrite Macarius and other researchers.

In Nizhny Novgorod historiography, Khramtsovsky is consistently referred to as "the first Nizhny Novgorod historian." His observations on the mid-19th-century urban environment have lost none of their value: specific details — descriptions of facades, materials and building décor — retain their worth as eyewitness testimony from an era preceding the wave of reconstructions. Born in Vologda, Khramtsovsky lived in Nizhny Novgorod from 1828; in all, he published more than 50 articles, notes and reference pieces on the history of the Nizhny Novgorod land, and on his initiative the Nizhny Novgorod All-Estate Club and the Kulibin River School were established.[2]

Sources

  1. Wikipedia (ru) — Khramtsovsky, Nikolai Ivanovich (archive)
  2. ngounb.ru — Literary Map of Nizhny Novgorod Region: Khramtsovsky Nikolai Ivanovich (NGOUNB named after Lenin)
Materials used from articles (4)

Remler's Rental House, Mariinsky Institute for Noble Maidens), Ryabinina Estate on Ilyinskaya, Church of Cosmas and Damian on Rozhdestvensky Street