Pavlovsky District

Pavlovsky District is a district in the west of Nizhny Novgorod Region that has existed since 2020 as the Pavlovsky Municipal Okrug. ^[3][4] It borders the Volodarsky, Bogorodsky, Sosnovsky, and Vachsky okrugs of the Region, as well as Vladimir Oblast. Three towns lie on its land — Pavlovo, Vorsma, and Gorbatov — along with the urban-type settlement of Tumbotino, and Pavlovo serves as the district center. ^[2] The okrug covers 109.85 thousand hectares and has 95 settlements; as of January 1, 2026, it had a population of 90,068. ^[2] It is the country's oldest nest of metalworking trades: knives, locks, and scissors have been made here since the 16th century, Pavlovo has earned the nicknames "knife capital of Russia" and "the Russian Solingen," and the okrug's coat of arms shows a golden boat with a hammer on its sail sailing across a red-and-blue field. ^[2][3]

The Western Corner of the Region

The okrug occupies the western part of Nizhny Novgorod Region on the right bank of the Oka; its 95 settlements are grouped into ten administrative-territorial departments, and Pavlovo is 78 kilometers from Nizhny Novgorod. ^[2] The neighboring industrial towns are also close — Dzerzhinsk, Balakhna, Zavolzhye, and Vyksa — and the Nizhny Novgorod–Kasimov regional highway runs through the territory, connecting to the federal Moscow–Nizhny Novgorod–Kazan highway. ^[2] The nearest railway station is Metallist, on the branch line from Nizhny Novgorod, and Pavlovo also has a river landing. ^[10]

The town and its surroundings lie on the slopes of the Peremilovo Hills, a high ridge on the right bank that stretches along the Oka from the Murom lands to Pavlovo. ^[10][17] The slopes are cut by ravines and river valleys, the ridge reaches a maximum height of about 210 meters, and individual hills within Pavlovo itself have their own names: the Dalnyaya and Voskresenskaya steeps, and Semyonova and Spasskaya hills. ^[17] In the riverbank bluffs, horizontal layers of alabaster are visible, interbedded with red brick clay and dye sand; the district's subsoil also holds limestone, dolomite, marl, sand, and peat. ^[17][10]

Two legends are told about the name of the hills. According to one, a pagan shrine to the god Peremil, patron of love and harmony, once stood here; according to the other, the hills were named by the Murom princess Fevronia as she returned from exile. ^[17]

• There are ten specially protected natural areas in the district: the Tumbotino State Natural Complex Reserve and nine natural monuments. ^[2]
• Among the natural monuments are Lakes Toskanka, Klyuchik, and Svyatoye Tumbotinskoye, as well as the Mother Pine, a tree of unusual shape. ^[2]
• The water in Klyuchik never rises above five degrees Celsius even in the hottest weather, which doesn't stop it from being one of the most photographed spots in the Region. ^[6]
• Two hiking routes run through the area: the "Oka Trail" and the "Trails of Berezopolye." ^[2]

May you be, from this day and for all ages, "most lovely hills" for having given us shelter and refuge

Pavlov Ostrog

The first written mention of Pavlovo dates to April 5, 1566, in a charter of Tsar Ivan the Terrible; the town counts its own history from that date. ^[6][1] A wooden fortress was then built on the steep bank, guarding the crossing over the Oka on the Nizhny Novgorod — Murom — Moscow road. The garrison consisted of fifty streltsy (musketeers) under a sotnik (commander of a hundred); they were not burdened with farm work or taxes, but were allowed to fish and keep forges. ^[7]

The origin of the name is explained in two ways: by one version, it comes from the ferryman Pavel, one of the first settlers; by the other, from the name of the first posad (trading-quarter) resident, since in early documents the settlement is called "Pavlov ostrog." ^[1][6] The unofficial "Pavlovo-on-the-Oka" appeared later and simply distinguished the town from the many places of the same name. ^[6]

The settlement grew in two parts from the start: one clung to the fortress on Spasskaya Hill, the other stretched along the little Tarka River, where craftsmen settled — blacksmiths, tinsmiths, coppersmiths, coopers, and potters. ^[1][7] When the defensive importance of the ostrog faded, the village took up crafts and trade: the steep banks of the Oka attracted merchants, metal was shipped in by river, and the surrounding forests supplied charcoal for the forges. ^[7]

In 1621, Pavlovo was granted to Prince Cherkassky, and in 1743 (according to other sources, 1742) it passed to the Counts Sheremetev: Princess Varvara Cherkasskaya married Pyotr Sheremetev, and the estate came to her as a dowry. ^[10][7][14] The selo was part of Gorbatovsky Uyezd of Nizhny Novgorod Governorate. ^[10]

Pavlovo received town status in 1919, and Pavlovsky Uyezd was formed at the same time; in 1929 it was transformed into a district. ^[1] In 1927, a railway was built here from Nizhny Novgorod. ^[7] In April 2020, the Regional Legislative Assembly passed a law transforming the district: the towns of Pavlovo, Vorsma, and Gorbatov, the urban-type settlement of Tumbotino, and six village councils — Ababkovsky, Varezhsky, Grudtsinsky, Kalininsky, Korovinsky, and Taremsky — were merged into Pavlovsky Municipal Okrug, with a transition period lasting until December 31, 2020. ^[4]

Locks, Knives, and Razors

The metalworking trade here grew out of the streltsy forges. In the early 17th century, Pavlovo had eleven forges, and by 1677 there were already forty, and the residents had gained a reputation as skilled makers of weapons, knives, scissors, scales, and padlocks. ^[7] In the 18th century, Pavlovo was a wealthy trading and industrial selo living off the lock-and-knife trade; about a hundred kinds of locks were made — decorative, miniature, and puzzle locks — and by the end of the century the selo had four steel plants and more than three hundred craft workshops. ^[1] Besides metalwork, the people of Pavlovo were engaged in leatherworking and made rope and lace. ^[10]

At first, iron was obtained locally, smelted from poor brown and bog ores, but from the 18th century they switched to imported metal — from the Urals and partly from Vyksa. ^[1] By the mid-19th century, Pavlovo's locksmithing industry encompassed about two hundred villages of Nizhny Novgorod and Vladimir Governorates, while Pavlovo itself remained a selo. ^[9] The products were sold throughout Russia and exported abroad, especially to the East — to Turkey and Persia; some craftsmen made locks a quarter of a centimeter in size and weighing one carat. ^[1]

Literature cemented the trade's fame: in 1851, P. I. Melnikov-Pechersky wrote about Pavlovo wares in the journal Moskvityanin. ^[6]

Who is not familiar with Pavlovo goods? Almost every one of us dines with a Pavlovo knife and fork, mends a pen with a Pavlovo penknife, wears clothes cut with Pavlovo scissors, locks up our belongings with a Pavlovo lock, and for some time now has taken to shaving with Pavlovo razors

The Tula masters shod the English flea, and the Pavlovo masters made it a collar and a chain so it wouldn't run away

Craftsmen, Buyers, and the Artel

The other side of the trade was described by V. G. Korolenko. He visited Pavlovo five times — in June and December 1889, in April and September 1890, and in February 1897 — kept a diary, spoke with the craftsmen and the buyers, and lost sleep at night watching how, by the light of dim lanterns, goods were bought up from the masters for next to nothing in basements. ^[9] His Pavlovo Sketches came out in 1890 and brought the village still greater fame. ^[9]

At the same time, the matter took a practical turn: Alexander Stange, a graduate of the University of Dorpat, came to Pavlovo and united the masters into the Pavlovo Craftsmen's Artel — the first in Russian metalworking, founded in 1890. ^[8][10] The artel produced metal kitchen utensils and household goods, and their quality was such that at the Russian-French exhibition in Paris in 1900 it received a gold medal, followed by nine more gold and thirteen silver awards from Russian and European exhibitions. ^[8]

The industrial line ran alongside the craft one: the first steel factory in Pavlovo was opened in 1820 by the entrepreneur Terebin, and many masters either followed his example or went to work for him. ^[7] In Soviet times the artel became a full-cycle plant, was named after Kirov in 1956, and grew into the country's largest producer of cutlery; in 1971 the plant was awarded the Order of the Badge of Honour, in 1994 it was classed among the folk art crafts, and in 2002 it was recognized as an enterprise of significant cultural and historical value. ^[8]

Today the knife-making trade is carried on by both a factory and private workshops: investment casting, hand engraving on steel, rediscovered secrets of Damascus steel, and handles made of wood, plastic, and moose and buffalo horn are all in use. ^[8] The craft has been recognized as a living brand of the Region and stands alongside other crafts of the Nizhny Novgorod land — it is covered both in the article Pavlovo Locks and Knives, Purekh Bells and by the Museum of the History of Artistic Crafts of Nizhny Novgorod Region. ^[8]

An artel is organized not only for the economic well-being of its members, but also for raising their cultural level

Three Towns and a Settlement

The urban population of the district makes up 81.4 percent of all residents; at the beginning of 2026, Pavlovo itself had 55,013 people. ^[2]

The area and the Vorosma River are mentioned in documents of the 14th–15th centuries, the village of Vorsma from the 16th century, and Vorsma itself is named directly in a written source of 1588; the name is Finno-Ugric and is interpreted as "forest land" or "land on the water." ^[13][14][15] The lands here belonged to the Princes Cherkassky, then to the Sheremetevs; in 1766, by decree of Count P. B. Sheremetev, a locksmith factory was established here, producing guns, knives, tongs, and locks. ^[15] In 1820 Ivan Gavrilovich Zavyalov, a serf of the Sheremetevs, opened his own business: in 1843 he received a large silver medal at the Manufacture Exhibition in Moscow, and in 1862 a medal at the world exhibition in London "for excellent samples of steel cutlery." ^[15][13] In Soviet times the town rested on two industries: the Lenin Medical Instrument Plant made surgical instruments, while the October Association produced up to 95 percent of all folding knives in the USSR, including gift and special army models. ^[15] Vorsma became a workers' settlement in the second half of the 1920s (in 1926 according to some sources, on July 18, 1927 according to others), and a town in 1955. ^[15][13] Today it is known for Lake Toskanka with a monastery on an island, for the Russian Tuscany festival, and for the Vorsma Knife Museum, opened in 2022. ^[2]

Gorbatov is the smallest town in the Region. ^[2][6] A document from 1565 mentions the village of Meshcherskaya Porosl on lands granted by Ivan the Terrible to Prince Shuisky-Gorbatov; from it grew the selo (a larger village) of Gorbatovo, named after its owner's surname, and the Meshcherskaya settlement, and in 1779 the two were merged into the district town of Gorbatov. ^[12] It is an ancient center of rope and cord making, and also a city of orchards: the Gorbatov, or "parental," cherry variety originated here. ^[12][2] The local museum of regional studies tells of the merchant class, local trades, and the Red Gorbatov cow — see Revival of the Red Gorbatov Cattle Breed (2026). ^[6] Gorbatov is the birthplace and childhood home of Alexandra Potanina, a traveler and the first woman admitted to the Russian Geographical Society; the grave of Grigory Smolin, the prototype of the merchant Marko Smolokurov in Melnikov-Pechersky's novels "In the Forests" and "On the Hills," has also survived here. ^[6]

Tumbotino stands on the left bank of the Oka opposite Pavlovo and lives by the tool. The M. Gorky Medical Instrument Plant, founded in 1884, produces more than five thousand types of surgical instruments — from general surgery to ophthalmology and veterinary medicine, including ones made of titanium alloys; its products go to 26 countries, and exports reach up to 30 percent of sales volume. ^[16] The settlement's second plant, the Horizont association, makes scissors — for hairdressing, manicure, sewing, animal grooming, and medical use — as well as garden and construction tools and axes. ^[2] The settlement's knife-making tradition is celebrated with the Festival of Tumbotino Finnish Knives (finkas). ^[2]

How Many People Live Here

The population of the district is declining along with the rest of the industrial provinces: on January 1, 2017, the district had 95,280 residents, in 2025 it had 90,990, and on January 1, 2026, it had 90,068. ^[5][11][2] Of the rural settlements, the largest is Taremskoye, with about 3,100 residents. ^[11]

The towns of the district have different population histories. Pavlovo grew throughout the entire Soviet era — from 12,400 residents in 1897 to 71,500 in 1989 — and has lost about a quarter since then. Vorsma followed the same curve on a smaller scale, while Gorbatov, by contrast, was more populous at the end of the 19th century than in the middle of the 20th. ^[10][13][12]

Economy

Pavlovo and its surroundings are an important center of machine building and metalworking and the heart of the Pavlovo–Sosnovskoye–Vachsky metalworking district. ^[2] Nineteen large and medium-sized enterprises are engaged in manufacturing; they account for 71 percent of shipped output and 31.2 percent of all employed people. Next come trade and vehicle repair (15.7 percent of those employed), education (7.6), health care (6.8), and agriculture and forestry (4.4). ^[2]

Most of the output goes to the all-Russian market, while a smaller share is exported: in the late 2000s it was estimated at about 15 percent, and by 2017 at around 10 percent. ^[5] At that time, five plants in the district were listed in the Regional Register of Core Enterprises of Leading Industries.

The best-known local name is PAZ. The plant was begun in 1930 as a supplier of drivers' tools and body fittings for the Gorky Automobile Plant; in 1932 it went into operation as the Automotive and Tractor Tool Plant, during the war it supplied parts for off-road vehicles and light tanks, and in 1952 it produced its first bus, after which the "city of blacksmiths" became a city of buses. ^[1][7] The plant's record includes the first Russian-made low-floor bus, the PAZ-3237. ^[1] In the 1960s a souvenir factory also opened in the district, making pins and keychains in hard and soft enamel (see Pavlovo "Souvenir" Plant (plant-souvenir.ru)), and among the other machine-building enterprises is the Pavlovo Experimental Machine Plant (pomz.newmail.ru). ^[7]

Natural and climatic conditions favor dairy and meat livestock farming, fodder, grain, and potatoes: the district grows grain, potatoes, and vegetables and raises cattle and poultry. ^[10] Agriculture is carried out by 11 enterprises, which produce 91.7 percent of the sector's output, 16 private farms (2.2 percent), and 10,419 household plots (6.1 percent); the largest are the Pavlovskaya poultry farm, "Gorbatovskoye," and "Komarovskoye." ^[2]

The district has 918.1 kilometers of public roads. Passenger transport is provided by the Pavlovo Passenger Motor Transport Enterprise on 29 routes and by five commercial carriers on another fourteen. ^[2] Gas networks extend for 1,163.2 kilometers, and 48 settlements are supplied with gas; the district's housing stock totals 2,630.46 thousand square meters, or 28.4 square meters per resident. ^[2]

Pavlovo Hunts

Besides metalwork, Pavlovo clings to three domestic pastimes, which are known locally as the "Pavlovo hunts": indoor citrus growing, breeding songbird canaries, and goose fighting. ^[2]

Lemon cuttings were brought from Turkey in 1860; tradition names the merchant Ivan Karachistov, who traded with the East. ^[1][6] The plant took root on windowsills, in the 1930s the town even set up an experimental demonstration citrus farm, and today indoor lemons and fragrant bitter oranges bloom in almost every Pavlovo apartment and have spread far beyond the town. ^[7][1][10] In 2005, on Town Day, a monument to the Pavlovo lemon was unveiled: a small tree with fruit in a window with carved frames was forged by students of the Pavlovo Technical School of Folk Arts and Crafts. ^[1] The town has both a Citrusovaya Street and a nursery that sells saplings. ^[6]

Canaries are said to have first been kept by artisan locksmiths in their spare time: the birds were not merely listened to but taught to sing, by placing them near the cages of other songbirds. By the end of the 19th century the hobby had begun to bring in income, and Pavlovo canaries, according to tradition, were taken to the imperial court. ^[7] Bird-singing contests are still held today — the festival "Canary, the Singing Little Bird" draws participants from across the country. ^[1][2]

Goose fights take place on the first Sunday of the second half of March: the birds seize each other by the wings and try to force their opponent to squat, while the "lyubki" — female goose companions — honk nearby. According to tradition, such a bout was shown to Peter I, and he liked it. ^[7][6] In 2013 a monument to goose fighting was erected in Leninsky Garden. ^[6] Pavlovo breeds of fighting chickens are also known. ^[1]

Holy Sites

The area has eighteen churches and two monasteries, and several more churches are being restored — in Vorsma, Gorbatov, and the villages of Detkovo and Frolovskoye. ^[2] In Pavlovo itself, the Church of the Resurrection of Christ, dating from 1778, and the Ascension Church, which is variously dated to 1775 or 1795, have survived. ^[2][10]

The Holy Trinity Ostrovoezersky Monastery stands on an island in the middle of Lake Vorsma. According to tradition, the first to settle here was the hermit Makary, who obtained permission to found a monastery from Prince Boris Kambulatovich Cherkassky; by 1580 the island already had wooden cells and a church with two altars — the Trinity altar above and the Kazan altar below. ^[14][15] The Cherkassky family built and adorned the monastery over several generations, and after 1743 their work was continued by the Sheremetevs. ^[14] The monastery kept a piece of the Robe of the Lord, given to Prince Ivan Borisovich Cherkassky by royal decree: in Russia, such relics were held in only three places. ^[14][15] In the 1920s the monastery was closed, and in the 1950s its walls were dismantled and the Trinity and Kazan churches were destroyed; its revival began in 2007, in 2010 the Church of Michael Maleinos and a 35-meter bell tower were restored, and in 2011 the first liturgy was served in the rebuilt Trinity Cathedral. ^[14]

The second monastery is the The Ababkovsky St. George and St. Nicholas Convent on the right bank of the Oka, whose founding is linked to the blessing of St. Seraphim of Sarov. ^[5][2]

Museums and the Old Town

The main attraction for educational tourism in the district is the Pavlovo Historical Museum, one of the largest local history museums in the Region. It occupies the former estate of the merchant V. I. Gomulin, one of the most beautiful buildings of the second half of the 19th century in the Region, and tells the story of the all-Russian fame of Pavlovo's steel-and-locksmith crafts. ^[5][2] The museum's collection exceeds forty thousand items; its collection of locks is especially well known, ranging from nine tenths of a gram to fifty kilograms. ^[2][1] Some of the exhibits have to be viewed under magnification: a mechanical flea in platinum bast shoes and a tiny lock fastened to the eye of a needle, the work of the master craftsman Pavel Kulikov. ^[1] In 2019 the museum gained a branch, the Knife Museum, which displays products of local factories from the pre-revolutionary era to the present day. ^[2]

Another of the town's attractions is the largest padlock in the world, on display in the Dynasty café in central Pavlovo: the district administration gives its weight as 300 kilograms, while the Region's tourism portal gives 399 kilograms, with a height of almost two meters and a key weighing 16 kilograms. ^[2][6]

Pavlovo has to a large extent preserved its historic layout and buildings, with a clearly defined center. Here stand the Sheremetev estate office, the residential house of the factory owner Terebin, the estate of P. Shchetkin, the house where Academician A. E. Favorsky was born, the houses of the Knyazevs, Arzhanov, Dryakhlov-Nazarov, K. P. Pervov, and M. P. Sedov on Lomonosov Street, and the apartment building of the Vagin brothers. ^[1][2] In 1993 the town was granted the status of a historic settlement of federal significance. ^[7] In the town park and on the streets are monuments to Pavel the Ferryman, "The Longboat," "Cyril and Methodius," a memorial stone to the people's militia, and a monument to the Pavlovo blacksmith. ^[2][6]

Institutions and Sports

The district has 36 preschool institutions, 21 schools, five institutions of supplementary education, and two children's homes; secondary vocational education is provided by the I. I. Lepse Pavlovo Automotive Technical College and the Technical College of Russian Folk Art Crafts, and higher education by a branch of Lobachevsky University and a faculty of Alekseev Technical University. ^[2]

There are 44 cultural institutions: eighteen club-type facilities, nineteen libraries, four schools of supplementary education for children, two museums, and an exhibition hall. The pride of Pavlovo residents is the Palace of Culture, with large and small halls seating 1,200. ^[2]

Since 2025, healthcare in the district has been consolidated into the Oka Interdistrict Medical Center, which, alongside the Pavlovo Central District Hospital, now includes the Vachsky and Sosnovsky hospitals; its structure comprises 808 beds, fifteen outpatient and polyclinic units handling 3,910 visits per shift, and fifteen feldsher-midwife stations. ^[2]

The sports infrastructure has doubled in size over a decade and a half. In the late 2000s, 54 organizations were engaged in physical-fitness work in the district, 13 of them in rural areas, along with twenty fitness and wellness centers at enterprises, and there were 91 sports facilities, including two sports halls. By 2025 the number of facilities had grown to 201, with three sports schools, 29 fitness and sports clubs, and 22 specialized nonprofit organizations in operation. ^[2]

Film

The environs of Gorbatov proved a convenient setting for filmmakers. Mikhalkov Nikita shot a couple of episodes of "The Barber of Siberia" here in 1996; he liked the area and built an estate in the vicinity, near the village of Shchepachikha. ^[6][21] In 2005 the film crew of "Burnt by the Sun 2" was based in Pavlovsky District: one of the main locations was the village of Polyany, not far from Gorbatov, where a wartime Belarusian village was recreated — a barn and plank fences were built, and the houses were artificially aged. ^[21] Sets were also built in other villages of the district, including Chmutovo. ^[21]

For the final part, "Citadel," a huge fortress was erected from wood and plaster near the village of Nizkovo and partly blown up in the finale — in neighboring Gorbatov, houses shuddered from the roar; on maps the spot is still marked as a filming site. ^[21] About four hundred local residents appeared as extras — one in every six people in Gorbatov. ^[6] Aleksey Fedorchenko's "Silent Souls" was also filmed in these parts. ^[6]

Natives and visitors

Pavlovo is the birthplace of two famous scientists. Aleksey Evgrafovich Favorsky was born on March 3, 1860, in a priest's family; he became an academician, the founder of a large school of organic chemists, and president of the Mendeleev Russian Physico-Chemical Society, discovered a method for synthesizing isoprene and isoprene rubber and a method for synthesizing vinyl ethers, and in 1945 received the title of Hero of Socialist Labor. A monument to him has been erected in Pavlovo. ^[18][1]

Nikolay Mikhaylovich Albov was born here in 1866 in the family of a regimental priest (his real surname was Mikhaylov; he received the nickname Albov at the gymnasium for his light hair). A botanist and geographer, he traveled Abkhazia on foot, discovered a number of glaciers and lakes in Western Transcaucasia, and from 1895 worked at the museum in La Plata, Argentina, exploring Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego. He lived only thirty-one years, but eighteen plant species are named after him. ^[19][1]

In the village of Meschera in Chmutovo Volost, Gorbatov Uyezd, the prose writer Aleksandr Ivanovich Patreev (1900–1974) was born; he described his Pavlovo childhood in the memoir "Meschera." From 1935 the poet Vladimir Sergeevich Zarevoy (Koshkarov) lived in Pavlovo. ^[9]

Outside writers came here too: besides Korolenko, Pavlovo was written about by Gleb Uspensky and the writer-ethnographer Filipp Diomidovich Nefyodov (1838–1902), who corresponded with Pavlovo peasants and in 1901–1902 published two essays about them in Nizhny Novgorod newspapers. ^[1][9]

In 1948 the actor Georgy Zhzhyonov, who had by then already served time in a Kolyma camp, took a job at the Pavlovo drama theater; in June 1949 he was arrested again and sent into exile in Norilsk. ^[20][1]

Where tourists go

Pavlovo is part of the Region's southern ring — the route Nizhny Novgorod — Bogorodsk — Pavlovo — Vacha — Kazakovo — Vyksa — Nizhny Novgorod — and of the river "Moscow circumnavigation," and in 2025 it was also included in the "Golden Ring." ^[2] The Solnechny guesthouse and the vacation bases in the Zarechye part of town operate year-round, along with eighteen collective accommodation facilities with more than four hundred beds and two sanatoriums. ^[2] For organized groups, the factory museums of the bus plant, the Kirov Plant, and the technical school of folk art crafts are open. ^[2]

The selo of Varezh on the Oka is known for willow weaving — the craft is still taught at the local school — and for its annual "Oka Fish Soup" festival. ^[2]

• Pavlovo City Day is the main summer holiday of the district. ^[2]
• "Oka Craftsmen" is a festival of folk art and crafts. ^[2]
• "Literary Oka" is a poetry festival. ^[2]
• "Russian Toscana" in Vorsma is a parade of stylized boats, with historical reenactments and workshops. ^[2][6]
• "Mushroom Solyanka" and the festival of Tumbotino Finnish knives. ^[2]
• Workshops on growing the Pavlovo lemon, willow weaving, and metalworking. ^[2]

Sources

1. pavlovo.nobl.ru — Administration of Pavlovo Municipal Okrug — "About the Okrug" section (archive)
2. pavlovo.nobl.ru — Administration of Pavlovo Municipal Okrug — consolidated document on the economy, social sphere, and tourism, 2025
3. nobl.ru — Government of Nizhny Novgorod Region — municipality profile — Pavlovo Municipal Okrug (archive)
4. NIA "Nizhny Novgorod" — on the laws of the Legislative Assembly of April 23, 2020 — Eleven districts of Nizhny Novgorod Region to be transformed into okrugs (archive)
5. web.archive.org — Administration of Pavlovo District, 2017 snapshot of the site in the web archive — Characteristics of the Socioeconomic Potential of Pavlovo District (archive)
6. nn-tourist.ru — Tourist portal of Nizhny Novgorod Region — guide to Pavlovo and its surroundings — Pavlovo (archive)
7. V gorode N — essay on the town's history based on archival photographs — Pavlovo in Nizhny Novgorod Region: history and archival photos of the bus town (archive)
8. livingheritage.ru — Atlas of Local Brands "Living Heritage" — on the Pavlovo knife-making craft — Pavlovo Knives (archive)
9. ngounb.ru — Nizhny Novgorod Regional Universal Scientific Library — "Literary Map of Nizhny Novgorod Region" — Pavlovo District
10. mojgorod.ru — "Moy Gorod" — reference on Pavlovo with population dynamics — Pavlovo (archive)
11. mojgorod.ru — "Moy Gorod" — composition and population of the okrug — Pavlovo Municipal Okrug
12. mojgorod.ru — "Moy Gorod" — reference on Gorbatov (archive)
13. mojgorod.ru — "Moy Gorod" — reference on Vorsma — Vorsma (archive)
14. sobory.ru — Popular Catalog of Orthodox Architecture — history of the island monastery based on the monastery's guidebook — Vorsma, Ostrovoezersky Trinity Monastery (archive)
15. тоскания.рф — Vorsma.rf — local history essay on the town and the monastery — History of the Town of Vorsma (archive)
16. tumbotino.ru — Maxim Gorky Medical Instrument Plant (Tumbotino) — history of the enterprise — History of the Plant (archive)
17. museum-murom.ru — Murom Museum of History and Art — report by E. I. Sazonova at the 2010 annual conference — Peremilovy Hills (archive)
18. warheroes.ru — "Heroes of the Country" — biography of the organic chemist, a native of Pavlovo — Favorsky, Alexey Evgrafovich (archive)
19. нгодб.рф — T. A. Mavrina Nizhny Novgorod State Regional Children's Library — essay on the botanist and traveler — Nizhny Novgorod Scientists. Nikolay Albov (archive)
20. mounb.ru — A. S. Pushkin Magadan Regional Universal Scientific Library — biographical note — Georgy Stepanovich Zhzhonov (archive)
21. kino.mail.ru — Kino Mail — overview of filming locations of Nikita Mikhalkov's trilogy — Where the "Burnt by the Sun" Trilogy Was Filmed (archive)