Alexandrov (formerly Alexandrovskaya Sloboda) is a city (since 1778) in Russia. The fourth largest city in the region, a tourist center on the Golden ring of Russia.
Alexandrovskaya Sloboda is a unique Palace ensemble of the middle Ages. It was created by Italian and Russian masters,
and according to contemporaries only slightly inferior to The Moscow Kremlin in beauty and wealth.
The settlement on the site of the present city is known from the middle of the XIV century, in documents XIV — XV centuries mentioned under the name of the Great Sloboda, since the beginning of the XVI century-the New village of Alexander and Alexandrov (Alexander) Sloboda. The proximity of the settlement to Moscow, the Trinity-Sergius Lavra and Pereslavl-Zaleski made it in the XV century vacation place of the Moscow princes while traveling on a pilgrimage.
In the spiritual Charter of Ivan III (1504) the New village of Alexandrovskoye was bequeathed to his son Vasily, the future Grand Duke Vasily III. In the years 1509-1515 was built a large complex of several Palace, four temple and a number of economic structures — one of the distant residences of the Prince.
Historical and architectural complex in the city of Alexander is part of the Golden ring of Russia. Its palaces and temples were built by the best Russian and Italian architects who built the Moscow Kremlin. The architecture of the complex traces elements of the Vladimir-Suzdal style, Moscow architecture of the 16th century and the Italian Renaissance, you can see the buildings and the later period. Royal palaces, white stone chambers, tent churches with paintings form a single ensemble, creating a unique atmosphere.
To date, the Palace and temple complex preserved:
- Trinity Cathedral (formerly Pokrovsky);
- Pokrovskaya Church (formerly Trinity);
- Church of Metropolitan Alexei (inside the existing Crucifixion Bell Tower);
- Assumption Church.
After the death of Vasily III Elena Glinskaya builds around the complex of Palace buildings fortress wooden walls with gates, surrounds it with a moat. Son of Basil III, Ivan the terrible, following the tradition of his father, continued to make a pilgrimage. With 1532 in 1563 the years of Ivan IV came to Alexander's settlement more than 10 times.
Alexandrovskaya Sloboda under Ivan the Terrible
December 3, 1564 Ivan the terrible from Moscow went to the prayer. By December 21, the Royal procession arrived at the Trinity-Sergius monastery. After prayers and traditional service Ivan IV went not to Moscow, and to Alexander Sloboda. By the autumn of 
1565, all the threads of internal management had converged in Alexandrov Sloboda. Until 1581 Sloboda was the main political and cultural center of the Russian state, the center of oprichnina. Here the king and his family were at the time of the "plague" pestilence", which engulfed Moscow in 1568.
In 1569 the first printing house in Russia was moved here from Moscow. The disciples of the first printer Ivan Fedorov, Andronik Timofeev (Ignorant) and Nicephorus Tarasiev in 1578, printed in her Psalm, repeating published in 1568 in Moscow, the first Russian textbook "Teaching Psalm". In the future, the printing house printed not only books, but also leaflets against Stefan Batory, which were distributed in "many German cities".
In the Alexander Sloboda in 1571 passed the Royal review of brides. From all over Russia came here two thousand beauties, of which Ivan the terrible chose his wife Martha Sobakin.
In November 1581, Prince Ivan died or was killed by his father in Alexandrovskaya Sloboda. After the death of his son, the king left Sloboda forever.
After Ivan the Terrible
In the reign of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, local merchants from the Alexander settlement appealed to the Abbot of the nearby Lukian desert, Abbot Lukian, For a petition to the king for permission to establish a convent on the ruins of the Royal residence in the Alexander settlement. Which at the beginning of the XVII century was heavily destroyed by the poles — in 1609 and 1611 it twice captured troops led by Jan Sapieha.
According to the monastery chronicle of the assumption convent, on April 15, 1650
Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich allowed to transfer the former house Church of the Alexander Royal Palace built by Vasily III and the Stone chamber adjacent to it from the North for the" good deed".
In 1698, by order of Tsar Peter I to the Crucifixion Church-bell tower were attached Board for his half-sister Marfa Alekseevna. Its Peter I suspected support of the Streltsy rebellion of 1698. In the assumption convent Marfa Alekseevna forcibly tonsured a nun named Margarita. In the chambers of the Crucifixion Church-bell tower Princess lived until the end of his days, and to our time in the chambers preserved some of her personal belongings: tiled stove — sample stove majolica late XVII century, the icon "Last judgment" in 1696 and beautiful wall paintings. In 1708, Martha A. dies. She was buried in a common grave in the monastery cemetery, and after 10 years at the request of the sisters, tsarevnas Maria and Feodosia, the remains of Martha Alexeyevna was moved to the basement of the Church of the visitation, a small single-domed Church built on the territory of the Kremlin in the XVII century (the two sisters a few years buried there). To this day, this tomb has not survived.
In 1718, the assumption convent became a prison for the first wife of Peter I-Evdokia Feodorovna. And until now there is a picture of her: in a monastic attire with an open book in his hands, under her inscription Slavic ligature: "Queen Evdokia Feodorovna in nuns, the wife of the first Peter The great."
In Soviet times, a Museum functioned on the territory of the former fortress and the abolished monastery.
The revival of the convent began in 1991 with the blessing of the Archbishop of Vladimir and Suzdal Evlogy. Today, the territory of the Alexander Kremlin is divided by the Alexander Sloboda Museum-reserve and the revived Holy Dormition convent.