Novodevichy Cemetery

Novodevichy Cemetery (Новодевичье кла́дбище, Novodevichye kladbishche) is the most famous cemetery in Moscow, Russia, situated next to the World Heritage Site, the 16th-century Novodevichy Convent, which is the city's third most popular tourist site. It should not be confused with an eponymous cemetery in Saint Petersburg.

The cemetery was inaugurated in 1898, when it was judged that there were too many burials within monastery walls. One of the first notables to be buried there was Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, whose gilded tomb is the work of Fyodor Shekhtel. Today, the cemetery holds the tombs of Russian authors, playwrights, and poets, as well as famous actors, political leaders, and scientists. More than 27,000 are buried at Novodevichy. It has a park-like ambience, dotted with small chapels and large sculpted monuments. It is divided into an eastern and western section; maps are available at the cemetery office.

Celebrities buried there: A,B,C

Ivan Agayants (1911–1968), a KGB officer and foreign spy
Sergei Aksakov (1791–1859), a writer
Nadezhda Alliluyeva-Stalin (1901–1932), wife of Joseph Stalin
Daniil Andreev (1906–1959), a writer
Demyan Bedny (1883–1945), a writer
Andrei Bely (1880–1934), a writer
Pavel Belyayev (1925–1970), a cosmonaut
Georgi Beregovoi (1921–1995), a cosmonaut
Mark Bernes (1911–1969), an actor and singer
Vladimir Bonch-Bruevich (1873–1955), a writer
Sergei Bondarchuk (1920–1994), an actor and director
Artyom Borovik (1960–2000), a journalist and businessman
Valery Bryusov (1873–1924), a writer
Mikhail Bulgakov (1881–1940), a playwright and author
Nikolai Bulganin (1895–1975), a statesman
Nikolai Burdenko (1876–1946), a neurosurgeon
Pavel Alekseyevich Cherenkov (1904-1990), a Nobel laureate in Physics
Ivan Chernyakhovsky (1906–1945), a General of the Army
Fyodor Chaliapin (1873–1938), an opera singer
Georgi Chicherin (1872–1936), a statesman

Celebrities buried there: D–G

Kuzma Derevyanko (1904–1954), an army general
Alexander Deyneka (1899–1969), a painter and sculptor
Lev Dovator (1903–1941), an Army general
Isaak Dunayevsky (1900–1955), a composer and conductor
Ilya Ehrenburg (1891–1967), a writer
Gabriel El-Registan (1899–1945), a poet
Sergei Eisenstein (1898–1948), a film director
Alexander Fadeyev (1901–1956), a writer
Dmitri Furmanov (1891–1926), a writer
Ekaterina Furtseva (1910–1974), a politician
Sergei Gerasimov (1906–1985), a film director
Reinhold Glière (1875–1956), a composer
Valentin Glushko (1908–1989), a spacecraft and rockets designer
Nikolai Gogol (1809–1852), a writer
Raisa Gorbachev (1932–1999), a former "First Lady" of the Soviet Union
Andrei Gromyko (1909–1989), a politician

Celebrities buried there: I, K

Ilya Ilf (1897–1937), a writer
Sergey Ilyushin (1894–1977), aircraft designer
Dmitri Kabalevsky (1904–1987), a composer
Lazar Kaganovich (1892–1991), a politician
Leonid Kantorovich (1912–1986), a Nobel prize winning economist
Lev Kassil (1905–1970), a writer
Valentin Kataev (1897–1986), a writer
Velimir Khlebnikov (1885–1922), a poet
Nikita Khrushchev (1894–1971), a politician
Leonid Kogan (1924–1982), a violin virtuoso
Alexandra Kollontai (1872–1952), a politician
Pavel Korin (1892–1967), a Russian painter and art restorer
Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya (1923–1941), a heroic partisan
Pyotr Koshevoy (1904–1976), an army general
Gleb Kotelnikov (1872–1944),the knapsack parachute inventor
Ivan Kozhedub (1920–1991), an air force general
Ivan Kozlovsky (1900–1993), an opera singer
Peter Kropotkin (1842–1921), Russia's foremost anarchist

Celebrities buried there: L–O

Lev Landau (1908–1968), a Nobel laureate in Physics
Alexander Lebed (1950–2002), an army general and politician
Sergei Lebedev (1902–1974), a compuer pioneer
Yevgeny Leonov (1926–1994), an actor
Isaac Levitan (1860–1900), a painter
Maxim Litvinov (1876–1951), a politician
Samuil Marshak (1887–1964), a writer, translator and children's poet
Vladimir Mayakovsky (1893–1930), a poet
Alexei Maresiev (1916–2001), a flying ace
Anastas Mikoyan (1895–1978), a politician
Vyacheslav Molotov (1890–1986), a politician
Kirill Moskalenko (1902–1985), a former commander of Strategic Rocket Forces
Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko (1858–1943), a theater director
Yuri Nikulin (1921–1997), a clown and actor
Sergey Obraztsov (1901–1992), a puppeteer
Vladimir Obruchev (1863–1956), a geologist, geographer and explorer
Nikolay Ogarev (1813–1877), a writer
David Oistrakh (1908–1974), a violin virtuoso
Nikolai Ostrovsky (1904–1936), a writer
Aleksandr Oparin (1894–1980), a scientist

Celebrities buried there: P, R

Ivan Panfilov (1892–1941), an army general
Anatoli Papanov (1922–1987), an actor
Valentin Parnakh (1891–1951), a poet and jazz musician
Lyudmila Pavlichenko (1916–1974), a female sniper
Ivan Petrov (1896–1958), an army general
Nikolai Podgorny (1903–1983), a politician
Boris Polevoy (1908–1981), a writer
Aleksandr Ivanovich Pokryshkin (1913–1985), an Air Force marshal
Sergei Prokofiev (1891–1953), a composer
Arkady Raikin (1911–1987), a stand up comedian
Sviatoslav Richter (1915–1997), a pianist
Mikhail Romm (1901–1971), a film director
Nikolai Rubinstein (1835–1881), a Russian pianist and composer
Lidiya Ruslanova (1900–1973), a folk singer

Celebrities buried there: S

Alexander Saburov (1908–1974), an army general and politician
Otto Schmidt (1891–1956), a scientist
Alfred Schnittke (1934–1998), a composer
Alexander Scriabin (1872–1915), a composer
Nikolai Semashko (1874–1949), a politician
Yuri Senkevich (1937–2003), an explorer
Valentin Serov (1865–1911), a writer and artist
Alexey Shchusev (1873–1949), an architect
Vissarion Shebalin (1902–1963), a composer
Dmitri Shepilov (1905–1995), a politician
Dmitri Shostakovich (1906–1975), a composer
Vladimir Shukhov (1853–1939), a civil engineer
Vasily Shukshin (1929–1974), a writer and actor
Innokenty Smoktunovsky (1925–1994), an actor
Vladimir Solovyov (1853–1900), a philosopher
Konstantin Stanislavski (1863–1938), a theater director
Mikhail Arkadyevich Svetlov (1903–1964), a poet

Celebrities buried there: T–Z

Viktor Talalikhin (1918–1941), a heroic army lieutenant
Sergei Taneyev (1856–1915), a composer
Vladimir Tatlin (1885–1953), a painter and architect
Vasily Tikhomirov (1876–1956), a choreographer
Nikolai Tikhonov (1905–1997), a politician
Aleksey Tolstoy (1882–1945), a writer
Pavel Tretyakov (1832–1898), a businessman and art collector
Andrei Tupolev (1888–1972), an aircraft designer
Aleksandr Tvardovsky (1910–1971), a writer
Galina Ulanova (1909–1998), a prima ballerina
Vasili Ulrikh (1889–1951), a military judge
Yevgeny Vakhtangov (1883–1922), a theater director
Sergey Vavilov (1891–1951), a physicist
Vladimir Vernadsky (1863–1945), a mineralogist and a geochemist
Ivan Vinogradov (1891–1983), a mathematician
Nikolay Zelinskiy (1861–1953), a chemist
Georgiy Zhzhonov (1915–2005), an actor

Sculptors

The sculptors whose works can be found at Novodevichy Cemetery:

Sergey Konenkov (1874–1971)
Vera Mukhina (1889–1953)
Ernst Neizvestny (b. 1925)
Ivan Shadr (1887–1941)
Yevgeny Vuchetich (1908–1974)

External links

Photographs
More photographs
Novodevichy Cemetery (in Russian) – article from the Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Cemeteries in Moscow

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