Sivtsev Vrazhek Lane

Sivtsev Vrazhek

Сивцев Вражек
Sivtsev Vrazhek Lane
Location	Moscow, Russia

Sivtsev Vrazhek is a radial lane in the Central Administrative Okrug of Moscow; it forms the boundary between Arbat and Khamovniki municipal districts. The lane begins at a T-junction with Gogolevsky Boulevard and runs west, roughly parallel to Arbat Street (north) and Prechistenka Street (south), ending at a T-junction with Denezhny Lane, one block short of the Garden Ring. The name of the lane, literally Sivka stream gully, refers to a historical stream now locked in an underground sewer and is only one of two Vrazheks in present-day Moscow (the other being Kozhevnichesky Vrazhek west of Novospassky Bridge).

Sivka Stream ran eastward along the present-day lane into Chertoryi Stream that flowed southward on site of present-day Gogolevsky Boulevard into Moskva River. In the 18th century Sivka was locked into an open stone-clad ditch, opening up space for a proper lane, and in the first quarter of the 19th century the ditch was rebuilt into an underground sewer.

In the 15th and 16th centuries Sivtsev Vrazhek was part of a road connecting Moscow with Smolensk. The area prospered since taking of Smolensk by Vasily III, but, in the end of the 16th century, construction of Bely Gorod fortress walls separated the street from the center of Moscow; the Smolensk highway changed its track in favor of Arbat Street, and Sivtsev Vrazhek became a quiet residential street. During the 17th century the area was fragmented into four slobodas of different trades employed by the Court: from east to west, these were icon painters, horse grooms, carpenters and mint workers. All of these trades are retained in the names of north–south lanes crossing Sivtsev Vrazhek. The crisis of Moscow economy caused by Peter I depopulated these slobodas, and in the first half of the 18th century their lands were taken over by aristocracy. The area was dominated by wooden estate houses placed on spacious garden lots, with very few stone buildings.