Imperiia: a spatial history of the Russian EmpireMain MenuAboutProjectsDashboardsData CatalogMapStoriesGalleriesGamesWho said history was boring?Teach Our ContentCiting the ProjectKelly O'Neilldc20b45f1d74122ba0d654d19961d826c5a557f5The Imperiia Project // Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, Harvard University
View of Kortcheva (Korcheva), early 20th century
12020-12-14T12:52:17-05:00Kelly O'Neilldc20b45f1d74122ba0d654d19961d826c5a557f591photograph by M. Dmitriev, Nizhnii-Novgorodplain2020-12-14T12:52:17-05:00Kelly O'Neilldc20b45f1d74122ba0d654d19961d826c5a557f5
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12020-12-11T10:16:29-05:00Kortcheva20a town that rose, fell, and was submergedplain2020-12-14T16:00:20-05:002020-12-14T16:0256.792778, 36.839444A district capital with 2,500 inhabitants.
That is all that Baedeker has to say of this place. But I fell into a pleasant conversion on deck with a gentleman who told me that the town had been a village for centuries until, one day in 1781, Empress Catherine II declared it otherwise. Korcheva proudly took its place on the map, so to speak, as a district town, and it thrived.
That is, it thrived until the railways bypassed it, with the main line between St. Petersburg and Moscow running just west, and the next line running from from Moscow to Kimry to the east.
A common enough tale. And one that matters very little in the scheme of things.
Yet in the few moments it took to pass through, I was overcome with a fleeting sense of nostalgia for a place I would never know.Distance from Tver: 87 versts
