page_title: Basmanny District
section_title: German Quarter
hierarchical_section_title: Basmanny District / History and architecture / German Quarter
caption_attribution_description: Lefortovskaya Square, Basmanny District, Moscow, Russia. It is not in Lefortovsky district, but on the opposite, northern side of Yauza River. The building on the right, Lefortovo Police department, was once crowned with a wooden fire lookout tower - like all police depts in old Moscow.
context_page_description: Basmanny District is a district of Central Administrative Okrug of the federal city of Moscow, Russia. Population: 108,204; 100,899.
  The district extends northeast from Kitai-gorod, within the radial boundaries of Vorontsovo Pole Street and Yauza River in the south and Myasnitskaya Street and Novaya Basmannaya Street in the north. It also includes the territory of Lefortovo Hospital on the opposite, southern bank of Yauza. Historical Lefortovskaya Square also lies within Basmanny District, on the northern side of Yauza.
  The district contains Kursky Rail Terminal, historical areas of Khitrovka, Clean Ponds, Red Gates, German Quarter and Basmannaya Sloboda. It retains memorial buildings of Petrine Baroque, Neoclassicism and Art Nouveau periods. Its history is closely associated with Peter I of Russia, Matvey Kazakov and Alexander Pushkin. The district is home to Russia's largest engineering college, Moscow State Technical University.
context_section_description: Original German Quarter emerged between present-day Baumanskaya Street and Lefortovskaya Square in the late 16th century and was repopulated with Europeans of all nations after 1652, becoming then known as New German sloboda. By 1672, it had three Lutheran and two Calvinist churches (Sytin, p. 310) and numerous factories.
  Tsar Peter, who grew up in nearby sloboda behind Yauza River, was a frequent guest in this settlement and built a palace for Franz Lefort (which later passed to Alexander Menshikov). The palace currently housed military archives. Present-day old hall of Moscow State Technical University, established in 1830, incorporated this palace, as well as former Alexander Bezborodko palace rebuilt by Domenico Giliardi.
  After the fire of 1812, property changed owners, and by 1826 foreigners virtually disappeared from the former German Street (present-day Baumanskaya Street), replaced by local merchants and craftsmen. The district quickly industrialized, especially after Emancipation reform of 1861. Notable additions in the Soviet period were the TsAGI buildings in Radio Street and the numerous expansions of Technical University.
  In the late 1990s, the area became the site of Lefortovo tunnel construction, completing the Third Ring freeway. February 23, 2006, a roof of Baumansky market in the center of German Quarter collapsed, killing 56. The land, cleared of rubble, is still vacant, used for storing impounded cars.
caption: Lefortovskaya Square, hub of former German Quarter
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