Presidential Library’s cinema club showed and discussed “Frontier Area” film

The Presidential Library hosted another meeting of the cinema club. The documentary entitled “Frontier Area”, which was the result of joint efforts of the Presidential Library’s film crew and the Bryansk State Museum of Local History, was shown as part of the meeting. Representatives of the Kirillo-Belozersky State Historical, Architectural Art Museum-Reserve, the A. I. Marineco Museum of the History of the Russian Navy Submarine Forces, the Bryansk community in St. Petersburg "Peresvet" brought together, and the Bryansk State Museum of Local History, the F. I. Tyutchev Bryansk Regional Research Universal Library joined the discussion via video-conferencing. On the closed part of the portal, the employees of the Central Library System of the Black Sea Region of the Republic of Crimea watched what was happening in the Presidential Library.

According to director of the film Tatyana Dyakonova, it was based on an interview with Vladimir Petrovich Alexeev, Deputy Director for Science at the Bryansk State Museum of Local History. "This amazing man and scientist managed to fill the film with the verified historical knowledge and make it truly relevant, because the border Bryansk region, neighboring Ukraine and Belarus, apparently, is determined to be an outpost of Russia in the south-west".

The film spotlights the history of Bryansk land and its ancient cities of Russia. Events, that took place here in the past, are presented in the chronicle “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign”. Archaeological monuments of world importance on the Desna River and the Russian Plain – the only sources, that give a chance to study the life of this area from the Middle Paleolithic to the time of Ancient Rus’, give proof of those events. The Bryansk Museum of Local History keeps an extensive archaeological collection, which is presented in the film by Vladimir Alexeev, Deputy Director of the museum.

The Bronze, Copper, Iron Ages… Artifacts of the Bryansk Museum illustrate the way of life of tribes, which had inhabited the area. Gradually the population became sedentary. Many fortified settlements appeared: people of Bryansk area were always ready to defend themselves from nomads – the Scythians. The Bryansk Museum exposition displays Scythian triangular copper arrows.

"Bryansk is that territorial limit that Russia repeatedly beat back from its enemies - the Poles, for example", - Vladimir Alexeev told via video conferencing. - It is here that we need to look for origins of the ethnogenesis of the Slavs, the "appearing" of Vyatichi, Radimichi, and Drevlyans into the Russian people. The role of the Bryansk region is thus immense in the history of Russia, and our film is an attempt to use imaginative multimedia to tell about it".

The archaeological part of the exposition was created by a museum employee, a well-known archaeologist Feodor Mikhailovich Zavernyaev, the author of a monograph on the history of the Paleolithic. It was him in the vicinity of Bryansk at a depth of 20 meters was discovered the world famous Mid-Paleolithic parking Hotylevo 1.

Battle of Kulikovo is described in detail in the rare books of the Presidential Library, such as, for example, "Demetrius of the Don and the Battle of Kulikovo" (1863), and the film traces a "Bryansk trace" in this heroic and dramatic history - the Battle of Kulikovo was opened by Alexander Peresvet, a former Bryansk monk (according to other sources - boyar). The memory of Alexander Peresvet is perpetuated by the equestrian statue, established on the Pokrovskaya mountain, the ancient center of Bryansk.

In the XVIII century Bryansk became the basic forge of weapons for the Russian army. "Under Peter I, an arsenal is being created here, as yet as workshops for the repair of weapons and artillery", - Vladimir Alexeev continues his story on the screen. - Shipyards are being built, they were built here for the production of wooden vessels throughout the XVII century. The exposition displays wooden ship of the XIII century, made of a whole oak. And already under Empress Anna Ioannovna the shipyard is based in Bryansk".

Thanks to the cannons of the Bryansk arsenal, Novorossiya was conquered and the territory of the Northern Black Sea Coast and the Crimean peninsula were joined. When the Russian shipyards were built in Kherson, the need for Bryansk production was over, and the Admiralty shipyards were closed. The frontier area once became a part of central Russia in new time. And today Bryansk is again an outpost in the west of the country.

The film "Frontier Area" can be watched on the Presidential Library portal in "Multimedia" section.