Description of the attraction
Old Orhei in the city of the same name in the Republic of Moldova is a museum-reserve located at Cape Pestere, in a picturesque rocky gorge, 60 km north-east of Chisinau. The open-air museum-reserve has another name "Moldavian Troy".
In Old Orhei, archaeologists have discovered traces of several civilizations. It was here that the Geto-Dacian defensive fortress (VI-I centuries BC), the settlement of the Golden Horde Shehr-al-Jedid (end of the XIV century), Orthodox monasteries (starting from the XIV century), as well as a Moldavian town Orhei (XV-XVII centuries).
The local territories have been inhabited since ancient times. At the beginning of the XIV Art. this territory was conquered by the Golden Horde, after which a city was founded on this place, which received the name Shehr-al-Jedid. At that time, Sherh-Al-Jedid was an important staging post for the army during the campaigns of conquest. In the second half of the 60s. XIV Art. the city was destroyed. In the 20s. XV Art. the Moldavian settlement of Orhei appeared here. In the XV century. the famous ruler of the Moldavian principality Stefan cel Mare ordered the construction of a stone fortress Orhei on this place. In the middle of the XVI century. local residents moved to a new place - 18 km north of the previous one. After a while, they founded a city here called Orhei.
Old Orhei is the only urban-type architectural monument in Moldova. Archaeological excavations here began in 1947 and continue to this day.
The Museum-Reserve is a system of natural landscapes and historical monuments. The complex includes several steep cliffs, the central of which is the Pestere rock. Together with one more rock - Butuceni, they form a harmonious natural complex.
The oldest fortified structure of Old Orhei is the Geta fortress, located on the Butuchenskaya rock. Another building that is of great interest among tourists is the Medieval Fortress, built after the conquest of this area by the Golden Horde. Among other sights of Old Orhei, it is also worth noting, located on the opposite bank of the Reut river, a long and narrow section of the bank with the ruins of several more ancient structures - a rock monastery of the 15th century, the building of the Assumption Church of the 19th century, and fragments of the Geto-Dacian defensive fortress.
