The exhibit of the Museum of Local History and Tradition
The ethnographic collection
Architectural monuments of Podporozhsky district

The museum collections are presented in several permanent shows.

The "Nature of the Svir' Lands" exhibit tells of animals and plants of the area displaying stuffed animals and birds and pictures of inhabitants of local woods and lakes.

The "Our Lands in the Remote Past" exhibit presents the late Stone Age monuments of 6,000 B.C. The "Mound Culture of the Ves'" section documents research of the medieval tumuli of the 10th-13th centuries.

The "Domestic Life in the Villages of the Svir' Lands" show introduces visitors to common trades and occupations of local population in the late 19th-early 20th centuries. The scale models of the 16th-19th centuries monuments of wooden architecture in the Svir' lands deserve special attention.

The "Our Land during Great Patriotic War" exhibit demonstrates the army operations that took place in the area and tells about the Heroes of the Soviet Union - both natives and those who defended these lands in 1941-1944.

The draft projects, "Svir'stroi" journals edited by Genrikh Graftio, photographs documenting the history of the Verkhne-Svirskaya hydropower station that was built in the environs in the 1930-ies are of no less interest.

The Vepsa (Vepsian) people has been long since settling on the territory of Podporozh'sky district between three northern lakes - Ladoga, Onega and Beloye. It belongs to the Baltic Finnish branch of the Finno-Ugric language family. The history of the Vepsians is interconnected with the history of the Russians living side by side with them for many centuries.

The samples of Vepsian applied art, household artifacts, documents, issues of "The Vepsian Pravda(Truth)" and books in Vepsian language are displayed in the museum. Many articles (like towels and dresses) since the early 20th century has been decorated with traditional Vepsian fast-printed pattern.

Original woodwork is displayed here. Ornamented salt-cellars and wickerwork using pine-tree roots or birch-bark are still produced by the Vepsa.
Many museum items were donated by locals, the ABC book of 1932 in Vepsian language with a jig-saw supplement "Natural history" of 1936 being especially valuable.

Podporozhsky district lies in the northeast of Leningrad region, in the Svir' and Upper Oka Rivers basins.

In old days an important road (named Arkhangelsky trakt, i.e. route) connecting the shore of the White Sea with Moscow traversed the Svir' lands. Villages and church-yards with household buildings were erected along the road by local masters. Peasants' houses, threshing barns, storehouses and churches in the villages of Rodionovo, Gimreke, Vazhiny, Sheleiky have survived to our days.

The number of registered historic and architectural objects located in Podporozhsky district equals 126, 64 of them being monuments of wooden architecture. The most valuable structures are announced national monuments.

One of these unique sites, the Church of Resurrection in the village of Vazhiny, was built in 1630 as the inscriptions on the boards of the icon screen witness. The temple has four premises - a storeroom with the altar, the proper church made out of thick logs and looking like a fortress, a refectory and an octahedral bell-tower.

The Nikolskaya Church (Church of Sv.Nikola) in the village of Sogintsy was erected in the late 17th century. It is a typical church building felled of thick logs having a steeple with an "onion" cupola.

The small Church of the Apostles Peter and Paul built in the 1680-ies in the village of Zaozer'e is also worth seeing.

The most renowned church of the Svir' lands is the Church of Sv.Georgy (St.George) in the village of Yuksovichi (Rodionovo now) which is 60 km far from Podporozh'e. The village of Yuksovichi was first mentioned in the Charter of Novgorodian Prince Svyatoslav Ol'govich in 1137. "Yuks" means "the first" settlement in Vepsian.

According to the legend, 500 years ago monks came to Yuksovskoye Lake to build a church on its shore. They threw an axe-handle to the lake and watched where it would float. Thus the place for the church was chosen - on the high eastern shore of the lake.

The Church of Sv.Georgy, a treasure of church wooden architecture, was built in 1493. It is perfectly shaped in its austerity and expressiveness. The building refers to the oldest and simplest type of a Russian church - it represents a plain framework of a storehouse under a gable roof. To produce monumental impression, the builders of the church crowned the roof with a cupola bearing a cross and attached a porch. A three-level icon screen was placed inside the church.