Taras Hill or Chernecha Hora ( uk, Чернеча гора; literally, Monk's Hill) is a hill on the bank of the

Dnieper } The Dnieper () or Dnipro (); , ; . is one of the major transboundary rivers of Europe, rising in the Valdai Hills near Smolensk, Russia, before flowing through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. It is the longest river of Ukraine and ...

near

Kaniv Kaniv ( uk, Канів, ) city located in Cherkasy Raion, Cherkasy Oblast (province) in central Ukraine. The city rests on the Dnieper River, and is also one of the main inland river ports on the Dnieper. It hosts the administration of Kaniv urb ...

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

and an important landmark of the Shevchenko National Preserve where the remains of the famous Ukrainian poet and artist

Taras Shevchenko Taras Hryhorovych Shevchenko ( uk, Тарас Григорович Шевченко , pronounced without the middle name; – ), also known as Kobzar Taras, or simply Kobzar (a kobzar is a bard in Ukrainian culture), was a Ukrainian poet, wr ...

have been buried since 1861. The original site of Shevchenko's burial is the

Smolensky Cemetery Smolensky Cemetery () is the oldest continuously operating cemetery in Saint Petersburg, Russia.St. Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

and later his body was moved to the banks of

. The hill formerly belonged to Kaniv's Holy Dormition monastery (Eastern Orthodox) that existed here since the 11th century. The monastery was the burial place of several hetmans of Ukraine:

Ivan Pidkova Ivan Pidkova ( uk, Іван Підкова) or Ioan Potcoavă (died 16 June 1578), also known as Ioan Creţul, and Nicoară Potcoavă among Romanians, was a prominent Cossack ataman, and short-lived Voivode (Prince) of Moldavia (November–Decem ...

, Samiylo Kishka and others. Тарасова світлиця

Due to the 100th Anniversary of Shevchenko birth, in 1914 the Russian government dispatched gendarmes and cossacks to prevent pilgrimage to the burial. Since 1923 the hill was part of the Kaniv Nature Preserve. In 1926 the special Kaniv Museum-Preserve of Shevchenko was created. In 1939 a Russian sculptor

Matvey Manizer Matvey Genrikhovich Manizer (russian: Матвей Генрихович Манизер, – 20 December 1966) was a prominent Russian sculptor. Manizer created a number of works that became classics of socialist realism. Life Manizer wa ...

(architect Yevgeniy Levinson) created the bronze statue that along with newly built museum building built by Ukrainian architects

Vasyl Krychevsky Vasyl Hryhorovych Krychevsky ( uk, Василь Григорович Кричевський; January 12, 1873 in Vorozhba village, now Lebedyn Raion – November 15, 1952, in Caracas, Venezuela) was a Ukrainian painter, architect, art scholar, gr ...

and

Petro Kostyrko Petro is a masculine given name, a surname and an Ancient Roman cognomen. It may refer to: Given name * Petro Balabuyev (1931-2007), Ukrainian airplane designer, engineer and professor, lead designer of many Antonov airplanes * Petro Doroshenko (1 ...

became the main features of the location. It was on the Taras Hill that

Oleksa Hirnyk Oleksa Mykolajovych Hirnyk ( uk, Олекса Миколайович Гiрник, Oleksa Mykolajovyč Hirnyk; 28 March 1912 – 21 January 1978) was a Ukrainian Soviet dissident, an engineer by profession, who burned himself to death as an act of ...

burned himself to death in protest of

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

suppression of the Ukrainian language, culture and history in 1978.''Crimes of Communism Against Ukraine And Her People, Art Ukraine web-site'' It happened on the 60th anniversary of the initial declaration of Ukrainian independence in 1918. At present, the mount belongs to the Shevchenko National Preserve dedicated to the poet and is a place of mass visits from all over the country and abroad. A

Church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * C ...

in memory of Taras Shevchenko (''Tarasova Cerkva'') is planned to be built here. Chernecha Hora is considered to be a historical, natural and cultural monument of All-Ukrainian importance and national relic of Ukraine.

References

External links

Historical outlook
at the Shevchenko Preserve website Hills of Ukraine Dnieper Upland Dnieper basin Museums in Cherkasy Oblast Poetry museums Biographical museums in Ukraine Kaniv {{Ukraine-museum-stub