Kitezh: The Invisible City of Lake Svetloyar

Folk etymology says the name Kitezh comes from Kideksha, a princely residence near Suzdal that the Mongols ransacked in 1237. The linguist Max Vasmer was not convinced and called the name "obscure". Kideksha was once a town; after the Mongol invasion it shrank to the small village it is today, four kilometres east of Suzdal where the Kamenka meets the Nerl. It is part of Suzdal's World Heritage listing, so the place where the legend may have taken its name is easy to reach.

Location precision: The link between Kideksha and the name Kitezh is a folk etymology, not an established fact; the pin marks the village.

Visitor guidance: A village about 4 km east of Suzdal.

In the legend Prince Georgy first built Little Kitezh on the Volga, then pushed on into the forest to found Great Kitezh. When Batu Khan's army came, the Mongols captured Little Kitezh and Georgy retreated into the woods. Folk tradition identifies Gorodets with that lost town. Batu's army did burn the real Gorodets to the ground in 1239. In Rimsky-Korsakov's opera, Little Kitezh on the Volga is where Fevronia's wedding procession is interrupted by invading Tatars.

Location precision: Gorodets is only one traditional identification; the legend's own Little Kitezh is also placed at Krasny Kholm in Yaroslavl Oblast.

To reach the lake, the legendary prince crossed the Uzola, the Sanda and the Kerzhenets. The opera begins in the "Kerzhenskii Woods", wild forest of thickets and bogs where Fevronia lives in a hut with a treecreeper for a "brother". One day a young prince hunting there loses his way and finds her. Today the Kerzhensky Nature Reserve protects the middle basin of the Kerzhenets: 46,940 hectares of upland and lowland swamp, set up in its current form in 1993.

Location precision: The legend and the opera name the Kerzhenets woods, not a single spot; the pin marks the nature reserve.

Here Great Kitezh made its stand by not making one. The Mongols reached a town with no fortifications at all; its people were praying. Fountains burst from the ground, the town sank into the lake, and the last thing the attackers saw was a cathedral dome with its cross. The old road to the shore is still called the Path of Batu, and on calm days, they say, bells and singing rise from the water. The oval lake, 470 by 350 metres and up to 33.4 metres deep, may in fact be a meteorite crater about 3,000 years old. In Bells from the Deep, Herzog has a local priest and pilgrims recount the legend.

Visitor guidance: The lake lies in Voskresenskoe Povetluzhye Nature Park; it has been a cultural heritage site since 2015.

Rimsky-Korsakov and his librettist Belsky first thought of an opera on Kitezh in the winter of 1898-1899. It reached the stage of the Mariinsky Theatre in Saint Petersburg on 20 February 1907 (7 February in the old calendar). In the finale Fevronia and her prince meet again in the Invisible City, and Good, Love and Justice are victorious. The Mariinsky, open since 1860, also hosted premieres of other Rimsky-Korsakov operas.

Visitor guidance: The Mariinsky Opera still performs in the historic theatre; check the programme for current productions.