12th-century monastery walls discovered during gas pipeline construction in Polotsk
On September 21, in Polotsk, during the laying of a gas pipeline on Yubileynaya Street, walls of the 12th-century St. Boris and Gleb Monastery were uncovered in a trench.
This is the second such incident after February 2015. At that time, an excavator bucket hit part of the foundation of the presumed large cathedral of the Belchitsky Monastery church; a section of the wall of an ancient building, laid with plinths, appeared in the side of the trench. The territory where excavation work is currently underway is part of the protected zone of the Polotsk historical and archaeological museum-reserve, according to "Narodnyya naviny Vitsebska".
The St. Boris and Gleb Monastery was founded by Prince Boris Vseslavich of Polotsk in the 12th century. There are suggestions that the princely residence in Belchitsy was also located in this area. The monastery had at least four churches. It included the so-called Great Cathedral (the actual name is unknown), the churches of St. Paraskeva and St. Boris and Gleb, and a tricophorium church.