Cultural and Historic Ensemble of the Solovetsky Islands

Far out in the White Sea, six islands totalling some 300 square kilometres carry an extraordinary weight of history. People reached the Solovetsky archipelago as early as the 5th millennium BCE, leaving stone labyrinths and burial mounds; from the 15th century a great fortified monastery rose here, its churches added between the 16th and 19th centuries. Remote, austere and hauntingly beautiful, the ensemble was listed as World Heritage by UNESCO in 1992.