Women’s Headrails
Since long ago Don Cossack women had peculiar headwear and hairdos. ...
Museum
The State M.A. Sholokhov Museum-Reserve is widely known in Russia and abroad as a unique memorial of the Russian culture, the Cossack history and the Don nature. In 2006, by the Decree of the President of Russia it was included into the National List of the most valuable structures of the cultural heritage of the peoples of the Russian Federation.
The Museum was set up on July, 11, 1984, on the purpose of perpetuating the memory of the great Russian writer. There are preserved all things connected with the life and creative work of Sholokhov (personal belongings, manuscripts, letters, houses, where he lived, the nature, villages and stanitsas depicted in his works), with the history and cultural traditions of the Upper Don.
The Museum-Reserve is situated in the Rostov Region on the territory of its three northern districts. The preserved landscape area is 38236 ha. There are 19 memorials of history and culture, 6 natural memorials and 256 archeological memorials. The Museum has 17 permanent exhibitions and expositions laid out on the up-to-date level, arts and crafts workshop, classrooms. The exhibition area is 1870 m2, the total number of the museum-pieces kept in the museum funds exceeds 70 000.
The Museum carries out an extensive expositional, keeping, scientific-research, educational, ecological and tourist activity. Notwithstanding its considerable remoteness from the railway and big cities (the nearest railway station of Millerovo is 145 km, Rostov-on-Don is 354 km, Moscow is 800 km) it is visited by 70 thousand people annually, with the number of visitors growing increasingly.
The exhibitions of the Museum collections travelled to many parts of Russia and abroad. In 2006 the residents of Taiwan got acquainted with the Russian literature classic M.A. Sholokhov at the exhibition “To the Summit of the People’s Literature. Dialogue Between Russia and Taiwan”. In 2010 the exhibition devoted to the 105th anniversary of the writer visited the XIX International Book Fair in Havana. At the international tourist exhibitions in Spain, Germany, Great Britain, bringing out thousands of visitors, the Sholokhov Museum exposition arouse a great interest.
Within the past quarter of the century the Museum-Reserve of M.A. Sholokhov has become a noticeable phenomenon in the cultural life of Russia, one of the most dynamically progressing young museums in Europe. During the recent 5 years realizing the conception of development “The Open Air Novel” it was awarded with the International M.A. Sholokhov Prize (2004), with the Golden Medal “National Property” of the charity fund “The Maecenases of the Century (2005), with the Silver Crown and the diploma of the contest “The Leaders of Tourindustry” (2005), with the finalist diploma in separate nominations and the Grand-Prix of the festival “Intermuseum”. The Museum got the certificate of the European Heritage Association “The Best in Heritage”, became the member of the International Club of “The Best in Heritage”, became the nominant in the contest of the European Museum Forum for the title of “The Best Museum in Europe” of 2007, the laureate of the Y. Senkevich National Tourist Prize in the nomination of “The Best Regional Museum” in 2008, got the Grand-Prix of the National Ecological Prize “EcoWorld 2009”.
The Museum-Reserve of M.A. Sholokhov is young, and now it is opening out with its youth enthusiasm, continually extending its cultural influence in Russia and abroad.