Berezovets

Berezovets stood above the eastern shore of Lake Seliger’s Berezovsky reach, beside a portage across the watershed between the Volga and the rivers leading to Novgorod. Its fortified height was protected by an earthwork of boulders, sand and clay reinforced with timber. The site had become a Novgorodian stronghold by the early thirteenth century.

A 1440 agreement between Novgorod and the Lithuanian grand prince Casimir named Berezovets among the places from which he was to receive tribute, including money and twenty marten pelts. The Seliger route later lost importance under Moscow, and the fortress declined, especially after the Polish-Lithuanian intervention. Its ruined ramparts remained a landmark on the lake shore. The hill above Berezovy Ryadok preserves the place of the old fortification and the portage it once guarded.