Roslavl

Roslavl stands above the Oster, a tributary of the Sozh, in the southern part of the old Smolensk lands. Originally called Rostislavl, it took its name from Prince Rostislav Mstislavich of Smolensk. Its fortified height guarded a route toward the southern Rus' lands, and the town became a centre of princely administration, crafts and trade.

The town passed under Lithuanian authority in the later Middle Ages and was contested by Moscow as the frontier shifted westward. During the Time of Troubles and the wars that followed, Roslavl again changed rulers. The Truce of Deulino placed it under the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1618; Russian forces captured it in 1632, and after further fighting it returned to Russian control in 1654. Its location on the road between Smolensk and the south kept the town involved in military movements across the borderlands.

In 1708 Roslavl lay in the path of Charles XII's Swedish campaign. Under imperial administration it became a district town of the Smolensk region. The old ramparts on Burtseva Hill remained a reminder of the fortified centre around which the town had grown, while its markets served the surrounding villages and their fields and woods. Archaeological traces of the early town show building on the hill in the twelfth century, and the remains of stone churches point to the resources of its princely community.