Approaching Red Square
The gates under the twin green, red and white towers on the left mark an entrance to the square. In front of them a bronze marks GPO "ground zero" for distance measurements to Moscow. The red building in the middle is a museum and on the right the red tower with yellow walls is part of the Kremlin. Kremlin means fort or town and this was the original 1495 walled fort of Moscow, where the Tzars and government was (and still is, to an extent). Other Russian towns have their own fort or kremlin.
Founded in the 12th century, the Principality of Muscovy, was able to emerge from over 200 years of Mongol domination (13th-15th centuries) and to gradually conquer and absorb surrounding principalities. In the early 17th century, a new Romanov Dynas... ... read more 
