Photo by Gilbert H. Grosvenor 



The: battleme:nts oi'' the; kre;mun : Moscow 



In early days the walls of the fortress were built of oak, but the wooden walls yielded 

 so often to fire that the princes of Moscow finally attempted to construct them of stone and 

 brick. Though this period was three centuries after the English, French, and Germans had 

 built lasting memorials in stone — Ely Cathedral, Notre Dame, Strasburg Cathedral, and 

 many others — the Muscovites were still so ignorant of masonry construction that the walls 

 they built soon fell to pieces. Ivan III, the same who married the heiress to Constantinople 

 (see page 428), thereupon imported Italian architects and Italian masons, who erected the 

 present imposing battlements and taught the people how to manufacture good brick and 

 mortar. 



430 



