The cemetery was designed by
Ivan Mashkov and inaugurated in 1898. Its importance dates from the 1930s, when the necropolises of the medieval Muscovite monasteries (
Simonov,
Danilov,
Donskoy) were scheduled for demolition. Only the Donskoy survived the
Joseph Stalin era relatively intact. The remains of many famous Russians buried in other abbeys, such as
Nikolai Gogol and
Sergey Aksakov, were disinterred and reburied at the Novodevichy. The 19th-century necropolis within the walls of the Novodevichy convent, which contained the graves of about 2000 Russian noblemen and university professors, also underwent reconstruction. The vast majority of graves were destroyed. During the
Soviet Union, burial in the Novodevichy Cemetery was second in prestige only to burial in the
Kremlin Wall Necropolis. Among the Soviet leaders,
Nikita Khrushchev and
Mikhail Gorbachev would be buried there. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, the Kremlin Wall is no longer used for burials and the Novodevichy Cemetery is used for only the most symbolically significant burials. In 1997, former premier
Nikolai Tikhonov was buried in the cemetery at state expense (since he didn't have any money of his own). In April 2007, within one week both the first
President of the Russian Federation Boris Yeltsin and cellist
Mstislav Rostropovich were buried there. Today, the cemetery holds the tombs of Russian authors, musicians, playwrights, and poets, as well as famous actors, political leaders, and scientists. Notable burials include
Dmitry Shostakovich,
Sergei Prokofiev and
Anton Chekhov. ==Monuments==