The Novodevichy Convent has been founded in 1524 by the prince Vasily III in honor of the greatest orthodox shrine - the Smolensk icon of the Mother of God, and in commemoration of liberation of Smolensk from Poles and his return to structure of Russian lands. Throughout several centuries the monastery has been closely connected with the main events and characters of political, religious and cultural life of the state Russian: Ivan the Terrible, Boris Godunov (who in 1598 has been called in the monastery on a kingdom), the tsar Alexey Mikhaylovich. At the end of the 17th century the monastery has been involved in bitter political struggle for the power between Peter I and his sister Sofya. As a result Sofya has been violently sent to the monastery and tonsured in the nun where she has died in 1704. In Patriotic war of 1812 when French have occupied Moscow, the monastery has been used for placement of warehouses, and there was even a threat of explosion of all his constructions.