S.A.K.A

The Literary Memorial Museum to Taras Shevchenko and the Memorial were built on Tarasova Hill in the mid-to-late 1930’s and were officially unveiled in June 1939. But with the invasion of the Nazi forces in 1941, the Hill became a battleground and in 1943 the Museum was fated to be converted into the headquarters of a concentration camp, from where the inmates, civilians and captured red army soldiers, were put to work digging defensive trenches all over the hill. The ground floor of the building was used as stable for German horses and a slaughterhouse for cattle. Gun emplacements were cut into the roof to watch over the River Dnieper. Both the Museum and the Memorial were extensively damaged, but were restored in the years after the war. Over a period of six years the Museum has been totally refurbished and was reopened in August 2010. The walls of the galleries are decorated with stunning enlargements of famous paintings by Taras Shevchenko and the halls contain many artefacts.