Balchug — a popular flea market near the Nizhny Novgorod Kremlin.
Background
Near the riverbed Pochayna (on the left), in the first half of the 19th century, there was a small settlement called “Pochaina,” which was completely destroyed by a fire in 1850. After that, the area remained undeveloped for a long time, and starting in the 1880s, rows of stalls from the St. John the Baptist Church were moved here to form a rag market known as “Balchug.”
Balchug was built according to a plan Nizhny Novgorod 1881, upon publication Pochaina Ravine and Pochainskaya Street to The Nizhny Posad Guest House and Christmas near the ancient Church of Our Lady of Kazan (Built by the merchant and industrialist A.-F. Olisov in 1687.)
Origin of the Name
The Pochainsky flea market was commonly known as “Vetoshny” or, in the Tatar language, “Balchug,” since the main merchants there were Tatars from Nizhny Novgorod. It mainly sold raw materials, worn-out clothing, used furniture, scrap metal, and other secondhand goods. Junk dealers bought up old coats, boots, and holey hats on Nizhegorodskaya Street in Nizhny Novgorod, collecting all sorts of odds and ends of negligible value—binoculars without lenses, empty sword scabbards, and tattered portraits of military figures Russia, broken candlesticks covered in century-old mold, and other junk. Balchug’s regulars were members of the lower classes, who dealt in cheap goods and made a pittance. According to some researchers, Balchug was associated with the early years of Maxim Gorky. An industrial development area is emerging above the market (the Yermolayevs’ factory, now JSC “Pochaina”).
See also
- "Bracket"