Not many people know that the burial vault of Tsar Boris Godunov and his family is located in the Троице-Сергиевой лавре. To the left of the entrance to the stunningly beautiful Успенский собор stands a low covered structure, just over a meter high. This white-stone building is the Godunov family burial vault.
On its facade are four marble plaques with the names of those buried here: Tsar Boris Godunov, his wife Maria (née Skuratova), Tsar Fyodor Borisovich, and his sister Ksenia (after taking monastic vows, Olga). The tragic history of this family did not end even after their deaths.
After the murder of Fyodor and his mother Maria in 1605, their bodies, together with the body of Boris Godunov, who had been buried earlier, were interred in the Varsonofievsky Monastery by order of False Dmitry without any ceremonies or honors. But the very next year, Tsar Vasily Shuisky ordered the Godunovs to be solemnly reburied in the Троице-Сергиевом monastery. 17 years later, their daughter and sister Ksenia joined them, whom False Dmitry had forcibly tonsured as a nun.
Originally, the Godunovs were buried differently, but in 1782 the monastery porch collapsed, and their graves were left uncovered. After that, it was decided to protect the burials with an enclosed burial vault.
