Russkaya starina, History and ethnography museum in Smolensk, Russia

The Russkaya Starina building is a two-storey structure of irregular rectangular plan in the Russian style, built 1903–1905 at the corner of Tenisheva and Isakovskogo streets. A lower vestibule adjoins its west side. Above the main entrance, a ceramic panel shows Princess Tenisheva's monogram "MT", the date "1905" and the name "Русская старина". Inside are eight large exhibition halls covered by brick vaults on beams.

Princess Maria Tenisheva kept her collection of icons, manuscripts, weapons and folk art at Talashkino before moving it in 1905 into this purpose-built museum. On 30 May 1911 she donated the collection and the building to the Moscow Archaeological Institute, whose Smolensk branch had opened in 1910. After 1917 the holdings were nationalised, and in 1931 the art gallery was merged into the Museum of Fine Arts named after Nadezhda Krupskaya. The recreated Russkaya Starina exhibition reopened here on 6 October 2022.

The museum's name, "Russian Antiquity," comes from the collection Tenisheva kept in a chest called the "Skrynya" at Talashkino. The 2022 recreated display shows folk and decorative art, including ceramics by Dmitry Alekseenkov, whose panel details over the entrance Tenisheva admired.

The building stands at the corner of Tenisheva and Isakovskogo streets, near the city centre. The entrance vestibule is a lower annex on the western side, and the main exhibition space is on the first floor, reached by a staircase. The eight halls are connected in sequence, so visitors pass through them one after another.

The building's main entrance tympanum carries Tenisheva's monogram "MT", the year "1905" and the inscription "Русская старина", set among plant ornament. The ceramic panel details were made by Dmitry Alekseenkov, a master at the Glembovetsky factory, while artist A. P. Zinoviev designed the composition.