Alarm Tower

This was one of the last towers to be built. It got its name from the bell hanging in it which used to summon the townfolk in times of danger. In 1680, it was topped by a cube adorned with slender semicolumns, a four-faceted tent roof with double listening apertures and a watch tower with a bell. In 1771, the tolling of the bell marked the outbreak of a popular uprising against the boyars and high clergy in Moscow. After cruelly suppressing the uprising, Empress Catherine the Great ordered the bell's tongue to be removed, which was common practice at that time in Russia. For more than thirty years, the bell hung "tongueless". In 1803, the bell was taken down and transferred to the Arsenal and subsequently, in 1821, to the Armoury where it remains to this day.

The height of the tower is 38 m (125 ft).