This is the historical part of Moscow bordering the Kremlin on the east, Staraya (Old) and Novaya (New) squares on the west, and the Moskva River on the south and including the area known as Red Square.

Settlement in Kitay-gorod began in the 11th century. As a suburb of Moscow, it became a centre of trade in the 14th century under the name of Bolshoi Posad ('Large Merchants' Quarter').

The name Kitay-gorod dates only from the 16th century when the quarter prospered and became the hub of the powerful merchant class. Although in Russian Kitay is for 'China' and gorod is for 'town', Kitay-gorod does not mean 'China town' at all, and is probably derived from the Russian word 'kita', which is for several poles tied together, referring to the form of construction used in building the 16th century wood-and-earth fortifications.
Another interpretation attributes the origin of the name to the distorted Tartar word katay ('fortress,' or 'centre'). In 1535-38, a nearly six-metre-thick wall (connected to the Kremlin) was built to protect Kitay-gorod from invasion.

The 1.6-mile- (2.5-kilometre-) long brick wall was demolished in 1934, and only small sections of the original wall have been preserved. Although ravaged by fire during Polish invasion (1610) and again during the 1812 war, Kitay-Gorod continued to be for centuries the commercial and cultural centre of Moscow, where, along with banks, the stock-exchange and warehouses, Pechatny Dvor, Russia's first printing house (1563) and the Slavonic-Greek- Latin Academy (1687), Russia's first institute of higher education, were built.

Out of survived constructions of particular note are the Church of the Trinity (1628-34) in Nikitniki, the 15th-century Church of St.Anne of the Conception, and the Epiphany Cathedral (1693-96). Many of the old buildings near the Moskva river, however, were demolished in the 1960s to make room for the huge Rossiya Hotel.

Among the noted architectural monument of the area are also the 16th-century house of the Romanov boyars, the Gostiny Dvor, Moscow's largest 19-th century trading center built by Giacomo Quarenghi in 1835, and the Monastery of the Sign (1679-89). The total reconstruction of the area took place in the 20s of the last century.