The quarter post is a forestry sign that is installed at the intersection of quarter clearings. Such a post was used to mark quarters in forestry. It was found in the former monastery forest between the Varlamovskoe and Filippovskoe lakes.

The numbering on the quarter posts indicated which quarter was located where the post stood. By the numbers on the quarter posts, one could determine the direction of the cardinal points: the angle between two smaller numbers (on two faces of the post) would point to the north, while the opposite angle would indicate the south.

The forest occupied almost the entire area of the monastery lands. The main holdings were acquired during the time of the monastery’s founder, Head Superior John; from that period, the monastery monitored, preserved, and expanded its forest lands.

Having formed a single continuous land mass adjacent to the monastery (which is referred to on maps as the “Sarov Forest Estate”), the monks began industrial logging after 1782. It became the main wealth of the Sarov Monastery.

By the late 19th and early 20th century, the forest estate of the Sarov Monastery was an exemplary, well-organized space. The forest was divided into plots separated by clearings and was logged according to a specially developed elaborate plan. There were nursery quarters for planting and renewing the forest. Each forest plot had a ranger of its own, and special guardhouses were built for such rangers. The forest provided the main source of income for the monastery, with revenue from timber sales being the largest part of all monetary receipts for the year.

The famous Sarov Forest was celebrated numerous times by pilgrims and traveling guests of the monastery, including well-known poets, writers, and philosophers of the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Among them was Maximilian Voloshin who wrote in his poem “Saint Seraphim”,