Until 1923, the village of Shagota was part of the Romanovo-Borisoglebsky district. This very ancient settlement was first mentioned in the spiritual charter of Dmitry Donskoy in 1389, when the prince bequeathed it along with the Belozersky region to his third son Andrey. In the first half of the 18th century, Shagota belonged to the Khilkov princes, and then passed to the descendants of the Tula gunsmith Nikita Demidov.

After the manifesto on the establishment of ministries was issued in 1802, which also called for donations for education in Russia, Pavel Grigoryevich Demidov was one of the first to respond to this call. In 1803, with his donations, the "Demidov Institute of Higher Sciences" was founded, and the village of Shagota, then called Staroandreevskoye, came into his possession. In 1834, a parish school opened here. The influence of enlightenment on the local peasants is confirmed by the establishment of the Society of Sobriety in 1891, which maintained two tea houses in the village. In 1905, a public library opened in Shagota.

Despite the active educational activities, the Shagota volost remained a center of the radical direction in Old Belief, known as "bezpopovstvo". Among the peasants were supporters of various currents of this movement, such as Pomor and Spasov consent, "fedoseevshchina" and "filippovshchina". Here, there were also "runaways" who rejected any compromises with the world after the church reform of Nikon. The local clergy tried to fight against the "schismatics" by creating a repository of church polemical literature in 1894, available to all who wished.

The history of the village gives special significance to the Church of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary with chapels in the name of Saint Nicholas and Saints Cosmas and Damian, built in 1790. The facades of this two-light cubic temple, executed in baroque style, are decorated with various arched window frames, a wide inter-floor belt, and pilasters. The bell tower with four cubic tiers, located at the western wall of the refectory, has partially preserved frescoes. The apse of the church is destroyed, and the church fence and stone chapel, built in 1889, are in a ruined state. The second stone chapel, erected in 1870 by merchant Alexander Efimov, has not survived. The church is surrounded by an overgrown but functioning cemetery.

Until the early 20th century, there was also a wooden church in the name of Saints Cosmas and Damian, built in 1792.