The object of study is related to the features of dark tourism as a factor of preserving cultural and historical memory. Some researchers see its origins that appear to be sociocultural phenomenon in the traditions of medieval pilgrimage, during which pilgrims often visited the places of martyrs’ death. A growing interest towards the “sites of memory” (ruined cities, historical cemeteries, graves of famous people, etc.) was observed in the mid–19th century, when the first guidebooks appeared. And the study of dark tourism at the turn of the 20th–21st centuries is due to the “memory boom” — increased attention of researchers to a new direction in the humanities of the era of globalization — “memory studies”. The purpose of the article is to consider the history and practices of dark tourism in the context of modern cultural knowledge.