Trips and Tales (Part 29)
On the beaten track. Moscow must-sees. (I’m running out of cathedrals…)
Cathedral Roundup (Part 4)
In 1612, Dimitry Pozharsky and Mikhail Kutuzov rose in battle to repel Polish invaders. With them they carried a venerated copy of the icon: the Theotokos of Kazan, one of the most revered in Russian Orthodoxy, depicting the Virgin Mary – the “God bearer”.
Pozharsky believed that the icon brought them assistance and ultimately victory, and decided to commission and fund a wooden church as a means to honour it and give thanks for deliverance. The church would also commemorate the siege and capture of Kazan by Ivan IV in 1552. The wooden structure was destroyed by fire in 1632, but rebuilt as a brick church and consecrated in 1637 (then restored in 1753). 1812 saw the military connection reawakened, as the cathedral held a service praying for deliverance against Napoleonic forces. That seemed to work, too.
Located on the north side of Red Square, the form is essentially tiered-cubic, with one main towered dome and several smaller attendees, with the Averkiy Ierapolskiy chapel and a separate bell-tower being built in 1865; all of it in the candy-coated, imported neo-renaissance style. By 1932, the original form had been obscured by later architectural additions, so restoration was undertaken by Peter Baranovsky. Four years later, the cathedral was demolished under orders from Stalin, and ignominiously replaced with a public toilet.
Interestingly, Baranovsky’s intervention was not able to prevent the cathedral’s destruction, but it did succeed in saving the magnificent St. Basil’s cathedral instead. Fortunately, Baranovsky’s measurements and notes on Kazan Cathedral were to survive and provide invaluable reference for the cathedral’s 1993 reconstruction.
Cathedral of the Twelve Apostles
This is part of the same building as the Patriach’s Palace built between 1653 and 1656 as Patriarch Nikon’s grand residence, and marks the entrance to the grounds. Its solid cubical form and 5 helmet-domed towers reference both the Byzantine and Renaissance architectural styles, along with the Vladimir and Suzdal school.
After receiving damage during the Revolution, the cathedral was closed in 1918 but has since been reopened and restored to house the Museum of 17th Century Life and Applied Art, in what was formerly a banqueting hall. Although most of its interior murals have “disappeared”, the cathedral still retains 12th century images of Saints Peter and Paul and a five-tier 17th century iconostasis, itself salvaged from the Ascension Convent before its destruction by the Bolsheviks.
Yelokhovo Cathedral
It’s an explosion of gilded domes and pastel-green Renaissance architecture, with a bell tower thrown in for good measure. Significantly, it is also the vicarial church of the Moscow Patriachs, and unlike most of its major siblings, it did not close during the Soviet era.
The original church was built in 1722–31, although the surviving building dates from 1837 to 1845. It features the familiar squat, cubic base, and major gilded dome with smaller attendees. Separate from the main body of the building, though on the same base, is the ornate bell-tower.
The cathedral has seen the installation of Moscow Patriarchs since 1943, and with fewer and fewer other options left to choose from, became the adopted home of the Russian Orthodox Church in the early 1940s.
Aside from its reliquary of Alexiy of Moscow and the venerated copy of the Theotokos of Kazan, another unusual (although mundane by comparison) feature is the building’s incorporated air conditioning, driven by a natural water supply 250 metres below the capital.
Next time: The Moscow Night Watch
A cinematic diversion into Timur Bekmambetov’s Night Watch.
[Photo by yeowatzup]