Pokrovsky Cathedral Biography

The Orthodox Church is located in the historical center of Moscow, which has earned international recognition of unique beauty. The uniqueness of the architectural monument makes us admire all guests of the capital, and Muscovites are sincerely proud that they are involved in the world masterpiece. The Cathedral of Basil Blessed was built in - gg. The king of all Rus' vowed that he would build a church in the event of the capture of the Kazan Khanate.

The people were called the Cathedral on the moat, as it was built next to the deep moat passing along the eastern wall of the Kremlin. The posttaken and Barma were Russian architects, who built the Cathedral of Vasily Blessed. This became known only in the year, when there were records in the historical manuscript collection of the 17th century.

According to legend, Ivan the Terrible, seeing the cathedral built according to their project, was so delighted with its beauty that he ordered the architects to blind so that they could no longer build a temple equal in beauty to the Pokrovsky Cathedral. Later, in one of the limits of the temple, the most revered holy fool in Rus' was buried - Vasily Blessed.

The legend says that he collected money for the future Pokrovsky temple, and on Red Square threw coins over his right shoulder - and no one, even thieves, dared to touch this money. And in August, before his death, he gave the collected money to Ivan the Terrible, who ordered the temple to build on this place. Blessed Vasily Cathedral is a symmetrical ensemble of eight polling churches surrounding the ninth - the highest temple crowned with a tent.

Each of the eight churches is named after the saint in whose day this or that important event of the Kazan campaigns of Ivan the Terrible occurred. And the central church is dedicated to the holiday of the Virgin cover - it was on this day that Kazan was taken by the attack. The crowds of churches are crowned with onion domes, not one of which, according to architectural decoration, repeats others.

Each dome is decorated with cornices, kokoshniki, windows, niches. According to one of the legends, Napoleon wanted to transfer this miracle of architecture to Paris, but the technique of that time was unable to cope with this task, and then the French emperor, before the retreat, ordered his army to blow the temple with the Kremlin. Muscovites tried in vain to extinguish the lit wicks, but the providence intervened, and suddenly poured pouring rain, which helped stop the explosion.

In the middle of the XX century, the Cathedral of Vasily Blessed received the status of the museum, and since the year it has been listed as a branch of the State Historical Museum. The temple-museum presents 9 iconostases, in which there are about icons of the XVI-XIX centuries representing the best examples of the Novgorod and Moscow icon painting. In addition to the icons, the cathedral presents portrait and landscape painting, and church utensils, the walls of the cathedral are formed by frescoes.

Among the particularly valuable exhibits is the rat of the XVII century a liturgical vessel for the consecration of wine belonging to Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. It contains an interesting collection of bells cast in Russia, Belarus, Holland, France and Germany, as well as various weapons of the times of Ivan the Terrible.