One of the most beautiful buildings in the Russian capital. Erected in the 17th century, which has undergone many changes and transformations, today it is part of the Grand Kremlin Palace, is the Residence of the President of the Russian Federation and a true masterpiece of Russian architectural art. We can say that the Terem Palace is the result of a harmonious synthesis of traditions and features inherent in Russian wooden architecture, and the enfilade construction of premises, completely new and unusual for that time.
History of the Terem Palace
The Terem Palace, which was then simply called the Tsar's Palace, was built in 1635-1636 by order of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich. A new building was built by masters Larion Ushakov, Bazhen Ogurtsov and Trefil Sharutin under the leadership of Antipa Konstantinov. The basis for the future palace was the lower tier of the northern part of the grand-ducal palace built in the 15th century and the Workshop Chambers built above it in the next century.
The new palace went down in history as the first royal chambers made of stone. He also became the “ancestor” of the enfilade construction. For its construction, the latest technologies at that time using iron “connections” were used. This made it possible to reduce the thickness of the walls and, accordingly, increase the width of the space.
The first tier of the new palace had an economic purpose; it also housed the chambers of the queen and the heirs to the throne. The third was located on a flat roof (gulbishche) and was a large tower - the same “Golden-Domed Tower” in which meetings of the Boyar Duma were held.
The second tier, in which the royal chambers were located, was considered the “main” one. Each of the chambers had its own name - “Passage Hall”, “Chamber of the Cross”, “Bedchamber”, “Altar Room”. On the southern side of the palace there was a front Bed Porch, to which the Golden Staircase led from Boyarskaya Square, which in turn overlooked Verkhnespasskaya site.
The Verkhnespasskaya site got its name due to the fact that the royal house church of the Savior “on Seny” was located on it. This church was also called the “Church of the Savior behind the golden bars,” since the staircase leading to it was locked with bars. Not gold - iron, but the gilding was applied so flawlessly that the grille really seemed golden. And in the western part of the palace there is the Church of the Nativity of Our Lady “on Senya”, built on the foundation of a church built at the end of the 14th century. The Church of Catherine, over which the Church of the Resurrection of the Word was erected, and the Church of the Crucifixion are also located on the territory of the Terem Palace. The crucifix in the chapel of the Church of the Crucifixion is the creation of the hands of the monastic elder Hippolytus. But there are legends about the image of the Savior in the church of the same name that it appeared there without human intervention.
Painting of the Terem Palace
The walls of the Terem Palace were painted with fancy ornaments, heraldic patterns, and decorated with paintings on biblical themes and scenes illustrating monarchical ideas. The original painting has not survived. In 1836 - 1837, 200 years after the construction of the palace, during the restoration work and construction of the Grand Kremlin Palace, the interior painting was done anew under the strict guidance of the artist F. Solntsev. The new wall decoration was in the style of the 17th century.
The first stone residential chambers in the royal palace, later called the Terem Palace, were built in 1635-1636. for Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich of stone craftsmen Bazhen Ogurtsov, Antip Konstantinov, Trefil Sharutin and Larion Ushakov. The basis for the newly erected three-story chambers was the lower tier of the northern part of the palace, built by Aleviz Fryazin in 1499-1508. and built over it in the second half of the 16th century. Workshop chambers.
Terem Palace, 1797. Veduta by Giacomo Quarenghi
The Terem Palace was designed according to the type of Russian wooden houses, the features of which are manifested both in the exterior and in the layout of the building. The palace is a multi-tiered building. New floors were erected at some distance from the old walls and rose up in stepped tiers.
It seems that each tier seems to grow from the previous one like a pyramid. Here the talent of the palace’s creators was fully demonstrated: limited by space and the proximity of neighboring buildings, they managed to create a masterpiece of architectural art, pleasing the eye with its festive splendor.
Antiquities of the Russian country, 1846-1853. Illustrator - ru: Solntsev, Fedor Grigorievich. Section VI. Monuments of ancient Russian architecture Windows of the Terem Palace.
Boyar's Square and the Church of the Savior behind the Golden Lattice in the Moscow Kremlin. 1838. E. Gilbertzon
Boyarskaya site in the Moscow Kremlin. (until 1838)
The features of Russian wooden architecture can be traced not only in the tiered structure, but also in the nature of the roof, the design of the porch with a gable roof, and the layout of the rooms, reminiscent of the interior of a Russian hut, which is based on a cage (a log frame usually with three windows on the facade). The white stone window frames and portals are decorated with floral patterns depicting birds and animals.
Terem Palace in the Moscow Kremlin. 1635-1636. South facade. Engraving from the 1870s
Alekseev F. Ya. View in the Kremlin of the Terem Palace and the Church of the Savior on Bor. 1800s
Fedor Yakovlevich Alekseev. Boyar platform in the Moscow Kremlin (1801)
Terem Palace. Sovereign's window.
The window of the royal chamber is decorated with a high pediment, but which depicts a coat of arms supported by small columns; the bases of the columns are presented in the form of stone sculpted lions.
Even before the construction of the Grand Kremlin Palace began, a watchtower with decorative kokoshniks and an octagonal roof was attached to the western side of the Terem Palace. Portals with triangular pediments framing the tower windows with colored glass, oriented to the cardinal points, resemble the carved frames of the Terem Palace windows. A steep hipped roof with a patterned design of gilded metal and small flags successfully complements the palace ensemble. Although for its time the Teremny Palace was a rather tall building (the “golden top” is located at the level of the fourth floor of a modern house), the Grand Kremlin Palace, in the courtyard of which it is located , almost completely hides it from view.
The facades of the Terem Palace can only be seen through the windows of the Great Kremlin or State Kremlin Palaces. Only the façade of the Queen’s Golden Chamber and the domes of the house church are visible from Cathedral Square. From the Armory, however, you can see the gilded dome of the Church of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary
Each floor had its own purpose and its own lifestyle. The ground floor premises were used for domestic purposes. It contained rooms for household purposes, as well as rooms where there were supplies of water and candles, as well as preparations of vegetables and pickles
The queen's workshops were located on the ground floor. The production of all types of clothing, linen and other types of household items for the royal family was concentrated here. Here, court embroiderers decorated clothes with silk, gold embroidery and pearls.
The third room on the third floor of the palace is the Throne Room, or the royal office. In the “red” corner of the room there is a royal chair covered with velvet. In the 17th century, this was the most beautiful and most inaccessible room in the entire palace. Only in the mornings did the boyars closest to the tsar, “waiting for the time,” enter it to strike it with their foreheads.
The middle window of the room, decorated from the façade with a carved white stone casing, was called Petition. A box was lowered from it, where everyone could submit a letter of petition to the king. The common people called this box Long, since petitions lay here for a long time, unread by anyone. This is where the saying comes from: “Don’t put things off for too long.”
Here there were premises that included the royal family’s own chambers during their stay in the Terem Palace; the rest of the time the family lived in a wooden palace, which, according to contemporaries, was considered more beneficial for health.
The royal chambers occupied the second floor of the palace. These were four panels of relatively small sizes, covered with closed vaults with strippings: Entrance vestibule, Cross Chamber, Altar Room and Bedchamber. In the layout of the chambers, as well as in the general composition of architectural volumes, the influence of wooden architecture, in particular wooden mansions, built on the principle of connecting individual cages, will still be felt.
Upon completion of construction, the walls and vaults of the chambers were painted with floral patterns. Then, under Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, the painting was resumed by S. Ushakov.
The current painting was made in 1836 according to drawings by F. G. Solntsev and T. A. Kiselev.
On the second floor there was the king's personal bath. Water was supplied here using a pump from a water tower. A spiral staircase led from the bathhouse to the royal bedroom. The rooms located on this floor were often rebuilt and their purpose changed accordingly. In the 19th century an archive was located here, in which the most important state papers were kept.
On the third floor were the tsar’s personal chambers: large “rooms with three windows” overlooking the Moscow River. The suite of rooms on this floor ended with the Bedroom and Chapel.
In the first of them there was a gilded carved bed with a luxurious canopy embroidered in gold on a red background with numerous inscriptions. In the chapel, two carved iconostases, covered with bolted gold, with icons of the 17th-18th centuries were installed.
The northern wing housed utility rooms and a narrow corridor. According to legend, the most beautiful girls were shown here, among whom the king had to choose a bride. He had to walk down the corridor three times and hand the towel to the lucky chosen one.
The fourth floor, or mezzanine, was sometimes called the golden top because the roof was covered with gold and silver sheets and painted in different colors. In the spacious, well-lit room with a golden top, attention is drawn to wall paintings made in the middle of the last century in the so-called “Russian” style.
Three galleries-promenades surrounded the palace in tiers: the lower Boyar platform, or Bed porch, was located at the level of the ceiling of the Aleviz basement, where the Vladimir Hall of the Grand Kremlin Palace now stands. From this level, an open staircase led to the Front stone courtyard, built on top of the aligned arches of the Workshop chambers, on which the three floors of the Terem Palace were actually built.
The exit to the middle walkway was later closed by a Golden Grille, representing a unique example of blacksmithing. On the eastern side of the Terems there was the Front Golden Porch, along which one ascended to the second floor into the king’s living quarters. The last tier of the built chambers - the golden-domed Teremok, located in the center of the building, is surrounded by a third platform - the Upper Stone Courtyard.
The extraordinary picturesqueness and elegance of the new palace is created not only due to the complex space-planning design of the building, but also due to the rich decorative design of its facades.
Profiled pilasters between the windows, carved and majolica cornices, complex white stone frames of openings with hanging weights and triangular pediments, covered with carved ornaments, tiles and carvings in the flaps of the parapets of the walkways, gilded roofing - all this is harmoniously combined with the polychrome coloring of the walls and white stone details, restored during restoration of Terems in 1966-1969. Overall, the palace gives the impression of a precious piece of jewelry.
The Upper Golden Porch, topped with a tent and serving as the main entrance to the royal chambers, led from the Verkhnespasskaya platform to the second floor of the palace. From the Boyarskaya platform located in front of the arched basement, an open staircase (Lower Golden Porch) rose to the Verkhnepasskaya platform, which was locked with a gilded copper lattice at the Verkhnepasskaya platform (therefore the church is sometimes called the Church of the Savior behind the Golden Lattice).
In the western part of T.D. there is the Church of the Nativity of the Mother of God “on Senya”, notable for the fact that in its basement a four-pillar white stone church from the end of the 14th century has been preserved. - the most ancient of the Kremlin buildings that have come down to us.
Simultaneously with the traditional techniques of decorative decoration - flies, ornamental wickerwork, polychrome, tiles, a carved gilded ridge on the roof ridge, the architects of T. D. used classical order forms. At this time, the Order of Stone Affairs paid great attention to familiarizing Russian architects with Western European construction experience.
From the multi-colored glass, tiled stoves and painted walls, Teremov emanates a distant, fabulous antiquity. Furniture - in the style of the 17th century. Benches and chairs are upholstered in Venetian velvet. Once upon a time, the cabinets and shelves were filled with gold and silver dishes, which are now preserved in the Armory. Songbirds sat in golden and silver cages.
No gold was spared when painting the Terem Palace. According to the chronicles, even the roofs and gutters were painted and gilded, and the doorways were decorated with painted and gilded carvings.
The interior decoration of T.D.'s chambers was very picturesque: bright ornamental paintings with heraldic signs woven into it covered the surfaces of the walls, vaults, formwork and even window sills; Biblical stories in symbolic form illustrated the monarchical idea. Simon Ushakov took part in the painting of T.D. (when it was resumed during the reign of Alexei Mikhailovich). The painting has not survived.
The Golden Tsarina Chamber is a 16th-century palace building in the Moscow Kremlin. It got its name after the walls of the Tsarina’s Chamber were painted with gold at the end of the 16th century. The so-called Zhiletskaya Chamber, which served as Tsaritsina’s vestibule, has also survived to this day. In the old days, the palace guards were on duty in these vestibules. They preserve an elegant Renaissance portal that forms the main entrance to the main room of the women's half of the royal palace.
The architectural ensemble of the Terem Palace also includes the Golden Tsarina Chamber of the 16th century and house churches (Resurrection of the Word, Savior, Crucifixion chapel, etc.), which in 1682 were brought under one roof and 11 domes were placed on it on necks decorated with tiles. The construction work was led by the architect Osip Startsev, the drawings for the majolica and crosses were made by the carver, Elder Ippolit.
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All restoration work was carried out based on the architectural support of N.G. Mukhin (Mosproekt-2, workshop No. 13) and on the recommendations of TsNRPM technologist M.P. Ievleva.
The original interior decoration of the chambers, with the exception of individual fragments, has not been preserved and was made again under the direction of the artist F.G. Solntsev in the style of the 17th century. These works were carried out in 1836-1837. during the restoration of an ancient monument, which was subsequently included during the construction of the Grand Kremlin Palace in a new complex of palace buildings.
Located on a high Kremlin hill, the Terem Palace building was facing the south, towards the Moscow River. Crowned with a gilded attic roof, surrounded by open walkways with hipped porches, the Terem Palace dominated the Kremlin chambers and mansion building and formed an integral part of the entire Kremlin palace ensemble.
Currently, the Terem Palace as part of the Grand Kremlin Palace is the Residence of the President of the Russian Federation.
Some photos:
http://www.kreml.ru/ru/kremlin/buildings/Teremnoy_dvorets/
http://banallex.livejournal.com/
Literature
Ivan Zabelin “Home life of Russian tsars in the 16th and 17th centuries.” Publishing house Transitbook. Moscow. 2005
Libson V. Ya., Domshlak M. I., Arenkova Yu. I. and others. The Kremlin. China town. Central squares // Architectural monuments of Moscow. - M.: Art, 1983. - P. 333-334
Let's admire the interiors of the Terem Palace at the end of the 19th century. Nowadays it is the residence of the President of Russia.
Interior of the Chamber of Facets with tables prepared for the meal (dignitaries, high clergy, military and civilians), which took place after the end of the coronation ceremony of Nicholas II
Interior of the Golden Tsarina Chamber (built in the 16th century, paintings from the 1580s) in the Kremlin
View of the Romanov Gallery in the [Terem Palace] of the Kremlin (built in 1635-1636 by Bazhen Ogurtsov, Antip Konstantinov, Trofim Sharutin, Larion Ushakov)
View of the bedchamber in the Terem Palace of the Kremlin. Moscow
View of the prayer house in the Terem Palace of the Kremlin.
View of the front porch of the Duma Chamber in the Terem Palace of the Kremlin.
View of the front corridor in the Terem Palace of the Kremlin.
Interior of the Cross Chamber in the Romanov Palace.
View of the bedchamber of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich in the Romanov Palace.
Interior of the Golden Patriarchal Chamber in the Kremlin.
Interior of the Golden Patriarchal Chamber
View of part of the living room in the Terem Palace of the Kremlin
View of the office in the Teremny Palace of the Kremlin.
Interior of the Chamber of Facets (built in 1487-1491 by Italian architects Mark Fryazin and Pietro Antonio Solari)
Interior of the Chamber of Facets
Interior of the Throne Chamber in the Terem Palace of the Kremlin (former Tsar's office or Golden Chamber")
View of carved gilded icon cases in the royal chapel of the Terem Palace
Interior of the [Dumna Chamber] in the Upper Teremok in the Kremlin
Interior of the Romanov Gallery in the [Terem Palace] of the Kremlin (in the ceiling painting there are portraits of Russian emperors)
The original interiors of the palace have been lost. In the thirties of the 19th century, the walls of the palace rooms were painted in the “Old Russian style”. The windows were decorated with stained glass and tiled stoves were installed. In 1992, restoration of the facades of the Terem Palace of the Moscow Kremlin was carried out.
Churches and icons of the Terem Palace
The architectural ensemble of the Terem Palace also included other buildings, making it rightfully one of the most important historical monuments of Russian architecture of the 17th century. For example, in the western part of the Terem Palace there is the Church of the Nativity of the Mother of God “on Senya”. The temple was rebuilt several times. Among the notable features is the almost completely preserved white stone four-pillar church. The construction of this church was carried out at the end of the 14th century by order of Princess Evdokia, the widow of the notorious Prince Dmitry Donskoy. This church is one of the most ancient buildings included in the Moscow Kremlin and is well preserved to this day.
On the territory of the Terem Palace there are a number of churches: the Church of Catherine (built by J. Thaler in 1627), the Church of the Resurrection of the Word built above it and the so-called Crucifixion Church. The roof with majolica and painted crosses, under which 3 churches are united - the Crucifixion, the Savior and the Resurrection of the Word, were made by the monastic elder Hippolytus, a famous carver of that time. By the way, the ancient wooden crucifix installed in the chapel of the Church of the Crucifixion is also the work of Hippolytus.
The house church on the men's half of the Terem Palace was built in 1636, when the construction of the entire complex was almost completed. The church was illuminated in honor of the “Savior Not Made by Hands” (it is believed that the image of the Savior appeared on its own, without human participation), and a little later the church began to be called in a new way - Verkhospassky Cathedral. The same 4 architects who built the entire complex of the Terem Palace worked on the temple. The murals that can be seen in the cathedral were created 30 years later, starting in 1660. Sometimes the cathedral is called “The Savior behind the Golden Lattice” and here’s why. The fact is that they decided to separate the Verkhospassky Cathedral and the Terem Palace with a lattice - not gold, of course, but made of iron. However, the gilding that covers the grille is applied so carefully and carefully that many people think that it is really made of gold! In the Church of the Crucifixion of the Terem Palace there is a very beautiful and monumental iconostasis. His icons are made on silk fabric using the appliqué technique. The author of the icons is the famous master of the Armory Chamber Vasily Poznansky. The Verkhospassky Cathedral also has an iconostasis made in the 18th century in baroque forms. However, in the lower row of the iconostasis of the Verkhospassky Cathedral there are even more ancient icons, works by masters of the 17th century: these are “The Centurion Longinus”, “Fedor Stratelates” and “The Savior Not Made by Hands” with 20 stamps on the theme of the lives of saints. The iconostasis of the Church of the Resurrection of the Glorious is made of wood and decorated with carvings and gilding. And the clock that decorates the temple is a gift from the Swedish King Charles 9.
Photo: Terem Palace of the Kremlin and Verkhospassky Cathedral
Photo and description
The first royal chambers made of stone, which appeared on the territory of the Moscow Kremlin at the beginning of the 17th century, were built by order of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich and called the Terem Palace. The royal residence of the Terem Palace and the Verkhospassky Cathedral, which since 1636 has been part of the complex of house churches of the Russian tsars, are part of the architectural ensemble of the Grand Kremlin Palace.
Grand Ducal Chambers above Borovitsky Hill
The great Moscow princes always settled in a high place. Their residences were built over Borovitsky Hill, from where there were magnificent views of the surrounding area. The first to build a palace on a hill Ivan Kalita. Later, mansions were erected on the edge of Borovitsky Hill for Sofia Vitovtna, wife of the Grand Duke of Moscow and Vladimir Vasily I.
At the end of the 15th century Ivan III undertook a global reconstruction of the Kremlin buildings. Under him, the old walls, built of white stone, were torn down and new brick walls began to be built. Several new structures were built on the territory of the Kremlin, which today are included in the lists of the most important attractions of Moscow. Stone residential buildings also began to be erected at this time, and in the Kremlin, in addition to the Assumption Cathedral, the Faceted Chamber and the Archangel Cathedral, buildings of the Sovereign's Court appeared at the end of the 15th century. Their project belonged to Aleviz Fryazin, an Italian who worked for the great Moscow princes for a long time.
Construction of the Terem Palace
The Time of Troubles, which devastated the Russian land, brought a lot of destruction to Moscow. By 1630, the Tsar's Kremlin palace had fallen into disrepair and was virtually abandoned. The first tsar of the Romanov family Mikhail Fedorovich ordered the construction of new chambers. Subsequently, the royal stone residence was named Terem Palace.
Architects Bazhen Ogurtsov, Antip Konstantinov and Trefil Sharutin We used many new technologies in our work. "Iron ties" allowed them to strengthen the walls, leaving them quite thin. Innovations contributed to an increase in the internal area of the structure, which was a very progressive trend in ancient Russian stone architecture.
The walls and foundation remaining from the chambers of Ivan III were taken as the basis of the Terem Palace. The two tiers of the old building were expanded with three new ones, and a tower appeared at the very top. The interiors were decorated richly and whimsically. The roof of the mansion was painted with silver paints and gold leaf, the window openings were covered with mica translucent glass, and the walls and ceilings of the chambers were painted by an artel of icon painters, which was led by Simon Ushakov– a highly developed and talented artist, technically far ahead of his time.
The new royal mansions looked like a very large and even monumental structure. The architect skillfully combined in it the features of ancient Russian classics and elements of Italian architecture:
- The palace is mostly built from bricks, but the platbands, portals, parapets and pilasters are made of white stone.
- Used in decorative decoration traditional techniques of Russian stone architecture– tiled tiles on the cornices of the fourth floor, ornamental stone wickerwork, carved window frames, flaps on the parapets of the walkways, pilasters in the walls between the windows and a gilded ridge on the roof.
- Tiered stepped design The building demonstrates the typical features of mansion buildings erected by ancient Russian architects. However, the internal rooms were arranged in the form enfilades, which is typical for the later period of Russian stone architecture.
- The palace was heated using a system ovens. Each oven was decorated glazed tiles different colors and shapes.
- Led to the state rooms golden porch, which connected the Verkhospasskaya platform and the second floor of the Terem Palace. The entrance, painted in gold, was crowned with a pyramidal tent.
The Terem Palace became one of the buildings of the Royal Court, which occupied a large territory and included many buildings, including the Faceted and Dining Chambers, the Bed Mansions of the Royal Family, the Embankment Chambers and several house churches.
What to see in the Terem Palace
Each of five floors The Terem Palace had its purpose. The three lower floors, located on the basements of the 16th century, served for economic needs. Supplies and food were stored here in the basements and storerooms, and jewelers, gold seamstresses, gunsmiths and lacemakers worked in the workshops.
Royal chambers located on the third and fourth floors. The first premises where the sovereign and members of his family found themselves were checkpoints canopy. They were covered with low arches, and the front room was illuminated by paired lancet windows. The entrance halls were heated by stoves decorated with tiles. In the living room, the tsar communicated with the boyars and sometimes received foreign ambassadors.
Golden Chamber was the most richly decorated room of the royal residence. The walls of the chamber were decorated with gold paintings, the vaults were painted with images of the Savior and saints, and the royal throne, which stood in Throne Chamber, was covered with velvet. The saying about the long box was born here. In the Golden or Throne Chamber there was a box where petitions were submitted. Since the petitions were considered for a very long time and reluctantly, the box began to be called “long.”
A unique painting in the form of ornamental patterns has been preserved on the walls of the room adjacent to the Golden Chamber. They called him pantry and stored dishes and cutlery in it.
IN royal bedchamber there is a bed made by skilled wood carvers and decorated with a canopy made of natural silk. The royal box was made in the 19th century, when one of the reconstructions of the residence took place.
On the top floor of the Terem Palace there is a stone attic, which was called Golden-domed tower. Its roof was covered with gilded sheets, which gave the attic its name. Meetings of the Boyar Duma were held in the Golden-Domed Tower. Adjacent to the tower lookout tower, in the windows of which antique colored glass has been preserved.
Verkhospassky Cathedral
The complex of house churches of the Moscow Kremlin includes Cathedral of the Holy Image, more often called Verkhospassky. The temple was built in the first half of the 17th century and is located above the Throne Palace Chamber on the upper tier of the Terem Palace on its male half. From the north side Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov ordered to build a small side church for Evdokia Lukyanova- his second wife and mother of the prince.
The architects who worked on the project and its implementation were well known in Rus'. Bazhen Ogurtsov, who led a team of builders and architects, had been working in the Moscow Kremlin for about ten years. He participated in the reconstruction of the Assumption Cathedral, erected a gunpowder warehouse, supervised the construction of an extension to the bell tower of Ivan the Great, but his main creation is called the Terem Palace and the Verkhospassky Cathedral with it.
In the 60s of the 17th century, a refectory, and on the flat roof of the lower chambers - porch, connecting the sovereign’s chambers with the cathedral. At the same time, the facades were painted, the five domes of the temple were gilded, and a few years later the walls inside the church were painted by icon painters led by Simon Ushakov. In 1670, a copper and gilded grille was installed to block the staircase from the royal chambers that led to the cathedral. The temple began to be called Savior behind the Golden Lattice.
In 1682, all the house churches of the Terem Palace were brought under a single roof. The complex was crowned with eleven domes with incised crosses. To strengthen the structure, the architects had to build an arch on wide pylons.
In the 18th-19th centuries, the temple was restored and renovated more than once. The reason for starting new work most often was fires. One of them, Trinity, damaged the iconostasis and had to be made anew. Large funds for the repair of the Verkhospassky Cathedral were allocated by the maid of honor Matrona Saltykova. Thanks to her, the altar frescoes were restored in the temple, new royal doors were made and the iconostasis was covered with frames with silver niello.
IN 1812 The French plundered many churches, and the Verkhospassky Cathedral was among the victims. Fortunately, we managed to evacuate the most valuable church utensils in advance, but a lot had to be restored.
The house temple at the Terem Palace in 1836. The order for the next restoration came from the sovereign Nicholas I. The construction of the Grand Kremlin Palace, which began next, also made some changes to the layout of the Terem Palace and Verkhospassky Cathedral. The staircase adjacent to the temple was dismantled, the Verkhospasskaya platform was blocked, and the Golden Lattice was inserted into new arched openings. The wall of the refectory facing west was rebuilt. Now it had three doors, each of which was decorated with decorative grilles, stylized in the 17th century.
The corner of the cathedral, damaged by artillery shelling during the armed revolt of 1917, was restored in 1920, but by that time the temple was already closed and since then no services have been held in it.
Iconostasis of the Savior behind the Golden Lattice
The author of the iconostasis of the Verkhospassky Cathedral is a cabinetmaker Dmitry Shiryaev, who skillfully carved it from wood in the 18th century. In the central part of the iconostasis there is a frame made of blackened silver, made in 1778 at the expense of maid of honor Saltykova.
The most valuable icons of the Verkhospassky Cathedral were painted by artists S. Kostromitin and L. Stepanov. They are located in the local row. Attracts special attention image of the Savior Not Made by Hands, surrounded in the margins by twenty separate compositions called hagiographic stamps.
In the chapel of the cathedral, consecrated in honor of John the Baptist, you can see ancient images painted in the 17th century. The most revered of them are icons of Our Lady of Smolensk and St. John the Baptist.
