The Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood in St. Petersburg is one of the most beautiful, festive and vibrant churches in Russia. Find out what legends are associated with him!
The temple, built in memory of the death of Alexander II by the architect Alfred Parland, is considered one of the main attractions of the city on the Neva. However, not everyone knows that the Savior on Spilled Blood keeps many mystical mysteries and secrets: how the temple turned into a morgue and influenced the collapse of the USSR, where an icon that can predict the future is kept, and why the crosses were kept under water.
The Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood in St. Petersburg is one of the most beautiful, festive and vibrant churches in Russia. For many years during the Soviet era, it was consigned to oblivion. Now, restored, it attracts thousands of visitors with its grandeur and uniqueness.
The temple was built in memory of Emperor Alexander II. Back in 1881, at the place where the temple was later erected, tragic events took place.
On March 1, Tsar Alexander II was heading for the Field of Mars, where a parade of troops was to take place. As a result of the terrorist act committed by the People's Will I. I. Grinevitsky, the emperor was mortally wounded.
By order of Alexander III, the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood was erected on the site of the tragedy, where regular services were to be performed for the murdered. This is how the name of the Savior on Spilled Blood was assigned to the temple, the official name of the Church of the Resurrection of Christ.
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The main place of the temple is an inviolable fragment of the Catherine Canal.
It includes sidewalk slabs, cobblestone pavement, part of the lattice.
The place where the emperor died, it was decided to leave untouched.
To implement this plan, the shape of the embankment was changed, and the foundation of the temple moved the channel bed by 8.5 meters.
Under the bell tower, exactly in the place where the tragic incident took place, there is the "Crucifixion with those who are forthcoming"
The unique cross is made of granite and marble. On the sides there are icons of saints.
An architectural competition was announced to select the best project for the construction of the temple. The most eminent architects took part in it. Only on the third attempt (so many times the competition was announced) did Alexander III choose the project that seemed to him the most suitable. Its author was Alfred Parland and Archimandrite Ignatius.
The Savior on Spilled Blood in St. Petersburg was built on donations collected by the whole world. Contributions were made not only by Russians, but by citizens of other Slavic countries. After construction, the walls of the bell tower were crowned with many coats of arms of various provinces, cities, counties, which donated savings, all of them were made of mosaics.
A gilded crown was installed on the main cross of the bell tower as a sign that the august family made the greatest contribution to the construction.
The total amount of construction was 4.6 million rubles.
The temple was laid in 1883, when the construction project had not yet been finally approved. At this stage, the main task was to strengthen the soil so that it would not undergo erosion, because the Ekaterininsky Canal was nearby (in 1923 it was renamed the Griboyedov Canal), as well as to lay a solid foundation.
The construction of the Cathedral of the Savior on Spilled Blood in St. Petersburg began in 1888.
Gray granite was used for facing the basement, the walls were laid out of red-brown bricks, rods, window frames, cornices were made of Estland marble. The plinth was decorated with twenty granite boards, on which the main decrees and merits of Alexander II were listed. By 1894, the main vaults of the cathedral were erected, by 1897, nine chapters were completed. Most of them were covered with bright colored enamel.
The walls of the temple, domes, towers are completely covered with amazing decorative patterns, granite, marble, jewelry enamel, mosaics. White arches, arcades, kokoshniks look in a special way against the background of decorative red bricks.
The total area of the mosaic (inside and out) is about six thousand square meters. Mosaic masterpieces were based on sketches of the great artists Vasnetsov, Parland, Nesterov, Koshelev. The northern side of the façade presents the Resurrection mosaic, while the southern side displays the panel Christ in Glory. From the west, the facade is decorated with the painting "The Savior Not Made by Hands", and from the east you can see the "Blessing Savior".
The Savior on Spilled Blood in St. Petersburg is somewhat stylized as the Moscow Cathedral of St. Basil the Blessed. But the artistic and architectural solution itself is very unique and original. According to the plan, the cathedral is a quadrangular building, crowned with five large chapters and four slightly smaller chapters. The southern, northern facade is decorated with kokoshnik pediments, the eastern side is decorated with three rounded asps with gold domes. To the west there is a bell tower with a beautiful gilded dome.
The interior decoration - the decoration of the temple - is very valuable and far surpasses the exterior. The mosaics of the Savior are unique, they are all made according to the sketches of eminent masters of the brush: Kharlamov, Belyaev, Koshelev, Ryabushkin, Novoskoltsev and others.
The cathedral was opened and consecrated in 1908. It was not just a temple, it was the only temple-museum, a monument to Emperor Alexander II. In 1923, the Savior on Spilled Blood rightfully received the status of a cathedral, but by the will of fate or due to turbulent historical changes in 1930, the temple was closed. The building was handed over to the Society of Political Prisoners. For many years, under Soviet rule, a decision was made to destroy the temple. Perhaps this was prevented by the war. At that time, other important tasks were set before the leaders.
During the terrible Leningrad blockade, the building of the cathedral was used as a city morgue.
After the end of the war, the Maly Opera House set up a warehouse for the scenery here.
After the change of power in the Soviet government, the temple was finally recognized as a historical monument.
In 1968 it came under the protection of the State Inspectorate, and in 1970 the Church of the Resurrection of Christ was declared a branch of the Isaac's Cathedral.
During these years, the cathedral began to gradually revive. The restoration proceeded slowly, only in 1997, as a museum of the Savior on Spilled Blood, began to receive visitors.
In 2004, more than 70 years later, Metropolitan Vladimir served the Divine Liturgy in the church.
And now seven secrets and legends of the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood
1. Underwater crosses of the Savior on Spilled Blood
At one time, the location of the temple played an important role in its history: they say that in order to save the decoration of the temple from the Bolsheviks, the townspeople removed the crosses from it and lowered them to the very bottom of the Griboyedov Canal. Subsequently, when the danger passed, and the Savior on Spilled Blood began to be restored, but they could not find the crosses that crowned the temple, a curious incident occurred: an accidental passer-by who knew the legend approached the team of restorers and advised to look for the decoration in the water. The workers decided to try and sent a brigade of divers to examine the bottom - to everyone's surprise, the crosses were exactly where the stranger had indicated.
2. The tale of how the temple influenced the collapse of the Soviet Union
Another curious legend related to the Savior on the Blood and the materialization of thought took place already at the very beginning of the 90s. For a long time, one of the main sights of the city on the Neva stood in the scaffolding for decades, which gave rise to many anecdotes and even found its reflection in poetry and songs. On the wave among the townspeople, there was an ironic belief, they say that as soon as the forests were removed from the Savior, the entire Soviet Union would collapse. It may seem like a fiction to some, while others will write it off as a coincidence, but the fact remains: in 1991, the temple was "freed" from scaffolding, and a little later, in August of the same year, the end of Soviet power came.
3. The largest collection of mosaics in Europe
Many people know that one of the main temples of the Northern capital is a real museum of mosaics, because under its roof there is the richest and largest collection of mosaics, on which the most famous Russian masters worked - Vasnetsov, Nesterov, Belyaev, Kharlamov, Zhuravlev, Ryabushkin and others. Mosaics are the main decor of the church, because even the iconostasis of the Savior on Spilled Blood is mosaic. It may also seem curious that precisely because of the fact that the works of art took a very long time, the opening of the temple and its consecration was delayed for a good ten years.
4. Blockade morgue and "Spas-na-potato"
It's no secret that during the war (and under Soviet rule), churches and temples of the city worked in an unusual mode for them - somewhere they equipped cowsheds or placed enterprises. So, during the blockade, the Savior on Spilled Blood turned into a real morgue. The bodies of the dead Leningraders were brought from all over the city to the district Dzerzhinsky morgue, which for a time became the temple, confirming its historical name. In addition, one of the functions of the attraction in those difficult times was the storage of vegetables - some townspeople with a sense of humor even nicknamed him “Savior on Potatoes”. After the end of the war, the Savior-on-Blood was again not returned to its religious function; on the contrary, it began to be used as a repository for the scenery of the Maly Opera House, which is now known as Mikhailovsky.
5. Secrets of numerology and the Savior on Spilled Blood
The magic of numbers really exists, and the St. Petersburg church quite successfully proves this - for example, guides who want to add some mystical charm often turn to numerology and talk about the fact that the height of the central building is 81 meters, which fully corresponds to the year of the death of Alexander II, and another number 63 - not only the height to which one of the domes rises, but also the age of the emperor at the time of the attempt on his life.
6. Mysterious icon
In addition to the famous ghost of the embankment of the Griboyedov Canal, there is another mystical and mysterious legend (not proven and not refuted): supposedly under the roof of the Savior on Spilled Blood there is an icon on which the years fatal for Russian history appeared - 1917, 1941 and not only appear there … It is believed that the icon has power and is capable of predicting turning dates for the history of Russia, because other indistinct silhouettes of numbers can be seen on the canvas - perhaps they will appear as a new tragedy approaches.
7. Bloody pavement
It's no secret that the Savior on Spilled Blood was built on the site where the last attempt on the life of Emperor Alexander II took place on March 1, 1881. Naturally, immediately after the tragic events, the City Council proposed to build a small chapel here, but the new emperor Alexander III ordered the chapel not to be limited and to build a magnificent temple on this place.
The sovereign also ordered to leave an untouched section of the pavement inside the future cathedral, where his father's blood was shed.
Unbreakable church
Another belief that has not yet been refuted is that this cathedral cannot be destroyed. One of the vivid examples confirming the legend is the story of how in 1941 the authorities decided to blow up the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood, calling it "an object that has no artistic or architectural value." Holes were drilled in the walls, and explosives had already been placed there.
But the Great Patriotic War began, so all the explosives were urgently sent to the front.
In the 60s, while examining the domes of the temple, they found the only bomb that still hit the temple.
Hit but didn't explode.
The five hundred kilogram bomb lay in the hands of the Savior.