Church of the Savior on Nereditsa. The Church of the Savior on Nereditsa

Ilya Glazunov has a beautiful painting called "Mister Veliky Novgorod". The temple depicted on it, its location, the fields around very much resemble the Church of Our Savior on Nereditsa. No wonder, it is also located near Novgorod, and surrounded by the Volkhov flooded meadows.

Rurikovichi - the first Russian princes

In Russia, temples have always been built on the highest place - closer to God. The district has the highest crust - Nereditsa. The church of the Transfiguration of the Lord stands on it. It is dedicated to two of the dead sons of Yaroslav Vladimirovich. Some historians believe that the nickname "Wise" forgot to add "Cruel". There will not be enough fingers to list the number of children from each of the ruling Rurikovichs in Russia. And the son of Yuri Dolgoruky, Vsevolod, because of the number of wives and children, received the nickname "Big Nest". The princes died, and during their lives the brother went to war with his brother, the son of the father, the father of the son. The first Russian saints were Boris and Gleb, the brothers Yaroslav the Wise and Svyatopolk, who, according to the official version, killed them, for which he received the nickname "Damned." There is an opinion that they fell by the hand of Yaroslav. One way or another, the Church of the Savior on Nereditsa was partly dedicated to them, because the unique painting of the church preserved the faces of the first Russian saints.

Location of the temple

The church was built near the residence of Yaroslav, three kilometers from Novgorod. He put the temple near his house on the site of the fort. Now this place is an archaeological monument, known as the "Rurikovo hillfort", and is included in the list of historical heritage called "Great Novgorod", protected by UNESCO. The monastery, located a little later around the Transfiguration Transfiguration on Nereditsa, was named "Savior on the hillfort". In Novgorod, during the reign of Yaroslav, active church construction was conducted. Unlike the big St. Sophia Cathedral, in the late 12th and early 13th centuries temples of small sizes were actively built. The church is located on the bank of the Spassky River. A road passed through the temple to Moscow. Built in one summer of 1198, the Church of the Savior on Nereditsa was the last building of Yaroslav on this land. The Novgorodians expelled him. But it became the last princely building in general - Novgorod became a free city.

Conditions that guarantee identity

The church itself is small, although it makes an impressive impression. It is also a part of the historical heritage of "Veliky Novgorod", as well as other preserved churches built by Yaroslav and his predecessors. Samples of Kiev's temples, taken as a basis, were enriched by local traditions of the trading city, artistic taste of architects and masters. They have acquired originality due to the characteristics of the building stone and the technique of laying walls. It was unique - in turn layers of plinfa (bricks from shell rock), local stone, poorly processed, mortar with addition of brick crumb and Volkhov limestone were stacked. Because of the unevenness of the plinth walls were rough. All this peculiarity and allocated local construction in a separate niche called "the architecture of the Novgorod land", a characteristic representative of which is the Church of the Savior on Nereditsa.

Similar temples

A small temple, to which the adjective "chamber" is applicable, was erected in memory of the killed sons, and was conceived as a princely burial vault. Construction was carried out at a rapid pace, the timing was a record - only 4 months, but the whole next 1199 the church was painted. In its form and architecture (a single-domed church of a cubic form), the temple of the Savior on Nereditsa resembles other religious buildings erected at the same time. Very similar to it are the Transfiguration Cathedral in Pereyaslav-Zalessky, Dmitrievsky Cathedral in Vladimir, Pyatnitskaya Church in Chernigov, the Church of the Annunciation on Arkazh, Peter and Paul on Sinychnaya Gora and others. All of them are the main type of the Orthodox church. The construction of stone cross-domed churches in Russia began with the construction of the Church of the Tithes in Kiev at the end of the 10th century, and active construction of churches of this kind is actively continuing now. It is in our days that the cult buildings destroyed by the Soviet regime are restored and new ones are built. And it's good that they retain the form inherent in the Orthodox Russian church, and so resemble the paintings of Nesterov and Glazunov. Continuity is preserved, modern children are instilled with love for Russia from childhood, and the concept of "Holy Russia" becomes very close.

Extremely national traits

The Church of the Savior on Nereditsa refers to the cross-domed, with 4 supporting pillars of religious buildings. He, like many similar buildings, has the pozakomarnoe coverage inherent in the Russian Orthodox church construction. Pinnacles or semicircular zakomars represent a curvilinear roof, rather complicated in execution, repeating the form of the church vault. The zakomar itself is crowned with a spindle - a vertical fragment of the church facade. These vertical fragments, on the one hand, decorate the temple, on the other - give it a unique national identity. Because of its small size, the Church of the Transfiguration of the Savior on Nereditsa has small choruses, representing mezzanines for accommodation of the choir.

The construction of the church on Nereditsa

Usually these rooms - choirs or flats - are on an open gallery or balcony inside the church, and are always located on the level of the second floor on the wall opposite the altar. This church has very thick walls, a narrow staircase and the entrance to the choir, located on a wooden ridge, cut through the west wall. There are two side-chapels on the shelves. The Church of the Savior Nereditsa in Novgorod has irregular proportions, rough walls, but it does not spoil it at all, but gives the temple a certain sophistication and uniqueness. Plastic walls are considered amazing. Despite many analogues, the church is unique.

The church was erected quickly, and although they painted it for a year, the timing of the fresco painting was also relatively short. The painting covered the entire interior space - walls, a dome, carrying columns, and in this equal it was not. The largest picturesque ensemble, the most famous monument of monumental painting not only in Russia, but also in Europe - this is the painting that the Savior on Nereditsa possesses. Novgorod can not boast of yet another such church.

Forgotten and saved

For many centuries the church stood, surprisingly harmoniously blending into the surrounding landscape, and there was not around it a special excitement. Interest in it arose in the second half of the XIX century. Artist N. Martynov in 1867 received a bronze medal in Paris for watercolor copies of nemrichesky murals. In 1910 the restoration and active study of the frescoes begins. All this more or less intensively continued until the 1930s. This work was constantly pushed by Nicholas Roerich, who wanted to preserve such a pearl as Spas on Nereditsa. The frescoes of the temple reached that time in surprisingly good condition.

Great Insight

Only thanks to the work carried out at that time, these treasures have been preserved in photographs and copies until our days and issued in a separate book. The frescoes themselves, and the temple itself, absolutely perished in 1941 from fascist shelling, since there was a fire point in the church. So great was the significance of this church that the restoration work began in 1944. The temple is restored so skillfully that very few people recognize it as a postwar creation. It was possible to reconstruct the church only thanks to the dimensional drawings made in 1903-1904 by Academician P. Pivovarov.

One of a kind

From a distance you can see the temple of the Savior standing on the hill on Nereditsa. Photos, existing in large quantities, convey its amazing beauty. Outwardly, he is an exact copy of his predecessor, but the interior decoration could not be restored, since 15% of the original murals have survived, mainly the upper part - walls, arches, dome.

The uniqueness of the source is not only that everything was painted, everything was amazing - the manner of writing and themes of frescoes were amazing.

Unusually for that time and was considered a relic of the image in the dome of the "Ascension" figure of Christ with six angels. At this time the domes were decorated with "Pantocrat". This was, as a rule, the depiction of Jesus. He created the blessing with his right hand, he kept the Gospel on the left. Church murals were located in 9 tiers. There were compositions "Baptism", portraits of the murdered princes and the first saints Boris and Gleb. There was a large portrait of Yaroslav and a large composition of the Last Judgment, in which there was a place for the story "rich in hell." The general program of painting, as, for example, in the St. Sophia Cathedral, was absent, there was not the slightest chronology of events, but it does not entreat the significance of the non-fiction murals.

Collective creativity

Many specialists explain this unsystematicity by the presence of a large number of craftsmen and the rush of order fulfillment. And some suggest that Yaroslav for the short summer months, when churches are usually painted, invited independent specialists, among whom was even a foreigner. Therefore, there is such a discord.

The exact name of the artist is unknown, but (presumably) much indicates that he was an icon of Olisei Grechin. Archaeologists have found his workshop, where much indicates his involvement in the non-medieval paintings. Specialists note that the style of writing is broad, close, rather, in an oriental manner than a strict Byzantine one.

Preservation of heritage

After the war, the Church of the Transfiguration of the Savior on Nereditsa was completely restored in 1958, and in 1992 it was included in the World Heritage List.

A huge achievement is that now there are exposures in the 3D system. Students of the University of Leningrad on black and white photos and sketches, preserved in the archives, managed to recreate both the internal and external decoration of the temple, and it varies in time. And all this corresponds to reality.

Currently, the church itself works several days a week as a museum open to visitors.