This, one of the largest Orthodox church-museums in St. Petersburg, which has the full name of the Cathedral of St. Isaac of Dalmatia, we decided to visit during one of evening walks in the city...
At this time of the day there are very few visitors and you can calmly see all the sights of the temple without too much crowd...
Having become the owners of entrance tickets (for 250 rubles apiece), we enter the inside of the museum (for special days, with the permission of the museum administration, church services can be held in the cathedral)....
The interior of the cathedral is immediately striking in its splendor....
Often Saint Isaac's Cathedral called the "museum of colored stone" .... And this is not accidental, since inside its walls and floor are lined with marble slabs (14 varieties of natural marble were used), which were brought from Italy, France, as well as from the best quarries in Russia ..
It took more than 300 kg of pure gold to finish the cathedral,
a total amount, which was allocated by the royal treasury for work on the interior of the cathedral, amounted to a fabulous amount at that time - 23 million 260 thousand rubles in silver ...
After looking around a little, we begin to get acquainted with the history of the cathedral ...
It turns out that before the cathedral that we see today appeared, at this place in different time several churches were built...
This is what the first St. Isaac's Church looked like....
It was built in 1707 and was an ordinary wooden frame 18x9 meters in size... Its birth was due to vital necessity: at that time more than 10 thousand people worked at the nearby Admiralty Wharfs, who could not satisfy their spiritual needs... After the construction was completed, the temple was consecrated in the name of St. Isaac of Dalmatia , who was greatly revered by Peter I (he was born on the day of his memory)....
By 1717, due to the harsh climate, the church began to deteriorate badly....
It was then that the decision was made: instead of the old, wooden church, lay a new one - in stone ....
In 1727, such a church already received the first believers....
The dimensions of the new church were already 60x30 meters and it had a bell tower 27 meters high, which was decorated with a spire 13 meters high....
But this option did not work out either .... Firstly, when the church was being built, the place of its installation was somewhat changed from the previous version - it was moved closer to the Neva (to the place where the Bronze Horseman monument now stands). The temple on the very bank of the river looked great, but the architects for some reason forgot that the Neva is characterized by wide floods, which gradually began to undermine the foundation of the church .... And, secondly, in addition to this, in 1735 during a severe thunderstorm a lightning bolt hit the cathedral, which led to a big fire ... As a result, the temple was very badly damaged from the inside ...
In 1762, having ascended the throne, Catherine II issues a decree on the construction of a new cathedral (on the site of the first option) ....
The work is entrusted to the architect A. Rinaldi, who set to work with great zeal. According to his project, the cathedral was supposed to have five domes and a tall bell tower .... But Catherine II dies, Rinaldi removes himself from the construction management (during this time the building was built only up to the eaves), and Pavel I instructs another architect - V. Brenna to bring what he started to its logical conclusion .... But since the new emperor at that time was closely involved in the construction of his residence (Mikhailovsky Palace), he needed large quantities construction material, especially marble .... In order not to bother for a long time, Pavel I decided to borrow it from the construction of the cathedral .... As a result, the newly erected temple was very different from the original project: instead of 5 domes - 1, and the bell tower was half as low ....
On May 30, 1802, the third version of St. Isaac's Cathedral was consecrated in a solemn ceremony....
Everything would be fine (perhaps the third version of the temple would have existed for a considerable time), but according to the new emperor, Alexander I , the architectural appearance of St. Isaac's Cathedral did not correspond to the architectural concept inherent in the central part of the city at that time ... Therefore, already in 1809, a competition was announced for new project St. Isaac's Cathedral ... The most famous architects of that time take part in it: Cameron, Quarenghi, Voronikhin, Zakharov ... As a result, the little-known, young French architect O. Montferrand, who, through his protégé - A.A. Betancourt gets an appointment with the emperor and shows him his drawings with sketches of the cathedral.... The emperor liked them and he immediately signed a decree on the appointment of Montferrand as the personal imperial architect and instructs him to lead the construction of St. Isaac's Cathedral...
In June 1819, the solemn laying of the temple took place .... However, Montferrand did not go smoothly either .... Due to strong criticism of the project from leading architects - members of the Academy of Arts, who presented a list of specific and significant comments, Montferrand had to stop work and start finalizing the project ... New option the cathedral, which already suited everyone, was finally approved in 1825 ....
This, the fourth version of St. Isaac's Cathedral, we have the opportunity to see today....
In memory of the main builder, a bust of Auguste Montferrand is installed in the cathedral, which is made of the same material that was used in the construction of the temple.
Taking into account the specifics of the area on which the cathedral of impressive size was erected, for the first time in domestic practice, piles were used for the construction of the foundation .... In total, over 10 thousand of them were hammered ...
Not less than challenging task there was also the installation of 48 17-meter granite columns, each of which weighed more than 114 tons ...
For these purposes, a special design of scaffolding was developed, thanks to which it took only 45 minutes to lift one column ...
The design model of these scaffolds today occupies an honorable place among the exhibits of the museum, demonstrating the progress of technical thought in the days of grandiose construction....
During the construction of the temple, architects, engineers and workers had to solve many problems: from the delivery of granite monoliths from quarries to the construction of domes and their gilding....
Nevertheless, on May 30, 1858 (if you remember, this is just the day of the memory of Isaac of Dalmatia), a new, and the last to date, version of St. Isaac's Cathedral was solemnly consecrated in the presence of Emperor Alexander II....
According to its geometry, the cathedral represents a cross cut into a square.... Due to this, four porticos were formed: southern, northern, western and eastern....
The height of the cathedral is 101.5 meters, the width is 100 meters.... The diameter of the dome is 25.8 m... The cathedral has 112 monolithic columns of various sizes (48 columns of the lower tier with a diameter of 1.85 m and a height of 17 m are the most gigantic in the world, second only to the Alexander and Pompeian columns)...
Along the perimeter of the dome, which ranks sixth in size in the world, there are figures of angels and archangels cast in bronze....
On the corners and tops of the pediments of the cathedral there are statues of the apostles....
We somehow got carried away a little - and ended up outside the cathedral ....
In a hurry, we again return to the inside of the temple ...
In the eastern portico of the temple is the main iconostasis, which is a grandiose triumphal structure....
It is carved from white marble....
The architectural decoration of the iconostasis are eight columns and two pilasters 9.7 m high and 0.62 m wide, made of malachite and decorated with gilded capitals....
The main altar of the temple.... Dedicated to Isaac of Dalmatia...
While the people have resolved, you can come closer and carefully examine it ....
Fragment of the Royal Gates....
Behind the Royal Doors there is a stained-glass window depicting the Resurrected Savior, made at the Royal Porcelain Manufactory in Munich....
The area of the stained-glass window is almost 30 sq.m. Catholic churches.... It was after this incident that stained-glass windows found application in Orthodox monasteries....
It is possible to look inside the altar...
Here you can see gold items from the company "Nichols and Plinke"....
The top of the Royal Gates is decorated with a bronze group by Klodt depicting Christ the Almighty in glory...
Above the Royal Doors is the icon of the Last Supper....
In fact, St. Isaac's Cathedral is also a museum of painting: there are about 150 panels and paintings, the creation of which involved Bryullov, Zavyalov, Bruni, Markov, Basin, etc. there is high humidity, which has a detrimental effect on art canvases made using standard technology. To avoid negative consequences Because of this natural factor, it was decided to use mosaics for interior decoration...
One of the first paintings made using this technology is the "Christ the Savior" mosaic, which is located on the right side of the Royal Gates....
In addition to the main altar in St. Isaac's Cathedral, there are two more:
The left altar is dedicated to the Great Martyr Catherine....
Sculptural group "Resurrection" (sculptor N.S. Pimenov)....
Near the altar there is a mosaic icon "The Holy Great Martyr Catherine" and a bust of Montferrand by I. Vitali, 1850 ...
The right altar is dedicated to the faithful Alexander Nevsky....
Some mosaic icons of this altar
And part of its interior can be seen in more detail....
The bronze composition "Transfiguration" (sculptor N.S. Pimenov) above the entrance of the altar.....
Before us are the icons "St. Isaac" and "St. Peter" ....
"Nativity of the Virgin", "Resurrection of the Lord" ...
"The Descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles", "The Resurrection of Christ" ....
"Last Supper"...
"Holy righteous Joachim and Anna" (Steiben, 1849), mosaic icon "Saint Peter"...
miraculous icon"Our Lady of Tikhvin" - a list from an ancient icon located in the Tikhvin Monastery ....
"The Resurrection of the Most Holy Theotokos" (Steiben, 1853) and others....
Separately, I would like to stop at the gates of St. Isaac's Cathedral....
They are made of oak, on top of which bronze reliefs are installed... Each leaf of the gate weighs about 10 tons....
The bas-reliefs were made by Ivan Petrovich Vitali (Giovanni Vitali), who in 1841 received a large order for the sculptural decoration of St. Isaac's Cathedral...
As a plot for his works, Vitali used episodes from the life of saints...
After examining the "lower tier" of St. Isaac's Cathedral
It would be nice to have a look at the top...
The first thing that immediately catches your eye is a chandelier (chandelier) weighing more than 2.5 tons,
and of course the main dome of the cathedral...
The volumetric dome is "supported" by 12 angels....
The decoration of the dome is the painting "The Mother of God in Glory" by K. Bryullov (completed by P. Basin)....
The painting area is over 800 sq.m.....
Under the very dome, at an altitude of about 80 meters steel cables suspended "small" dove with a wingspan of only 1.65 m with a total length of 2.7 meters... This is the work of the sculptor Dylev...
No less expressive are the plafonds in other places of St. Isaac's Cathedral...
For example, from the eastern side of the temple, above the altar, you can see the "Last Judgment" by F.A. Bruni....
With west side we see the painting "Vision of the prophet Ezekiel" ....
A little lower - "Sun, Moon and Stars with Angels"...
It will take a lot of time and physical effort to see all the magnificent murals of St. Isaac's Cathedral (the head is thrown up quite often), therefore, in continuing the journey through the temple, we will present only some of the works (in total, there are 103 wall paintings and 52 paintings made on canvas in the temple) .....
In addition to murals and paintings, an integral part of the interior decoration of St. Isaac's Cathedral are numerous sculptures made of copper by electroforming....
With this, our journey through St. Isaac's Cathedral comes to its final stage...
We approach the information stand to once again refresh the memory of the main milestones in the "life" of the cathedral,
and heading towards the exit...
The third St. Isaac's Cathedral was founded on August 8, 1768 according to the project of A. Rinaldi, made in the spirit of early classicism. It was a five-domed building with a high two-tier bell tower (later the bells hung in the side cupolas).
The money was released, but construction under the guidance of the architect himself and his assistant A.F. Vista went very slowly - by the death of Catherine II, the cathedral was only brought under the eaves, although its walls inside and out were already lined different color Finnish and Italian marble. Dissatisfied with the protracted construction, Paul I instructed arch. V. Brenna completed it quickly by simplifying the project and replacing the marble with brick. On May 30, 1802, Metropolitan Ambrose consecrated the cathedral in His Highest presence, which was simultaneously transferred from the court department to the diocesan department. The sculptural decoration was performed by K. Albani, P. P. Sokolov and I. Schwartz, the stucco decoration by F. Bernasconi, the images by Gualtieri and A. I. Ivanov, the painting by F. D. Danilov.
Contrary to the plan, the appearance of the hastily completed cathedral turned out to be unimpressive, and already in 1809 a competition was announced among the capital's architects for its restructuring, which did not have a positive result. In 1816, due to the emergency state of the cathedral, services in it were stopped and transferred to the nearest Senate church, and in 1822 - to the Admiralty, where a new church of St. Spyridon of Trimifuntsky with an iconostasis from the chapel of the cathedral.
In 1818, Alexander I unexpectedly approved the project drawn up by the young and still unknown French architect O. Montferrand, and on July 26, 1819, the new cathedral was laid by Metropolitan Michael in His Highest Presence. According to the architect's plan, the eastern part of the former building was preserved, and it was supposed to erect a fence with statues of Russian saints from the dismantled one.
In 1822, due to the technical imperfection of the project, work on preparing the foundation was suspended, and a special commission was created at the Academy of Arts to correct the project, which included famous architects: V. P. Stasov, A. I. Melnikov, the Mikhailov brothers, V. I. .Beretti.
Montferrand took into account the proposals of the commission in a new project approved in 1825, and construction works continued. In March 1828, the first granite column of the portico was raised, weighing 114 tons and made from a single monolith. According to the original idea of Montferrand, the columns of the porticoes were installed before the laying of the walls. In 1836, the construction of ceilings and a huge metal dome, one of the largest in the world, began, for the gilding of which about 100 kg of pure gold went. Under the supervision of the Valdai master I.M. Stukolkin in St. Petersburg, eleven bells were cast from old copper nickels, the largest of which (and the largest in the capital) weighed 1860 pounds. By 1841, the cathedral was rough ready, and its decoration began.
Lined with gray Ruskol marble, the building in the pediments is decorated with bronze bas-reliefs by F. Lemaire ("The Resurrection of Christ" and "St. Isaac before the Emperor Valens") and I. P. Vitali ("St. also statues of apostles and evangelists in the corners, angels with lamps and portal doors.The reliefs in the niches belong to two other sculptors: P.K. Klodt and A.V.
Nothing changed in the cathedral after its construction, only mosaic and restoration work was carried out, including the straightening of the columns of the porticos in 1873-1881 according to the plan of M. E. Messmacher and under the direction of I. V. Shtrom.
On May 30, 1858, on the patronal feast, Metropolitan Gregory consecrated the cathedral, which was declared a cathedral, which is why it always solemnly celebrated church holidays and royal days. Pilgrims were especially attracted by two rites: the Triumph of Orthodoxy (on the first Sunday of Great Lent) and the Washing of the Feet (on Maundy Thursday). On Easter, lamps were lit on the roof of the cathedral - many townspeople later recalled this. On February 19, the hierarchal service celebrated the anniversary of the liberation of the peasants; May 11, the day of St. Cyril and Methodius, the Slavic Charitable Society served a prayer service for the unity of the Slavs. On August 30, a magnificent religious procession went from the cathedral along Nevsky Prospekt to the Lavra. Previously, it began in the Kazan Cathedral.
At the end of 1919, the cathedral came under the control of the “twenty”, and three years later it was robbed during the notorious “confiscation of church valuables”, when the Chekists took out 48 kg of gold and 2200 kg of silver. In 1923 and 1927, the authorities tried to close the cathedral due to alleged "improper operation", but succeeded in this only on July 14, 1928, taking the building from the renovationists under the pretext of its poor condition. On December 10, 1930, an anti-religious museum was opened in it, which worked for seven years. In the same year, all the bells were removed and given for remelting.
In 1957, after big restoration work, which continued later, the cathedral was opened as a museum-monument, protected by the state.
In June 1991, a church community was registered, and a year later a decision was made on the “joint” use of the cathedral by believers and the museum. Services in it were performed only on special days with the permission of the museum management. This was usually done on the patronal feast day and in the evening on the third day of Christmas and Easter. September 12, 2002 in the left aisle of St. Alexander Nevsky, regular services began. (. 2010 and pp.55-57)
One hundred and fifty years out of a little more than two hundred years of the history of imperial Petersburg, it has been built and rebuilt. The currently existing grandiose temple is the fourth in a row, it was built for several decades.
Peter the Great was born on May 30, the day of St. Isaac of Dalmatia, a Byzantine monk. In his honor, in 1710, an order was given to build next to the Admiralty wooden church. Here Peter I married his wife Catherine I. Later, in 1717, the construction of a new stone church was started, which was dismantled due to subsidence of the ground.
In 1768, by order of Catherine II, the construction of the next St. Isaac's Cathedral, designed by A. Rinaldi, began, which was erected between St. Isaac's and Senate Squares. Construction was completed after the death of Catherine II by 1800. Later, the temple began to deteriorate and fell "out of court" to the emperor.
Venerable Isaac of Dalmatia
Saint Isaac of Dalmatia, whom Peter I revered as his heavenly patron, lived in the 4th century, was a monk (in the rank of saints the Church glorifies only monastics), and labored in the wilderness. He suffered persecution during the reign of Emperor Valens (364-378), a zealous supporter of the heresy of Arius, who denied the consubstantial nature of God the Son to God the Father (Arius argued that God the Son was created by God the Father and, therefore, in comparison with Him, is a creature of a lower order ). After the death of Valens and the accession to the throne of Emperor Theodosius the Great, Saint Isaac founded a monastery near Constantinople, where he died in 383. After the death of Isaac, the Monk Dalmat became abbot of this monastery, after whom both the monastery and its founder were later called.After Patriotic War In 1812, by order of Alexander I, the design of a new temple began. The architect's project assumed the use of part of the structures of the cathedral by A. Rinaldi: the preservation of the altar and domed pylons.
The belfry, altar ledges and the western wall of the cathedral were to be dismantled. The southern and northern walls were preserved. The cathedral grew in length, but its width remained the same. The building in terms of acquired rectangular shape. The height of the vaults also did not change. On the north and south sides, it was planned to build columned porticos. The structure was to be crowned with one large dome and four small ones at the corners. The emperor chose the project of a five-domed temple in the classical style, the author of which was Montferrand.
Construction of a new St. Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg was started in 1818 and lasted 40 years. One of the tallest domed structures in the world was built.
Sasha Mitrahovich 20.01.2016 12:14
The device in St. Petersburg of the first church in the name of the Monk Isaac of Dalmatia, whom Peter I, who was born on the day of his memory (May 30, according to the old style), considered his heavenly patron, dates back to the earliest years of the existence of the northern capital.
The first, very modest, was called the church and was on hastily converted from a wooden drawing barn and was located approximately at the place where the main building of the Admiralty now stands.
It was in this temple that in 1712 the wedding of the sovereign and Ekaterina Alekseevna, the former “portomoy”, for whom fate prepared the Russian throne and the name of Empress Catherine I, took place.
Sasha Mitrahovich 27.12.2016 08:51
The wooden St. Isaac's Church quickly fell into disrepair, and already in 1717, Peter I personally laid the first stone in the foundation of the second church in the name of Isaac of Dalmatia.
The second St. Isaac's Church, designed in the style of the Peter and Paul Baroque, was under construction for ten years and had a lot in common with the Peter and Paul Cathedral.
The second temple stood closer to the Neva than the first, almost on the embankment, and this predetermined its short life: the river, not yet encased in granite, washed away the shore, destroying the church, and after a few decades it came, as they would say now, into emergency condition. In addition, in 1735 lightning struck the steeple of the bell tower, and the temple was badly damaged by fire.
St. Isaac's Church was repaired, but the work done did not solve the main problem. The ground continued to settle, destroying the foundation of the temple. It was decided to rebuild the new St. Isaac's Cathedral further from the coast.
Sasha Mitrahovich 27.12.2016 08:56
In 1761, S. I. Chevakinsky, the creator of the St. Nicholas Naval Cathedral, was appointed construction manager, but the start of work had to be postponed due to state “disorders”. In 1762, as a result of a palace coup, Catherine II ascended the throne, and soon Chevakinsky resigned. As a result, the laying of the third took place only in 1768. The project of the temple was prepared by the talented Italian architect Antonio Rinaldi, who worked hard on the architectural appearance of St. Petersburg and its suburbs.
According to the project of Rinaldi, St. Isaac's Cathedral was supposed to be magnificent. Five-domed, with a high bell tower, lined with marble, it fully corresponded to the plan of Catherine II, who wanted to honor the memory of Peter the Great. But the construction moved slowly, and by the time of the death of the Empress, the building was brought only to the eaves. Paul I was not inspired by his mother’s expensive idea and, not in the least upset by Rinaldi’s departure abroad, instructed the architect Vincenzo Brenna to complete the construction of the cathedral as soon as possible, while ordering the marble prepared for facing its upper part to be transferred to the construction of his new residence - the Mikhailovsky Castle.
Brenna, in a hurry to complete the construction, was forced to distort the original plan of Rinaldi, and the cathedral came out unsightly, curvy. On the marble base prepared for the solemn five domes, Brenna built a brick “something” with one dome, giving reason for the scoffers to compose an epigram: “Behold, a monument of two kingdoms, / So decent to both. / On the marble bottom / A brick top has been erected.” In the short Pavlovian era, for such verses it was quite possible to move from St. Petersburg to Siberia. But you can't hide the obvious: the third St. Isaac's Cathedral really did not harmonize with the ceremonial appearance of the St. Petersburg center. And, with the extreme savings shown at its completion, it quickly began to fall into disrepair: soon after the consecration of the cathedral (in 1802), plaster began to fall off the walls in pieces.
Sasha Mitrahovich 27.12.2016 09:16
The history of the construction of the fourth, final version, St. Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg, began in 1809, when Alexander I announced a competition for a project to bring it into proper shape.
At first, there was hope that it would be possible to get by with the restructuring of only its upper part, having found “a dome shape that could give greatness and beauty to such a famous building,” however, all the architects offered the sovereign projects for new cathedrals, and a few years later he left only one requirement for the project: to preserve the existing altar.
The Patriotic War ended, the Holy Alliance was concluded, and the question of rebuilding St. Isaac's Cathedral was still open. Only in 1818, a young Frenchman, unknown to anyone not only in Russia, but also in his homeland, presented Alexander I with a project that provided for the preservation of the altar part of St. Isaac's Cathedral and domed pylons.
The Montferrand project from the very beginning aroused the distrust of specialists, but on February 20, 1818, it was nevertheless approved by the sovereign, and on June 26, 1819, the solemn laying of the new St. Isaac's Cathedral took place.
No sooner had the metropolitan public admired the engraved views of the future cathedral, issued by Montferrand, than his project had a serious critic. It turned out to be the architect A. Maudui, who was one of the members of the Committee for Buildings and Hydraulic Works. In October 1820, he submitted a note to the Academy of Arts with remarks that it was not possible to build St. Isaac's Cathedral according to the existing project. Maudui rightly pointed out an error in the calculations, due to which the diameter of the huge dome did not fit into the "square" of four pylons.
The construction of the cathedral was suspended. Consideration of Maudui's remarks was taken up by a special committee, before which Montferrand had to make excuses, "shifting the blame" on the highest customer. “Since, of the several projects,” he declared, “that I had the honor to present, preference was given to the one already underway, then ... this issue should not be discussed with me; I must scrupulously preserve what is ordered to be preserved ... "
The committee confirmed Maudui's concerns, and the 1818 project was rejected. Only by 1825 Montferrand presented a new project, which was approved on April 3, a few months before the death of Alexander I.
St. Isaac's Cathedral was completed by Nicholas I
The accession to the throne took place during vague and joyless events. It is not surprising that in the first months of the new reign almost no one remembered St. Isaac's Cathedral. Construction has been suspended. The active intervention of the emperor was needed to get things off the ground.
a little later work on the construction of the cathedral acquired an unprecedented scope. Every year, the construction site absorbed up to a million rubles from the treasury (for comparison, the entire construction of the Trinity Cathedral on Izmailovskaya Square cost two million rubles). It should be noted that Nicholas considered it his duty not only to allocate sufficient funds for the construction of St. Isaac's Cathedral, but also personally give instructions on how to build. The desire of the emperor to build a temple, which would not be equal in splendor, led to the weight of the building, its congestion decorative elements. Fortunately, Montferrand managed to refuse the most inappropriate proposals of the sovereign: for example, he convinced Nicholas to change his decision to gild all the exterior sculptures of St. Isaac's Cathedral.
No money or human lives were spared for the construction of St. Isaac's Cathedral
The "construction of the century", patronized by the sovereign, struck the imagination of contemporaries. They did not stop at the costs or the sacrifices. What is the process of cutting and installing granite columns worth! They were cut down at the Peturlaks quarry near Vyborg, chosen due to the large reserves of granite and the proximity of the Gulf of Finland. The contour of the workpiece was marked on a sheer granite rock, then iron wedges were inserted into the holes drilled along the contour, and the workers simultaneously hit the wedges with heavy sledgehammers. The blows were repeated until a crack appeared in the granite.
Iron levers with rings were laid in the crack, in which the ropes were fixed. Each rope was pulled by forty people, thus pushing the blank of the column away from the granite "base". Then holes were punched in the column and hooks with ropes connected to the adjacent gates were fixed in them. With the help of these simple mechanisms, the column was finally separated from the rock and rolled onto a wooden platform prepared in advance. And although Montferrand noted that such work in Russia was “nothing but a daily affair that no one is surprised at,” they were still extremely difficult.
The future columns were transported on flat-bottomed vessels, and from the pier in St. Petersburg they were delivered to the construction site along a specially arranged rail track (the first in Russia).
To lift the columns, scaffolding was erected, consisting of three high spans, and 16 special cast iron capstan mechanisms were installed. Eight people worked on each of these capstans, and it took about three-quarters of an hour to set one seventeen-meter column (each of them weighed 114 tons) into a vertical position. The first column was raised on March 20, 1828 in the presence of a select audience (members of the imperial family were also present among the spectators), and by the autumn of 1830 all four colossal porticos had already appeared to the astonished gaze of Petersburgers.
Few of those who admired the slowly but steadily growing bulk of St. Isaac's Cathedral were interested in the fate of ordinary workers who took part in the construction of the main temple of the empire. According to the documents, there were up to half a million such "forced" creators of the cathedral. They were state and serfs. About a quarter of them died at the construction site due to accidents or illness. Only during the gilding of the dome of the cathedral, carried out in the technique of fire gilding, 60 masters died of poisoning with mercury vapor.
Death of Montferrand
In modern terms, St. Isaac's Cathedral was a "prolonged construction". For forty years in the center of St. Petersburg, work was going on, comparable, perhaps, only with the construction of the Egyptian pyramids. In the 1840s, rumors already spread around the city: Montferrand de was in no hurry to complete the construction of the temple, because he was predicted to die shortly after construction was completed. And indeed: less than a month has passed since the solemn consecration of the cathedral (May 30, 1858), as the architect died. However, he was no longer young, so it was apparently not a matter of prediction.
Montferrand wanted to be buried in the cathedral he built (not surprising, because a significant part of his life was connected with him), but this was expectedly opposed by Holy Synod, and Emperor Alexander II, since Montferrand was a Catholic. Therefore, the widow of the deceased had to take his remains to Paris. The symbolic farewell of the creator to his creation nevertheless took place: the funeral cortege with the coffin of Auguste Montferrand traveled around St. Isaac's Cathedral three times.
Sasha Mitrahovich 27.12.2016 09:27
One of the greatest squares in the world presented a wonderful sight: to our right, the cathedral church raised its golden dome to the sky; its porticos were covered with a diverse crowd in brilliant uniforms; to the left, behind another stage, built near Admiralteisky Boulevard, the wide ribbon of the Neva shone and the flags of ships fluttered; in front of us moved motley masses of troops, taking their places. The big bell rang solemnly...
Soon after the Sovereign Emperor, members of the August Family and Their retinue entered, where, in Their presence, the rite of consecration of the temple was performed, a religious procession appeared in the distance, preceded by singers in multi-colored clothes. The clergy, in white glazing vestments, with banners, images and holy relics, carried at the head by a bishop, marched in two rows, in front of which they carried a lantern and a cross.
As the procession passed by the regiments, the music played the hymn "How glorious is our Lord in Zion." This music, performed by the piano, made an amazing impression: it was not the instruments that were heard, but as if several choirs were singing in the distance. All together - this touching music of the sacred hymn, and this quiet, solemn, brilliant procession moving in the middle of the boundless square lined with troops and framed by thousands of people - presented a spectacle that, of course, everyone who happened to see his.
Upon consecration, the Cathedral of St. Isaac of Dalmatia was declared a cathedral. The solemnity of cathedral services on church holidays and royal days attracted a lot of people here. St. Isaac's deacons and choristers were famous in the city, and among them, deacon Vasily Malinin, who served in the cathedral in 1863-1905 and, according to the memoirs of his contemporaries, had a phenomenal bass. The pilgrims were especially fond of visiting “Isaac's” on Maundy Thursday during Holy Week of Great Lent, when the rite of washing the feet was performed - in remembrance of the Last Supper, during which the Savior washed the feet of his disciples.
Since 1879, at the initiative of the cathedral warden, General E.V. Bogdanovich, the cathedral began to publish and distribute brochures and leaflets of moral and religious content, addressed to the simple and having great popularity. Since 1896, a brotherhood operated at the main temple of the empire, maintaining several charitable institutions at its own expense, since 1911, a banner-bearers society. In 1909, in St. Isaac's Cathedral - for the first time in St. Petersburg - a liturgy was served, accompanied by popular singing.
Before the revolution, five priests served in the cathedral. Its last rector (since 1917) was Archpriest Nikolai Grigorievich Smiryagin.
Foucault pendulum in St. Isaac's Cathedral
The invention of the pendulum, which clearly demonstrates the rotation of the Earth, belongs to the French physicist and astronomer Jacques Foucault (1819-1868). The first public experiment with the Foucault pendulum was held in Paris in 1851. Then Foucault hung a metal ball weighing 28 kilograms (with a point attached below) under the dome of the Pantheon on a steel wire 67 meters long. The pendulum was designed in such a way that it could swing not in one plane (like clockwork pendulums), but in all directions. Under the pendulum, a circular fence with a radius of 6 meters was made with the center right at the suspension point, and sand was poured inside the fence. The tip, attached to the ball, traced the sand in its path, and it soon became clear that the plane of the pendulum's swing turned clockwise relative to the floor: with each subsequent swing, the tip swept the sand about three millimeters from the previous place. So the audience could see with their own eyes the rotation of the Earth. The Foucault pendulum, which has operated in St. Isaac's Cathedral since 1931, has now been dismantled, but there are several other similar pendulums in Russia, although smaller (in the St. Petersburg and Volgograd planetariums, as well as at Altai University).
"The triumph of science over religion"
After the revolution, the cathedral did not escape the fate common to all churches. In 1922, he was literally robbed - under the plausible pretext of helping the starving. The Bolshevik program for the seizure of church valuables cost St. Isaac's Cathedral 48 kilograms of gold and 2,200 kilograms of silver.
Repeatedly (in 1923 and 1927) the authorities tried to close the cathedral, but these attempts were crowned with success only in 1928. Two years later, all the bells were removed from the cathedral belfry (they were sent for remelting), and an anti-religious museum was opened in the cathedral itself, the pride of which was the Foucault pendulum on a suspension 98 meters long. The pendulum was launched on the night of April 11-12, 1931, and the then newspapers presented this event as “the triumph of science over religion” - although, in fact, the Church never had anything against either Jacques Foucault or his pendulum.
With the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, St. Isaac's Cathedral was adapted to store exhibits from suburban Leningrad museums, as well as from the Summer Palace of Peter I and the Museum of the City's History. The period of the blockade is still reminiscent of traces of enemy shells left in some places on the columns.
In 1948, a museum of the same name was opened in St. Isaac's Cathedral, and after restoration work in the 1950s-1960s, an observation deck for visitors was equipped on the colonnade of the cathedral, and almost all guests of St.
Sasha Mitrahovich 27.12.2016 09:53
The history of the construction of the symbol of St. Petersburg - St. Isaac's Cathedral - was long and painful. It was described in detail by the researcher Nikolai Nikitin, who analyzed many documents testifying to the process of designing and building Isaac.
Burnt church
For the first time on a site located near the current St. Isaac's Cathedral, the temple appeared in 1707. As the authors of the book "Auguste Montferrand" Olga Chekanova and Alexander Rotach point out, the cathedral was built by decree of Peter I in the name of the heavenly patron of the king - St. Isaac of Dalmatia. But a new building was not erected for the church - they simply converted a wooden barn into a temple. Nevertheless, the church played a special role in the life of St. Petersburg. For example, in It hosted the wedding of Emperor Peter I and Empress Ekaterina Alekseevna in 1712.
Later it was decided to build a stone church instead of a wooden one. The project was made by a well-known German architect in St. Petersburg Georg Mattarnovi, who also took part in the construction of the grotto in the Summer Garden and the Winter Palace. In 1717, Peter I personally laid the foundation stone for the future church. But the construction was not easy: in 1719, Mattarnovi died, and Nikolai Gerbel, the leading architect of St. Petersburg, was entrusted to bring the building to perfection. The eminent master did not quite cope with the task - the designs of the vaults he designed turned out to be unsuccessful and cracked. In 1724 Gerbel died, the construction of the church was completed by two at least famous architect: Gaetano Chiaveri and Mikhail Zemtsov.
Such a complex architectural creation suffered a sad fate. In 1735, after a lightning strike, the building caught fire, the fire significantly damaged it. For several decades, the burnt church stood abandoned. In 1760, the building was thoroughly investigated by the architect Savva Chevakinsky. He stated that the foundations were located too close to the Neva - the temple stood where the monument to the Bronze Horseman is located today - because of which they are washed away by water. Chevakinsky suggested moving the temple to a new location - further from the water. A year later, he was assigned to design a new building.
The architect decided to preserve as much as possible the appearance of the temple built under Peter I. The church, which has the shape of a Latin cross in plan, was supposed to be built with one dome. A bell tower, consisting of several tiers, should have stood nearby. The most important thing is that Chevakinsky outlined the exact site for the construction of the temple - for the first time he indicated exactly the place where St. Isaac's Cathedral now stands.
Chevakinsky played a big role in shaping the ideas of designing the central squares of the city. The transfer of the cathedral from the Neva embankment determined the configuration of St. Isaac's and Senate Squares, their connection with Palace Square, and the idea of creating a high-rise bell tower turned out to be fruitful. In the left-bank part of the city, a high-rise element was needed, which would enter into a certain spatial connection with the bell tower of the Peter and Paul Cathedral on the right bank of the Neva. They later became St. Isaac's Cathedral, built by Montferrand
Who is into what
The laying of the stone for the new cathedral took place only in 1768. By that time, Chevakinsky had already left the project, and the architect Antonio Rinaldi was responsible for the construction. He created new sketches of the cathedral at the place indicated by Chevakinsky. Unlike his predecessor, Rinaldi decided to change the appearance of the original church of the times of Peter the Great and create a five-domed church with a bell tower.
A beautiful project was not destined to be implemented. Rinaldi began work, but after the death of Catherine II in 1796, he decided to return to Italy. By that time, the cathedral, in accordance with the project of Rinaldi, had been erected almost to the level of the base of the drums of the domes. The construction of the five-dome composition was entrusted to the architect Vincenzo Brenn, who began work on April 1, 1798.
Brenna at first honestly wanted to bring to mind the idea of the predecessor, but, as stated in the book "Auguste Montferrand" there was not enough money for the construction, so the architect decided to make changes to the Rinaldi project and make the cathedral single-domed, and reduce the bell tower by one tier. Construction was completed by May 30, 1802.
The completed cathedral made a strange impression, surprised contemporaries with distorted proportions, a discrepancy between the marble finish of the main part of the building and the brick top. Rinaldi's plan appeared in such a distorted form. It is no coincidence that an epigram was circulated in St. Petersburg that characterizes this building and at the same time the historical period of the interregnum associated with the death of Paul I and the accession of Alexander I: "The bottom is marble, and the top is brick
Olga Chekanova and Alexander Rotach, "Auguste Montferrand"
But it soon became obvious that it was impossible to leave the temple in this form. The architects were invited to take part in the competition and figure out how to improve the existing building. In 1809, many prominent masters received a corresponding invitation, including Andrei Voronikhin, who was completing the construction of the Kazan Cathedral, Giacomo Quarneghi, who had just completed the Smolny Institute, and others.
Almost all architects ignored the task of preserving the parameters of the building, set by Alexander I, and began to propose new projects. The competition was left without a winner. But later fate brought the emperor to Auguste Montferrand.
Lucky Offering
The Frenchman Montferrand, who received an excellent education in Paris, himself made efforts to ensure that Alexander I noticed him. In 1814 the emperor came to Paris, where the architect handed him a folder of his projects. Alexander I was impressed by the work of Montferrand, and in 1816 the architect moved to Russia.
In 1818 Montferrand created a project for the completion of St. Isaac's Cathedral. The architect cheated: not all of his decisions, which looked great on paper, could easily be implemented. But Alexander I trusted the architect and signed the project on February 20, 1818, approving an estimate of 506,300 rubles for the first year of work.
The perestroika was to be supervised by a special commission, which brought together specialists and major statesmen, headed by a member of the State Council, Count Nikolai Golovin. On March 4, 1818, the first meeting of the commission took place, and on July 26, 1819, the foundation stone of the cathedral was laid.
In the western part, a gilded bronze plaque was lowered into the foundation under the entrance with the inscription: "This first renovation stone was laid in the summer of the Nativity of Christ 1819 on the 26th day of July in the month of the reign of Emperor Alexander the First in the 19th summer, during the renovation of the temple, begun by his great ancestor Catherine II in the name of St. Isaac of Dalmatia in 1768. During this restructuring of St. Isaac's Cathedral, Count Golovin presided over the Commission established by the Highest; the real Privy Councilor Kozadavlev, Lieutenant General Betancourt and Privy Councilor Prince Golitsyn sat; the architect Montferrand was rebuilt.
The French architect sought maximum independence during construction. From the very beginning, he demanded from the commission two assistants, four foremen, a secretary, two stone masters, twenty-five soldiers and a special person to receive materials received for construction at the request of the architect, and the inspector had to be directly subordinate to Montferrand. The Commission did not like this independence.
In November 1820, the commission sent a person to the construction site to control the expenditure of materials and money. The inspector in his reports stated about bribery and theft.
He blamed Montferrand for everything, although many of the abuses related to the activities of the commission, which turned a blind eye, in particular, to the lawless actions of the titular adviser Orlov, who, using Golovin's trust, deceived him. Later, the wide lifestyle of Montferrand served as the basis for accusations: buying their own house, expensive antique collections, although a good half of St. Petersburg architects of that time had own houses, and they did not have to receive such money as 100 thousand rubles donated by Nicholas I to Montferrand after the opening of the Alexander Column. The house on the Moika was bought, undoubtedly, at the expense of these funds. No evidence of Montferrand's participation in the abuses is known. On the contrary, many documents testify, albeit indirectly, to the financial difficulties of the architect during the verification period.
Olga Chekanova and Alexander Rotach, "Auguste Montferrand"
Montferrand after the check was removed from all economic affairs. At the end of January 1822, the committee informed Alexander I that the reconstruction of St. Isaac's Cathedral according to the drawings of Montferrand was technically impossible, and the project needed to be revised. At that time, about 5 million rubles had already been invested in the reconstruction of the cathedral. These funds went to demolition of the old building and laying of new foundations.
Alexander I proposed not to abandon the Montferrand project, but to refine it.
The project of the architect Montferrand should only be corrected, and not completely changed, then the exterior of the church should be left as close as possible to general view which it has in the mentioned project, therefore, it is necessary to preserve the alleged five domes of this temple and use granite columns prepared for two porticos, trying, however, to find for the same domes or domes best forms and accommodation, and for the porticos a decent and secure dispensation. The location of the interior of the building, both for the reliability of the middle dome, and especially in relation to the best view and lighting, is left to the discretion of the Committee.
proposal of the President of the Academy of Arts Olenin to the committee
At the same time, the emperor demanded that construction be stopped until the revised project was ready and approved.
Attempt number two
Since 1822, a new project of St. Isaac's Cathedral was being created. The work was attended by members of the committee for the restructuring of the temple, who worked out their proposals in sketches for three months and presented them at a special meeting on April 25. Participated in the design and Montferrand. Appearance The cathedral acquired the form to which we are accustomed: in the center of the composition there was a large dome, and two eight-column porticos from the western and eastern sides were also added to the previously provided two sixteen-column ones from the south and north.
The project was submitted to Alexander I for consideration on March 9, 1825 and approved almost a month later. On all the drawings, Montferrand was called the chief architect and put his personal seal next to the signature.
Construction work resumed in 1826. 48 columns were installed for more than two years: from March 20, 1828 to August 11, 1830. Moreover, most of the time was occupied by the preparation of fasteners, and the installation of the columns themselves did not exceed 40-45 minutes.
Even more difficult was the installation of 24 monolithic granite columns around the perimeter of the dome drum. The mass of each column is 64 tons. It took about two hours to install one. The first column took its place on November 5, 1837, within two months the remaining 23 were raised.
By 1841 all civil works in St. Isaac's Cathedral were completed. Until 1858, interiors were designed and created. The solemn consecration of the cathedral took place in 1858 on May 30 - the day of memory of St. Isaac of Dalmatia and the birthday of Peter I, who once stood at the origins of the very first building of the church of St. Isaac's Cathedral.
On June 11 (May 30 old style), 1858, a solemn ceremony of consecration of St. Isaac's Cathedral took place.
St. Isaac's Cathedral, which for 150 years has been the largest and most beautiful church in St. Petersburg, one of the main symbols of the city, has a very dramatic fate - it was built four times.
The first, wooden, was erected in 1707, during the reign of Tsar Peter I. The church was laid on the Tsar's birthday, which coincided with the feast day of St. Isaac of Dalmatia, hence the name. Peter understood that the wooden temple would not last long, and in 1717 he commissioned the German architect Georg Johann Mattarnovi to replace the walls with stone ones. The new church had no individuality, in many respects it repeated the Peter and Paul Cathedral, even the chimes on the bell towers of both churches were the same. In 1735 lightning struck the cathedral and started a fire. In this event, they saw a "sign of God", and the temple was abandoned.
At the end of her reign, Empress Catherine II undertook to revive the cathedral, but it was decided to put it in a new place, behind the back of the famous "Bronze Horseman", a monument to Peter. The construction was entrusted to the Italian architect Antonio Rinaldi, but Rinaldi fell ill and left for his homeland, and Catherine II soon died. Her son, Emperor Paul I, commissioned another Italian, Vincenzo Brenne, to complete the construction of the temple.
In 1816, during a divine service, a huge piece of plaster collapsed from the ceiling of the temple, causing horror among the faithful. The building clearly needed serious repairs. However, the next emperor, Alexander I, chose to solve the problem radically and ordered the cathedral to be rebuilt. This time the task was to make Isaac the main church and decoration of St. Petersburg. A competition for the best project was announced.
The life of the outstanding French architect Auguste Montferrand is connected with the last construction of St. Isaac's Cathedral. It was he who submitted to the competition a project that struck the imagination of the monarch. Montferrand was entrusted with the construction of a new Isaac. The construction, which began in 1818, dragged on for forty years and was carried out under three emperors - Alexander I, Nicholas I and Alexander II.
The work was held back by a number of reasons - the numerous wishes of the kings, inaccurate technical calculations, as well as the fact that the foundation was placed in a swamp. I had to drive about 11 thousand piles into the ground and put hewn granite blocks on them in two rows. It was on this powerful support pad that the cathedral was erected. Problems arose with the installation of 48 monolithic granite pillars weighing 114 tons each, which were intended for porticos. Through the efforts of thousands of serfs, these columns were delivered to St. Petersburg from Finland.
Montferrand took extraordinary architectural solution: install columns before erecting walls. In March 1822, in the presence of royal family and the crowd of townspeople raised the first column. The latter was put up only after 8 years, and only then did the construction of the walls begin. When everything was already moving towards the final, a huge spherical dome with a diameter of 22 meters was raised to the roof. Its copper lining was poured three times with molten gold. A cross of impressive size was erected on the dome. Montferrand abandoned the bell tower traditional for Russian churches, but retained their five domes, placing towers with domes at the corners of the building. The stone bulk of the cathedral, together with the dome and the cross, rose above the city by more than 100 meters.
The construction of the cathedral was completed in 1848, but it took another 10 years to finish the interior. The solemn opening and consecration of St. Isaac's Cathedral, which was proclaimed the cathedral of the Russian Orthodox Church, took place on June 11 (May 30, O.S.), 1858.
Interesting Facts.
Work on the construction of the foundation of the cathedral lasted five years and involved 125 thousand workers - masons, carpenters, blacksmiths. At the quarries of Pyuterlaks Island near Vyborg, granite monoliths for columns were being cut down. Work was carried out throughout the year.
Huge granite blocks weighing from 64 to 114 tons were mined in the quarries of Karelia. Granite monoliths for the columns of four porticos and marble for facing the facades and interior of the cathedral were mined at the Tivdi and Ruskol marble quarries. The first were located in the Petrozavodsk district of the Olonetsk province, and the second - in the Serdobolsk district of the Vyborg province. Light and dark red marble was quarried at Tivdiya quarries, while light gray marble with bluish veins was mined at Ruskolsky quarries.
The delivery of these blocks to the construction site, the erection of the dome and the installation of 112 monolithic columns were the most difficult construction operations that required many technical innovations from the builders. When one of the engineers building St. Isaac's Cathedral invented a useful mechanism to facilitate the work of the builders, he received the strictest reprimand for not having invented such a useful thing earlier, thereby introducing the treasury into wasteful expenses.
On the interior decoration Cathedral went 400 kg of gold, 16 tons of malachite, 500 kg of lapis lazuli and a thousand tons of bronze. About 300 statues and high reliefs were cast, the mosaic occupied an area of 6.5 thousand square meters. meters.
The faint smell of incense, which is captured in the cathedral, exudes malachite plates that adorn the columns of the main altar. Masters fastened them special composition based on myrrh oil. Myrrh is prepared according to a special recipe, combining the oil of the sacred myrrh tree with red wine and incense. The mixture is boiled over a fire Maundy Thursday, and is usually used for the rite of chrismation.
The process of finishing St. Isaac's Cathedral was difficult: the gilding of the domes was especially difficult, the decoration of which took 100 kg of gold. An integral part of the gilding of the domes of the cathedral was the use of mercury, from the poisonous fumes of which about 60 masters died.
Due to the fact that St. Isaac's Cathedral was being built for an unusually long time, there were rumors in St. Petersburg about a deliberate delay in construction, since the chief architect of St. Isaac's Cathedral, Auguste Montferrand, was predicted that he would live as long as the cathedral was being built. Perhaps this is a coincidence, but a month after the completion of the construction of St. Isaac's Cathedral, which became the life work of the architect, Auguste Montferrand died.
The material was prepared on the basis of information from open sources
