Description of the attraction
The Archangel Michael Cathedral is an Orthodox church located in Veliky Ustyug. This is the Catholicon of the Archangel Michael Monastery. Initially, during 1212-1216, a wooden church was built, named after Michael the Archangel; these years are considered the date of the foundation of the monastery. The temple burned down in 1651. In the period from 1653 to 1656, at the expense of the local merchant Nikifor Revyakin, with the permission of Metropolitan Iona Sysoevich, the construction of the modern Archangel Michael Church began.
The cathedral has a lot in common with some other buildings of Iona Sysoev. The entire main temple volume is a parallelepiped, slightly elongated from the eastern side and standing on a high basement. Due to the presence of a basement, there is a high, large porch near the entrance to the cathedral. The cathedral has a four-pillar structure.
The temple is a five-domed cathedral with a hipped-roof bell tower, which is connected through passages with the Vvedensky temple and the refectory. Initially, the chapters were made of wood, later they were rebuilt into stone ones. The main center drum is much more massive than the corner drums. The porch located on the west side leads to the gallery, the portals of which are framed by archivolts and columns. The western main portal was decorated with copper plates or stamps. The high and wide doors gleamed with bright silver and gilding and were engraved with a variety of biblical scenes. The engraving is flat, and the figures of animals and people are outlined with graceful and thin incised lines. Almost all the plates are silver-plated, and the images of the characters are decorated with gilding. It is this tradition of engraving temple entrance doors that has come down to us from ancient times. Most likely, in the 17th century, craftsmen tried to reproduce an old sample. The decoration of the plates was carried out by no less than two craftsmen: during the restoration of the gate on the reverse side, in two stamps, carved signs of the engravers were found, which differed from each other by the image of flowers in a flowerpot. The most respected connoisseur of Russian engraving, D. A. Rovinsky, attributed the gate plates to one of the most remarkable works of engravers working on silver. The temple was originally painted. Over time, most of the frescoes were plastered or whitewashed.
The historical past of the iconostasis of the Archangel Michael Cathedral is very interesting. At first, the iconostasis was four-tiered, but in the 1780s the master carvers Lodviks and Sokolov decided to reconstruct it. Traces of the insertion of their carving, located on the iconostasis of the 17th century, have survived to our time. There is an opinion that then the iconostasis was five-tiered. But this reconstruction did not fully satisfy the wishes of the customers; for this reason, during 1791-1792, the iconostasis became three-tiered. During 1784, the iconostasis was again subject to alteration: the columns and rods of the two lower tiers were made again, and the carved columns-columns were taken from the former iconostasis. The sculptural decorations that were located above the entrances were made by the master Kostromin.
Iconostasis painting belongs to the 17th century, and in its series there have been preserved icons of the 17th century: "Savior Not Made by Hands", "Trinity", "Meeting", "Procopius and John of Ustyug" and "Resurrection of Christ", only all of them were under the records of 1842-1845 years. In addition, fairly early icons have survived, for example, the famous hagiographic icon of St. Michael the Archangel, which is now in the State Russian Museum. From the cathedral comes the monumental icon "Cathedral of the Archangel Michael", dating back to the turn of the 13-14 centuries and written for the first wooden church. The icon contains images of the archangels Gabriel and Michael in beautiful imperial robes, which are skillfully decorated with precious stones and multi-colored pearls.
To the era of the most active struggle between Novgorod and Moscow for the northern lands, the icon of Nikolai Zevarsky with the image of saints and the Deesis of the 15th century is related. The centerpiece depicts Nicholas in a white crinkled felonie, as well as a white podriznik against a cinnabar background. The centerpiece with large pearl beads is highlighted with a black border. On the sides there are images of the Deesis and the Savior Not Made by Hands.
