Description of the attraction
The Church of the Exaltation of the Cross, or as it was originally called, Zdvizhenskaya, is the only preserved ancient wooden church in Kamenets-Podolsk, built in the best traditions of the wooden architecture of Podolia. It is an original structure built without the use of nails. According to legend, the proposal to establish an Orthodox church under the walls of the Kamenets fortress came from the hetman Pyotr Saydagachny himself. On the way to Kiev through Kamenets, the hetman, wounded during the Khotyn battle, passing near the powerful fortress walls, thought about providing them with protection not only with a stone, but also with faith. Then the hetman imagined a wooden church, light as a prayer, which was soon erected under the walls of the castle. To prevent the church from being flooded with water, the architects put it on a high stone foundation.
However, in the future it was not this trouble that threatened the monastery - in the middle of the 17th century, the Turks, who took possession of the city, burned down the church. The Church of the Exaltation of the Cross was being restored at the turn of the 18-19th centuries. The new building was the same as the old one, as if there was no fire. The light three-frame cloister turned out to be unusual: the hipped roof was crowned with square log cabins, giving the structure an originality. The color of the church gives rise to the feeling of archaism, antiquity, and its serenely modest, devoid of ostentatious luxury, exclusively wooden decoration and a primitive Orthodox cross on the dome remind of the Old Believers.
In the 63rd year of the 19th century, a bell tower was erected near the church on the west side. Since then, the architectural ensemble of the church has not undergone any changes - after centuries it looks the same as it was in the first half of the 19th century. The place where the old church is located is considered holy and prayerful.
