Description of the attraction
John the Baptist Monastery is located opposite the entrance to the Kremlin, located in the Spasskaya Tower. The other side of the monastery faces Bauman Street.
In 1555 St. German of Kazan founded the courtyard of the Sviyazhsky Mother of God Monastery. In 1564-1568, on the site of the courtyard, Herman founded the John the Baptist Monastery. The monastery was named after the angel of Tsar Ivan the Terrible - John the Baptist. Until 1595 the monastery remained without an abbot.
The first buildings were made of wood. In 1649, a fire destroyed all the buildings of the monastery. In 1652, the Moscow merchant Gavrila Fedorovich Antipin, who had a courtyard next to the monastery, rebuilt the burnt-out brick monastery. A cold temple of the Lord's Entry into Jerusalem was built, crowned with three tents supporting the vault, with side-altars in the name of John the Baptist and the Evangelist John the Theologian. The second church - the Entry into the Temple of the Most Holy Theotokos - is warm, with five domes and an octagonal bell tower. The tents were supported by a vault overlapping an elongated quadrangle. A refectory, cells for the abbot and brethren were added to the temple. The church was a brownie, it had three floors. The upper floor housed a church and a rector's cell. On the second floor there were fraternal cells. On the ground floor there was a kitchen, a refectory and a cellar. Around the monastery, a stone fence was built with a gate church from the side of the Kremlin. In 1652, on the day of the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos, Metropolitan Korniliy (Kazan and Sviyazhsky) solemnly consecrated the monastery.
In 1756, by the imperial decree of Catherine II, an icon with a particle of the relics of St. German was transferred from Sviyazhsk to the Vvedenskaya church.
As a result of the fires of 1815, almost the entire monastery burned down. The restoration of the monastery began in 1818. In 1886, the temple became damaged and was dismantled to the ground. In 1887 - 1899. a new temple was built, designed by G. B. Rusch. The construction works were supervised by architects V. V. Suslov and P. M. Tyufilin. The new cathedral was twice as tall as the previous one and had three tents. 100,000 rubles were spent on the construction of the temple. In 1897, a bell weighing one hundred poods was installed on the bell tower. New abbot and fraternal buildings were built. In 1918, the Diocesan Administration was located in the St. John the Baptist Monastery.
In 1929 the monastery was closed. In Soviet times, in 1930, the cathedral was demolished. Of all the buildings of that time, the Vvedenskaya Church, an octahedral bell tower and an insistent and fraternal building have been preserved. The abbot and fraternal buildings housed the Society for the Protection of Monuments. In 1992, the St. John the Baptist Monastery was returned to the Kazan Diocese.
