Description of the attraction
The Church of the Holy Trinity is an Orthodox church in the Old Russian and Novgorod dioceses. The temple is located in the ancient city of Staraya Russa on Timur Frunze Street, which in the past was called Spaso-Troitskaya. The Trinity Church is located on the right side of the city territory, namely in the south side of the Spaso-Preobrazhensky Monastery.
The date of the erection of the originally wooden church is not exactly known, although in the first city inventory, which was carried out by order of the great Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich during 1625, the church is listed as burnt by Lithuanian troops in 1607. This kind of fact was recorded in the Scripture Book of 1624. It is known that for more than seventy years this place was completely deserted. In 1680, a stone church in honor of the Holy Trinity was erected at the expense of the wealthy merchant Yakov Tverev, the consecration of which took place on December 13, 1684 with the personal presence of Metropolitan Korniliy of Velikie Luki and Novgorod.
In the summer of June 29, 1759, a strong fire broke out in Staraya Russa, the fire of which went to the Church of St. John Chrysostom, which was located very close to the Trinity Church. Soon he also caught fire with a strong flame. During the fire, the holy main altar, vestments, various church utensils burned down, although some icons and the church iconostasis still survived. Three years later, the church was rebuilt. According to the petition of a priest named Theodosius Savin, a chapel was built in the narthex, consecrated in the name of John Chrysostom, on the site of the burnt down Zlatoust church.
In the summer of June 13, 1836, a terrible storm fell on Staraya Russa, which caused great damage to the temple building. From the north-west, the dome was completely ripped off, which collapsed next to the church building, significantly damaging it. In addition, the head located from the south-west not only staggered, but also strongly tilted, and rather large cracks appeared in the temple walls. According to the order of the main leadership of the military settlements, which was in charge of the entire Staraya Russa, four chapters located on the side were removed, although this did not prevent the further destruction of the church. Only in 1854 was the Imperial permission of the great Emperor Nicholas the First drawn up for the repair work of the temple with full preservation of the inherent ancient architecture. Restoration work was carried out under the leadership of the famous architect Ton K. A., as well as a priest by the name of Lavrovsky and the church head Bulin Yakov. During the work, the altar apses were significantly enlarged, and the chapel in the name of John Chrysostom was moved to the right apse from the narthex. The vaults were also strengthened, the chapters and tribunes were built on, and the lower additional row of window openings was pierced. A typical four-pitched roof was built on the site of the old tent tent. The completely renovated Church of the Holy Trinity was consecrated in the middle of 1860, and the church chapel in the name of John Chrysostom was consecrated in 1865.
At the Trinity Church, a parish school ran its work, in which children were taught not only literacy and numeracy, but also the Law of God and church singing. After the socialist revolution passed in Russia, the school began to work as an initial four-year school.
The Church of the Holy Trinity is an architectural monument of the standard model of a spacious posad church of the late 17th century. The temple is quite large - 17 by 17 meters. The shape of the church is cubic, and the building itself is four-pillar and three-apse, five-domed with a vestibule on the west side and side vestibules-tents. Originally, the porch was slightly smaller than the modern one. The building of the temple is richly decorated.
Among the sights of the temple are the silver chalice, the gilded altar cross, the image of the Life-Giving Trinity, the image of Jesus Christ, the image of St. John Chrysostom. At the moment, the location of these shrines is unknown.
