One of the main sights of Yaroslavlis the church of the Epiphany, located on one of its main squares. The exceptional artistic and historical value of this monument made it a kind of visiting card of the city. In addition, by uniting the objects of cultural heritage located around them, the church is their architectural dominant.
From the documents that have come down to us it is known that inYears of the Time of Troubles, the site where the Church of the Epiphany (Yaroslavl) is now located was the property of the nearby Holy Transfiguration Monastery, and the wooden church built here in time immemorial gave it the name of Epiphany Sloboda. On the date of its erection, historians do not have a common opinion. Usually point the XV century, but there are supporters of an earlier period.
The present temple of the Epiphany of the Lord (St. Yaroslavl) was founded in 1684. It was built, as it often happened in Russia, with the funds of a private donor. In this case, he was the merchant of the first guild, Alexei Platonovich Zubchaninov. In his family, this was no longer the first great charity work - the means of his ancestors once laid the neighboring Spaso-Preobrazhensky monastery.
The Church of the Epiphany (Yaroslavl) was built infor nine years, and when it was completed, a real miracle appeared before the astonished townspeople. What they saw, in no way resembled other temple buildings, built by Yaroslavl masters.
There were several differences, and all of them werefundamental. First of all, the building of the church was devoid of a podklet - a traditional lower floor, usually used as an economic or storage room, and rested directly on the foundation. In addition, it was the first church in Yaroslavl. The absence of massive supports inside the building created a sense of volume and spaciousness. This effect was enhanced by the closed and dome-free ceiling roof.
In general, the temple seemed huge. But what was the perfect novelty for that time is the bright colored tiles used by the architects to decorate most of the facade elements. Placed in the masonry walls encircling cornices and drums, they gave the building an elegant and festive look.
It should be noted that the churchThe Epiphany of the Lord (Yaroslavl) is not devoid of traditional elements for local architecture, such as the covered galleries, which surround the main building on three sides. At the same time on the north-west side of the church a tented bell tower was erected, and a century and a half later the main facade was decorated with a porch with a carved porch.
But despite all the architectural merits,the Church of the Epiphany (Yaroslavl) has always been famous, above all, for its rich painting, covering the solid carpet of the walls of its interior. In relation to their authorship, art critics do not have a single opinion, but it is generally accepted that they were created by masters led by Fyodor Ignatiev and Dmitry Plekhanov.
A distinctive feature of the frescoes decorating the interiorchurch, is their color saturation and rich coloring of colors. Scenes written on biblical subjects coexist in them with intricate decorative ornaments. Great interest for visitors is also not inferior to the frescoes in beauty of the iconostasis. There are reasons to believe that it has not changed since the day of the consecration of the church.
With all its splendor and external wealththe Church of the Epiphany (Yaroslavl) almost never received state subsidies from the state and existed solely on the means that brought her treasures, candle trade, lap collecting and individual donations of individuals. These were hardly any significant sums, since the arrival of the temple was very small. According to available archival data, it was the largest in the late 18th century, but even then it did not exceed two hundred people.
In the post-revolutionary period, the church remainedoperating until 1927, but was in a very poor state, as in 1918 during the Whiteguard uprising (mutiny, as they wrote in the Soviet era) was badly damaged by direct hits of artillery shells. Since there was no money to restore it to the parishioners, the building remained standing, devoid of roofing and with holes in the walls.
In the mid-thirties, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee unexpectedlyrecognized the church as a unique monument of Russian architecture and added to the list of protected sites, but this did not prevent the city authorities from re-equipping its western porch in the garage with a garage. Of course, the state of the already emergency building affected it in an extremely pernicious way.
Only in the early fifties the churchThe Epiphany of the Lord, the temples of Yaroslavl and many other cities of Russia began to gradually recover. It was then not about renewal of religious life in most of them, but it was gratifying that the authorities recognized them as historical and architectural monuments worthy of careful treatment.
The holy places of Russia, which were in the yearsSoviet power in extreme neglect, with the beginning of perestroika became the object of concern not only for the church, but also for the state and many public organizations. In 2000, full-scale restoration work began in the Epiphany Church. As a result, the building was returned to its original form, installed the copper roof lost in previous years, and restored so glorified its once-walled tiles. Shortly thereafter, divine services were interrupted for many decades.
Today the temple is in joint possessionThe Russian Orthodox Church and the Yaroslavl City Museum. It hosts not only divine services, but also excursions. In a sense, this is good, since it allows you to count on government subsidies in case of repair or additional restoration work. And they may be required. The church belfry, which tilted under the influence of the waters of the once-flowing and subsequently buried Nitechi river, is causing concern.
