St. Yuriev Monastery is considered one of the oldest in Russia. In the distant past, it was a spiritual center, and now it is a functioning male monastery. It is located five kilometers from Veliky Novgorod near Lake Ilmen.
History of occurrence
According to legend, the monastery was founded in 1030 by Yaroslav the Wise, who was given the name George in holy baptism. Hence the name of this spiritual center.
The first annalistic references to it date back to 1119. St. George's Cathedral of the Yuriev Monastery, like all buildings, was originally wooden. But in the same year, at the behest of Prince Mstislav, a majestic stone church was laid. St. George's Cathedral belongs to the creations of master Peter, who also created the Church of the Annunciation on Gorodische. This is the first ancient Russian builder whose name is mentioned in chronicles.
Since the residence of Prince Mstislav at that time was in Kyiv, the St. George Cathedral in Novgorod was built under the supervision of his son Vsevolod and Abbot of the monastery Kyriakos.
The work continued for eleven years. And before the endthe walls were completely covered with unique frescoes. On July 12, 1130, the temple was consecrated in honor of George the Victorious. The ceremony was conducted by Bishop John, since Abbot Kyriakos, who headed the construction, died two years before the St. George Cathedral of the St. George's Monastery was completed. The frescoes - the decoration of the building - were destroyed in the nineteenth century.
Building features
Majestic in size, St. George's Cathedral in Novgorod, although inferior to the church of St. Sofia, but also included in the treasury of medieval architecture in Russia. The uniqueness of the temple reflects the most beautiful ideas of our ancient ancestors about harmony and beauty. After all, they were not building a structure, but, as the chroniclers write, “an image of the Church in its universal sense.”
Architectural Solutions
Georgievsky Cathedral of St. George's Monastery has a very impressive size: about twenty-seven meters long, more than eighteen meters wide and exactly thirty-two meters high. Its walls are of mixed masonry - a combination of stone blocks and bricks. The original roof was first made pozakomarnaya, covered with lead sheets, but later it was replaced with a hipped one. And it is in this form that it has been preserved to this day.
Georgievsky Cathedral of St. George's Monastery is crowned with three asymmetrically located domes. The main dome is crowned with a crossroads, the second, inside which there is a special chapel for monastic service in seclusion, is arranged above a square stair tower on the northwestern corner, and the third - small - as ifbalances the previous one.
Like other ancient Russian churches, St. George's Cathedral of the Yuriev Monastery near Novgorod is made as a large front building. On its northwestern part, master Peter placed a rectangular tower of a rather high height with an internal staircase leading to the floors of the cathedral. The outstanding Russian architect managed to achieve in this building an amazing expressiveness of forms, brought to the limit of conciseness, as well as strict proportions.
New Solutions
Although the choirs of the cathedral are placed high enough, they do not look squeezed under the vaults. The western and eastern parts of the building are not equal in size, as, for example, in similar architectural monuments. In addition, the master, by increasing the width of the small naves, which are three times larger than the thickness of the walls, made the eastern one somewhat shortened.
In the temple, as if subconsciously, a certain division is caught into the main room, intended for worshipers, and into a slightly smaller one - the altar one.
Georgievsky Cathedral is as grandiose from the outside as it is from the inside. However, here one feels a surprisingly equal dimension, manifested in an abundance of identical windows and niches arranged in belts. A kind of academicism is felt in the accuracy of the composition, almost imperceptible due to the asymmetry of the three-dimensional construction and powerful masonry, not at all constrained by too strict lines.
Interior decoration
The modern appearance of the temple is quite close tothe original, exactly as it was centuries ago, and see it tourists coming to Novgorod. St. George's Cathedral of the Yuriev Monastery has an interior decoration that reflects the character and purpose of it as the main and at the same time princely church. To visit Mstislav and his son Vsevolod and their families, spacious choirs are arranged here. Here, according to the Slavic custom, there are also "chambers".
This cross-domed three-nave and six-pillar cathedral has three altar apses. In the same place, two chapels were made in the choirs: in honor of the Annunciation of the Most Pure One and the two holy martyrs Gleb and Boris. Unfortunately, the ancient fresco painting, which St. George's Cathedral was famous for in the Middle Ages, is almost lost for contemporaries today. Only insignificant fragments of the ornamental decoration of the window slopes of the northwestern tower have survived.
The role of the temple
The status that the Yuriev Monastery in the Novgorod diocese had was exceptional. Founded by leading Russian princes, for several centuries it was revered as the first in importance among the local spiritual centers. At one time it was even called the Yuryevskaya Lavra.
Since the end of the twelfth century, St. George's Cathedral has served as the final resting place not only for Russian princes, but also for the abbots of the monastery and Novgorod posadniks.
In 1198, both sons of Prince Yaroslav were buried here - Rostislav and Izyaslav, who was the godson of St. Varlaam. In June 1233, the remains of Theodore Yaroslavich were brought here -elder brother of Alexander Nevsky. Eleven years later, in May 1224, their mother, Princess Feodosia Mstislavna, also died. A few years before her death, she accepted monasticism, so in the St. George's Monastery she was known as Euphrosyne. The princess was buried near the southern wall, next to her eldest son.
Before the revolution
At the beginning of the seventeenth century, St. George's Monastery suffered severely at the hands of the Swedish invaders who occupied Veliky Novgorod. St. George's Cathedral was completely looted. But in these terrible years of captivity, as the chroniclers testify, by the providence of God a significant phenomenon was accomplished not only for Novgorod, but for the whole of Russia. It was the acquisition of the relics of the blessed holy prince Theodore Yaroslavich. This amazing event is sure to be told to tourists who come here on an excursion.
When, in 1614, Swedish soldiers, seized by the unbridled madness of making some money, began to dig up graves, they hoped to find treasures or at least some precious attributes of the power of local princes. They opened almost all the burials in St. George's Cathedral. In one of them, the soldiers found the incorruptible remains of Prince Fyodor. They pulled him out of the grave and placed the corpse against the wall. It was incredible that the body, not destroyed by time, remained standing like a living person.
When, in the nineteenth century, Anna, the only daughter of Count Alexei Orlov-Chesmensky, who inherited her father's huge fortune after his death, lost interest in secular life and began to strive for spiritual life, she directed most of her money torestoration of St. George's Cathedral. The archimandrite of the Yuriev Monastery at that time was Photius, who later became her spiritual father. This period became "golden" for the Novgorod monastery.
Not only St. George's Cathedral, but also other buildings were restored, three buildings were built. A little later, the bell tower was erected.
After the revolution
During this period, which the chroniclers call the way of the cross of the Church, St. George's Cathedral of St. George's Monastery also shared the fate of all other Russian monasteries. In 1922, when the seizure of church valuables began to take on the character of complete looting, not only the chasubles and liturgical vessels taken from the icons were melted down, but also the silver shrine of St. Feoktista.
And only a small fraction of the valuables were sent to Russian museum collections. When the monastery was finally closed in 1929, its surviving brethren were dispersed. The ruin lasted until 1935, when during the architectural restoration, for unknown reasons, its seven-tiered iconostasis was destroyed.
And when in December 1991 St. George's Cathedral of St. George's Monastery as part of the monastery was returned to the Novgorod diocese, it was a very deplorable picture. The dilapidated temple, in which not a single icon remained, created a huge problem for the authorities: how to preserve and maintain this ancient monastery.
Cathedral today
BIn 1995, the monastic monastery in Yuryev was renewed. Through the efforts of the Archimandrite of the St. George Monastery, the Archbishop of Staraya Russa and Novgorod, as well as a small number of brethren who came here to live and work, the monastery began to revive. Divine services began to be performed, temples were restored, icons were painted and households were organized.
