MOSCOW CHURCHES

                              A Few of Moscow's Churches

 Several times during our Moscow stay we passed by Christ Our Savior Cathedral.  The largest church in Moscow  was started in 1839 after the war of 1812, but took 44 years and the reign of four czars to complete. The first electric lights in the city were installed in front of this church. Stalin destroyed it in 1931 and it became a city swimming pool. The pool was covered up in 1994 and in 1995, financed with private monies, construction began on this new church. It took four years to finish the exterior and two years to finish the interior. The mosaics inside are beautiful. The church has five domes with a big central and four angular turrets with 14 bells. The church is so big that the main cathedral of the Kremlin can fit inside!

      
The white limestone Assumption Cathedral’s exterior dates to 1475. Five gilded cupolas sparkle atop narrow drums. The cathedral has stood for centuries as a Russian national shrine. Patriarchs have been anointed and czars have been crowned before her altar.  Ivan the Terriible’s custom-made coronation throne is housed within. Napoleon used the cathedral as a horse stable and its icons for firewood in 1812. The bell tower, holding 23 bells, reaches 264 feet into the air.

Archangel Michael Cathedral with its five domes was built 1505-08. Sarcophagi dominate the interior. The remains of every Russian czar up to Peter the Great rest here.

The churches are all Russian Orthodox, and it  was at the nine domed Annunciation Church where we learned a lot about the Orthodox Church. People attending church services stand,  with the exception of a ‘royal’ or ‘patron’ box, there are no chairs, benches or pews. Frescoes cover the walls, ceiling and columns in the church, and I swear there is not a square inch of free space! The frescoes in this church date to the 15^th century and were restored in the  17^th century. The frescoes tell the story of the bible for the illiterate.

The altar is hidden behind an iconostasis, which covers the entire front wall of the sanctuary. Icons are religious paintings that are usually painted on wood, sometimes on canvas. In the center of the iconostasis is an ornate door that opens to the altar. The second icon to the right of the door is of the saint for whom the church derives its name. The rows of icons is always an uneven number with five being the most common. The bottom row is ‘local’. The second row represents the district, the third row represents the feast and festival, the fourth row represents the prophets, and the fifth row represents the fathers of the church. Each of the icons is ‘framed’ with ornate gold molding making for a glittering wall. Russian Orthodox churches normally do not have statuary, angels etc as they are considered pagan. From what we could gather music is sung without the benefit of instrumentation. 

A COUPLE OF SMALL GERMAN CITIES

                                          Interesting Small Cities

Rudesheim

            During that blistering hot summer in Europe we arrived in Rudesheim mid-afternoon where it was 104 degrees. The town is small and probably best known for the enormous 35-foot high stone statue of Germania, the female symbol of the unification of the German Empire in 1871. It towers 1000 feet above the town of Rudesheim, but it was just too hot to make the steep hike up to it.

            It only took a short while to walk the small city before we visited the music instrument museum. It was much different than expected but interesting. There were many player pianos, carnival organs, and gramophones on display. The thick walls of the old building kept it a bit cooler than outside.

            There was no air conditioning anywhere in town. Other than the usual souvenir shops there were few shops. After the museum we sat at a sidewalk café enjoying a chilled soda while dreaming of ice and something really cold. Europeans simply do not understand cold.

Since we were eating in town that evening we decided wile away the afternoon in town and meet at the restaurant on the cobbled wine alley Drosselgasse at dinner time.  The restaurant was very hot with no cross ventilation. Ceiling fans would have been nice, but are not common. A small band played good music, but it was so loud it eliminated any dinner conversation. The food was fair at best, and the service very slow and inconsistent.

We anticipated and looked forward to the cool comfort of our air conditioned river boat cabin!

Wertheim

This is where Galileo thermometers are made. In fact they are made nowhere else in the world. See post of June2

The castle sitting high up on the hill anchored walls that led from it surrounding the city like a necklace. Originally 18 gates/towers surrounded the city. We ended a city walking tour at the Plaza where the attraction was the red sandstone Angel’s Well, built 1574. From here a fellow and I hiked up to the castle leaving his wife and my travel buddy sitting by the well.

It was a fairly easy walk. We walked most of the stairs up and the path-ramps down. The view from the top was spectacular. These are Germany’s second largest castle ruins. After the castle was destroyed a new one was built below, and now that 300-year-old castle is the city hall.

The tower clock at the 1383 Gothic church is rather unusual. The tower was added 40 years later. On the town side is a normal clock with both minute and hour hands so workers would work to the last minute. But only an hour hand is on the clock facing the castle, as the rulers were only interested in the hour, not the minutes.

I need to gather the info from all the unusual clocks I’ve seen in my travels and do one comprehensive post. One day when I have the time to search through the mountain of diaries!

Having made several European river cruises I’ve really enjoyed the small towns along the way. Unlike big cities , you have time to really see the town, learn its history and visit with the people, who without exception, I’ve found friendly and anxious to tell us about their hometown.