Red Square
As
promised here are brief descriptions of some of the important buildings in Red Square
behind the Kremlin wall.
The Armory Palace, Moscow’s
most fascinating and richest museum, flanks one side of The Kremlin at Red
Square. Created in 1806, it is Moscow’s oldest museum. It opened to the public in 1911. The
crown jewels, Catherine the Great’s coronation crown with its 5000 diamonds,
religious icons, priceless artifacts, and fabulous world famous Faberge egg
collection are housed in the Armory. Gold and silver shine everywhere in bowls,
goblets, chalices, and jewelry. Also
included are carriages, royal vestments, robes, and headdresses as well as the
189-carat Orlov diamond.
We
spent a long time walking the many rooms of the Armory while our
guide explained different displays as everything
was written in Russian. No English subtitles here! At times the glitter was
overwhelming. Thousands of pearls decorated gowns, crowns, book covers and
more.
We
were all agape at the tiny waists of past female czars as we viewed some of
their garments. My thigh was bigger than those waists! I was fascinated with the bronze floor to
ceiling gate that protected one room. It displayed the coat of arms of each
Russian state/district. It was truly a beautiful work of art.
It was a mind boggling visit.
Six churches are located
within and all are Russian Orthodox.
Cathedral Square. The white limestone Assumption Cathedral’s exterior dates to 1475. Five gilded
cupolas glitter 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
Terrible’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 towers 264-feet in 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.
At the nine-domed Annunciation Church we
learned a lot about the Russian Orthodox Church. People attending church
services stand, with the exception of the ‘royal’ or ‘patron’ box, there are no
chairs, benches or pews. Frescos, telling the story of the bible for the illiterate,
cover the walls, ceiling and columns in the
church. The frescos in this church date to the 15th century and were
restored in the 17th century.
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 from whom the church derives its name.
The rows of icons are always an uneven number with five being the most common. 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. I
stood in the middle of the sanctuary admiring the
crystal chandeliers and looking around I could not find a square inch of wall or ceiling
space that was not painted.
By then we’d been pretty well churched out so we left for other areas of
Red Square. It is a huge area and several buildings are office and government
buildings not open to the public.
The Gum department store and the Russian
artillery are described in earlier blog posts, 6/10 and 4/13 respectively.
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