12th century architecture in Smolensk

A major center of the formed architecture of its own tastes was Smolensk, lying on the picturesque heights of the left bank of the Dnieper. The city, located between Kiev and Novgorod on the great Dnieper-Volkhov way "from the Varangians to the Greeks", quickly developed and became rich, strengthening its military and political importance in the conditions of interprince struggle. And the combination of hills, winding ravines of the plateau only attracted craftsmen to the construction. Unfortunately, not many monuments have reached us, most are known only from excavations.

The architecture of Smolensk was formed by the middle of the 12th century, also due to the participation in its development of Chernihiv architects and extensive construction. The unpreserved city cathedral, founded by Prince Vladimir Monomakh in 1101, left behind samples (bricks and mortar), allowing to claim that the temple was originally built by South Russian architects, and then continued Chernigov.

From the middle of the 12th century to us reached the most surviving church of Peter and Paul, which according to the old tradition has four pillars, strict and powerful static appearance.

The Church of Peter and Paul in 1146. According to other sources, researchers claim 1170.

The walls acquire more plastic thanks to the blades (vertical relief protrusion in the wall for decor) and semi-columns (also vertical, but in the form of columns, a relief protrusion in the wall), enriched with frieze, carved details and lined with thin red brick with plinth. The location of the windows and portal (entrance) animates the walls, as does the drum of the dome, which has 12 narrow arched windows. The facades are decorated with arcature (ornamental masonry) inside the zakomar (which imitate the arches on the facade of the temple) and porebrik (ornamental brickwork, in which one row of bricks is laid at an angle to the outer surface of the wall), which came with the Galician tradition. These techniques, together with convex crosses on the wide planes of the angular shoulder blades, emphasize the mighty harsh walls. But a large chapter, constructed of 12 faces, on the contrary, has lightness and grace, especially created by an elegant belt of ceramic tiles. The grandeur and coldness reflect the amazing interior. The floor is covered with glazed ceramic tiles, the walls and vaults are richly painted. On the walls of the ancient temple, researchers found graffiti dating from the end of the XII century. The choirs (as enlarged loggias for the prince and the nobility), always located on the second floor, have their chapel and apse in their south-west corner (the semicircular protrusion of the wall is the altar part). To the choirs leads a barely lit narrow staircase in the thickness of the western wall.

It was destroyed in the war of 1812 and the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945. It was restored in its supposed original forms in 1962-1963 under the direction of architect P. D. Baranovsky.

The Church of John the Theologian dates back to the 60s and 70s of the 12th century and is almost completely similar in design to the Church of Peter and Paul, but it has retained just over half of its original height. These two churches were surrounded by galleries. A gallery is a narrow room, a building connecting to the main building of the temple, or a gallery is built into the plan of the building.

There are more modest in size four-pillar temples without galleries, also uncovered by excavations in Smolensk. And the larger six-pillar churches with galleries of this period are the Boris-Gleb Cathedral of the Smyadyn Monastery.(1145-1147)

Smyadyn or the Princely Land. Boris-Gleb Cathedral

Smyadyn or the Princely Land. Boris-Gleb Cathedral Built in the middle of the 12th century, also opened by excavations, a fast pillar church and a rectangular building - a princely tower. The pillarless church is very spacious and has no pillars inside, but on its facade the inner pillars imitate flat blades (vertical relief protrusions of the wall). This is a successful attempt to create a small temple with a spacious interior. The princely tower stood on the high edge of the mountain, from which you can observe the panorama of the city.

In addition to these structures, a church very different from traditionally Russian churches was found - a rotunda with a diameter of about 18 meters (wide dome), which is supported by four closely and closely placed pillars. This is the church of the "German Virgin", serving in Smolensk as a parish for foreign merchants. The technique of bricklaying is Chernigov, but the plan of the temple was Northern European Romanesque, the second half of the 12th century, since the construction was led by a Scandinavian architect.