According to the legend, which the historian I. M. Snegirev calls
doubtful, and I. E. Zabelin - a legend, the wooden Cathedral of the
Annunciation was built in 1291 by Prince Vladimir Andrei
Alexandrovich, on the site of Kuchkov Field. The first written
mention of a stone church dates back to the end of the 14th century,
where the foundation of the church was laid around 1393 by the son
of Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy - Grand Duke Vasily Dmitrievich.
It was a single-domed, pillarless house church of the
grand-ducal family, made of white stone blocks on a basement that
has survived to this day. Presumably, the altar barrier of the
church was decorated with frescoes depicting saints. Then the temple
was called the Annunciation "on the Tsar's entrance hall", "at the
Grand Duke's Court", "at the crossings". On the western side, it
connected with the chambers of the sovereign through the passage.
In 1404-1405, as the chronicle said: “We began to sign the
Church of the Annunciation in the Grand Duke’s courtyard ....”, the
temple was decorated with frescoes and murals by artists Theophan
the Greek, Prokhor from Gorodets and Andrei Rublev. The chronicler
wrote that near the newly built temple, the Grand Duke set up the
first fighting clock in Moscow, which surprised his contemporaries.
In 1416, the building was dismantled and a new, four-pillar,
three-apse building was erected, expanded to the size of a modern
one. The cathedral became three-domed with a large central and two
small eastern domes. In style, it was close to the monuments of
early Moscow architecture: the Assumption Cathedral in Zvenigorod,
the Church of the Nativity of the Virgin on Senya. The facade, the
top of the drum and the apse were decorated with a carved belt, the
walls were articulated with shoulder blades. At the same time, the
vaults of the basement, resting on the central pillar, were
strengthened, and its walls were almost double thickened with white
stone masonry; in this form, the basement has reached our time.
In 1482, Prince Ivan III Vasilievich, shortly after the
overthrow of the Tatar-Mongol yoke, wishing to decorate the place of
his dwelling with new buildings, also touched on the Church of the
Annunciation: "start to destroy the church on Annunciation Square
...", work on dismantling the temple to the basement was completed
in 1483 .
In 1484, the construction of a new stone church
building began under the guidance of the Pskov masters Krivtsov and
Myshkin. The construction was completed five years later, after
which, on August 9, 1489, it was consecrated by Metropolitan
Gerontius. The plan and general dimensions of the building of 1416
were repeated in the new one. The temple was built of brick and
surrounded by covered galleries - porches. The basement used to
store the prince's treasury was preserved from the previous
building. Facade decorations belonged to different construction
schools - Pskov, Vladimir-Suzdal, Moscow. In the central part of the
temple, a stepped vaulting system was used. The eastern and southern
galleries connected the cathedral with the palace and the Treasury.
In the southeast corner, a half-open porch was attached to the
porches. The northwestern gallery was used as the main entrance to
the palace and exit to the Cathedral Square; at the exit to the
square, a seedling was built. The southern porch was originally
built as a separate enclosed space (in 1489, a chapel of St. Basil
of Neocaesarea was placed there). On the basis of the porches,
white-stone pillars were erected, decorated with flower four-petal
rosettes. Three perspective portals with keeled ends led from the
porch to the cathedral, of which only the southern one retained its
characteristic appearance for the 15th century, and the other two
received a Renaissance decor, probably at the beginning of the 16th
century (according to their decision - the use of an order - and the
splendor of the decor, they are close to the portals Archangel
Cathedral). The walls of the cathedral were vertically divided into
three strands; they received a pozakomarny covering and were
decorated with an arcade-columnar belt (this element, characteristic
of Vladimir-Suzdal architecture, was probably intended to correspond
to the architecture of the recently built Assumption Cathedral). The
temple was crowned with three domes, two of which were placed over
the eastern corners of the main volume, and the central one was
decorated with a number of keeled kokoshniks. The drums of the domes
received a decoration reminiscent of Pskov from a runner, a curb and
triangular depressions. The cathedral of 1484-1489 became the center
of the composition of the existing building.
In 1508, by
decree of Vasily III, the cathedral was painted by Theodosius, son
of Dionysius, and Fyodor Edikeev. On the walls were depicted
Aristotle, Thucydides, Ptolemy, Plutarch, Plato and Socrates with
scrolls in their hands. In the same year, the icons were gilded and
decorated with precious frames, the church tops were gilded, after
which the church began to be called the “golden top”.
The
temple was damaged during a fire in July 1547: carved decorations
and porches were damaged, icons of Andrei Rublev, Greek masters,
books, wall paintings were destroyed. During the renovation of the
facades in the middle of the 16th century, the white-stone
archivolts and capitals of the pillars were replaced with brick
ones.
The last time the temple was rebuilt in 1564-1566 under Ivan the
Terrible. On the vaults of the galleries, single-domed chapel
churches were built, dedicated to the Cathedral of the Most Holy
Theotokos, the Cathedral of the Archangel Michael, St. George and
the Entrance to Jerusalem. Their decor is reminiscent of the decor
of the pillars of the church of John the Baptist in Dyakovo. At this
time, two western domes were also built on the main volume of the
temple, so that it became nine-domed. The roofs were covered with
gilded copper, and the cathedral was called "golden-domed". The
aisles, built of undersized bricks, were covered with vaults with
formwork. The walls were decorated with panels in the image of the
Archangel Cathedral. The floor of the cathedral was paved with
jasper brought by Ivan IV from Rostov. Icon painters from Novgorod,
Pskov and other cities were assembled for interior decoration with
icons, under the supervision of the priest of the cathedral,
Sylvester. The appearance of icons unlike the previous ones caused
discontent among Moscow society, which was fueled by Ivan
Mikhailovich Viskovatov, who submitted a written application to
Metropolitan Macarius. The issue was so acute that it was considered
at the Zemsky Sobor in 1554, where Viskovaty had to repent for his
error. At the same time, the previously half-open south porch was
turned into a closed one. According to legend, Ivan the Terrible
listened to the Divine Liturgy on this porch, as if he had entered
into his 4th marriage, and on its steps in 1584 he saw a comet with
a cruciform banner, which he took as an omen of his death. The porch
served as an exit for the kings and his family to a small orchard
with artificial ponds. In 1561, Ivan the Terrible presented the
cathedral with a temple image of the Annunciation, brought from the
Novgorod Yuriev Monastery. Since 1572, after the fourth marriage,
Ivan the Terrible no longer had direct access to church services,
and the chapel in the southern porch was converted into the tsar's
personal chapel. At the same time, the entire eastern part of the
porch, together with the porch, was decorated with carved white
stone polychrome decor (on pillars, capitals of shoulder blades,
portals). By decree of Fyodor Ioannovich, a golden cross with a
tsata, the symbol of the crescent, was installed on the central
chapter.
During the Time of Troubles, the Polish ruin did not
touch the church, as evidenced by the lack of capital work to renew
the church under Mikhail Fedorovich. In April 1621, the clerk Ivan
Mitusov was ordered to paint only "a similar stone staircase." With
the front side of the Terem Palace facing the square, the porch of
the Annunciation Cathedral was connected to the Faceted Chamber
through passages and the Red Porch, and the staircase began to bear
the name of the Annunciation. Under Alexei Mikhailovich, the
cathedral porch and porch were ordered to be painted with different
colors, the work was done by the icon painter Ivan Filatiev, and
Simon Ushakov supervised the work. Paul of Aleppo left memories that
everything was painted with wonderful images of gold leaf, “a
wonderful lattice of yellow copper with silver icons”, and in the
church itself a mosaic floor made of square small tiles of oriental
agate, jasper and other colored stones attracted attention. The last
alteration of the porch took place in 1696, when the porch, vaults
and walls were ordered to be cleaned, smeared with gesso and
whitened.
A traveler in Russia during the time of Peter I
Alekseevich Kroniliy de Bruin, surveying the Annunciation Cathedral,
noticed that this small church was full of images and paid special
attention to the relics stored. In only one upper compartment, he
was shown 36 silver and several gold reliquaries with the relics of
saints, among which were the blood of Christ, a cross made from the
cross of the Savior, the hand of the Evangelist Mark, several bones
of the prophet Daniel, and much more.
At the end of the 18th
century, the Treasury Chamber was dismantled, the southern porch was
rebuilt, arched openings were laid between the semi-columns.
In 1800, the floors in the outbuildings were replaced with carved
white-stone floors with black mastic ornaments. In 1822, the chapel
in the name of the Great Martyr George was rebuilt and
re-consecrated in the name of Alexander Nevsky. An Empire-style
iconostasis was installed in it, old windows were laid and new ones
were broken through. In 1836, according to the project of the
architect Ivan Mironovsky, a sacristy was added to the southwestern
corner of the cathedral and the southern facade of the porch was
reconstructed, decorating it with an arcade.
In 1836, a
chapel was created in the southern part of the temple in the name of
St. Nicholas the Wonderworker. In 1844, the cathedral was connected
by a passage to the new building of the Grand Kremlin Palace, built
for Nicholas I. In 1863-1867, the cathedral was restored under the
direction of Fyodor Richter. As a result of the work, the roof was
replaced, the rafters, the masonry of the vaults and domes were
repaired. In 1896, workers from the jewelry firm of Ivan Khlebnikov
made a new setting for the iconostasis.
During the October Revolution of 1917, the Kremlin was shelled from
heavy artillery - a shell hit the cathedral and destroyed its porch.
In 1918, along with other churches of the Kremlin, it was closed for
worship. In May of the same year, a committee was established for
the preservation and disclosure of monuments of ancient painting,
headed by Igor Grabar. On his initiative, a restoration group began
to work in the Kremlin cathedrals under the leadership of the
department for museum affairs under the People's Commissariat of
Education. They managed to clear icons from the deesis and festal
rows of the iconostasis, presumably by Andrey Rublev and Theophan
the Greek. Among them were found "The Savior on the Throne", "John
the Baptist", "Archangel Gabriel", "Basil the Great", "John
Chrysostom". In 1950, the southern portal was restored using
fragments of a 15th-century structure found under a layer of
plaster. Five years later, the cathedral was turned into a museum.
In the 1970s, it was renovated and the domes were gilded.
Large-scale restoration work was carried out in 1980-1984 by
artists-restorers of the All-Union Association "Soyuzrestavratsiya"
under the leadership of Leonid Sergeevich Muravyov-Moiseenko. After
cleaning the walls of late records, they managed to discover a
previously unidentified author's layer of painting from the middle
of the 16th century. However, part of the compositions was
irretrievably lost as a result of the works of the 19th century.
By the 500th anniversary of the cathedral in 1989, an exposition
of icons was opened, which the house of the royal temple had in
ancient times. Since 1993, on the patronal feast of the Annunciation
of the Most Holy Theotokos, patriarchal services have been performed
in the church. On this day, the Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus'
releases white doves from the steps of the cathedral. The aisles of
the cathedral were restored in 2008-2010. The facades were restored
to their original appearance before the restoration of the
1930s-1960s.
The temple acquired its present appearance in the 1560s. The walls
of the four aisles erected above the corners of the galleries are
separated by square flyers. The basement of the cathedral is an
architectural monument of the late XIV century. It is laid out of
large white stone blocks with a pillar installed in the center; an
apse adjoins it from the east.
The entrance to the temple is
decorated with white-stone carved front portals, created in 1508 by
Aleviz Novy simultaneously with the northern and western galleries,
as was established in the course of field studies by Oleg Ulyanov.
The doorway of the northern and western portals is framed by two
pairs of free-standing columns with Corinthian capitals and
entablature. On the doors of the northern portal, scenes of
prophecies about Christ and the Mother of God are depicted, created
using the technique of “fire gilding” on copper (they are close in
style to the southern doors of the Assumption Cathedral). The
southern entrance is made in the traditions of early Moscow
architecture: rectangular ledges and semi-columns alternate with
beads and sheaf-shaped capitals. The panels are filled with
compositions depicting vases, lamps, and plant garlands.
The
inner space of the cathedral is small and seems even more cramped
due to the placement in its western part of the choir for the grand
ducal family. You can climb the choirs along the spiral staircase
located in the thickness of the masonry of the southwestern corner
of the cathedral (another entrance to the choirs - along the passage
resting on the arch - leads directly from the palace). The stepped
vaults of the temple rest on four pillars. The interior of the
cathedral has largely retained features acquired in the middle of
the 16th century.
The main body of the temple wall painting
was completed in the middle of the 16th century, during restoration
after a fire in 1547. The original paint layer was largely lost as a
result of renovations, but the original compositions and plots have
been preserved (the frescoes on the choirs, pillars, the central
altar and in the diakonnik are best preserved, especially the
compositions “Bringing Peter out of the dungeon” and “The Life of
Basil the Great”) . Major renovations of the frescoes took place in
1648 by an artel of icon painters headed by Tikhon Filatiev and in
1771 (when the frescoes were painted in oil). When clearing the
murals on the western wall of the southern gallery in 1882-1884,
academician V. D. Fartusov discovered the remains of the original
fresco "Rejoices About You", which in style resembled the work of
Italian Renaissance artists; on it, in particular, were depicted
portraits of the donors of the temple - the Grand Duke and Princess.
The commission, which oversaw the progress of the study of murals,
accused Fartusov of falsification and removed him from work. At the
same time, the remains of the fresco were knocked down, and in their
place a new composition was made using the same plot.
The
northern, southern, western walls of the quadrangle and the vaults
under the choirs are decorated with scenes from the Apocalypse
(Revelation of John the Theologian); the large space devoted to
plots from the "Apocalypse" distinguishes the iconography of the
frescoes of the Annunciation Cathedral from its contemporary
buildings. On the pillars are the Grand Dukes Vladimir
Svyatoslavich, Vladimir Monomakh, Alexander Nevsky, Ivan Kalita and
Dmitry Donskoy. On the arches of the northern and western galleries
is the composition "The Tree of Jesse", consisting of more than 200
figures. It starts from the entrance with the image of King David
and ends at the western portal of the cathedral with the image of
the Virgin and Child. Ancient philosophers, historians, poets are
depicted on the vaults and outer walls, including Plato and
Aristotle, Thucydides and Plutarch, Homer and Virgil. The fresco
“Trinity” on the eastern wall of the western porch is well
preserved. In the arch above the entrance is the composition "What
will we bring, Christ."
The southern gallery hosts a
permanent exhibition of icons from the 14th-16th centuries and
interior fragments from the time of Ivan the Terrible. One of the
icons - the Smolensk Icon of the Mother of God - according to
legend, was written by the Evangelist Luke. There is also a bronze
silver-plated shrine with the relics of 50 saints, sent as a gift in
the 15th century by the Russian tsars from Greece. In the basement
of the cathedral, more than 1,500 exhibits of the 12th-17th
centuries are displayed: samples of jewelry, weapons, ingots, coins.
The iconostasis of the cathedral is one of the most ancient high iconostases in Russia. Its chased bronze frame was made according to a drawing by Nikolai Sultanov in the 1890s. The iconostasis consists of five ranks: forefather, prophetic, festive, deesis and local. Icons of the festive and deesis, consisting of nine figures in height, date back to the end of the 14th - beginning of the 15th century. Their authorship is attributed to Andrei Rublev (the first seven holidays of the festive rite - from the “Annunciation” to the “Entrance to Jerusalem”, with the exception of “Mid-half”), Theophanes the Greek (most of the icons of the Deesis) and Prokhor from Gorodets (the second part of the festive rite, from “ Last Supper" to "Assumption"). The icons of the fourth, prophetic tier were painted in the middle of the 16th century, during the restoration after the fire of 1547, when the iconostasis was badly damaged; Moscow icon painters are considered to be the authors of the figures of the prophets (the same masters, presumably, performed the "Meniture" in a festive rite). In the uppermost, fifth tier of the iconostasis, there are bust images of the forefathers, made in the 16th-19th centuries. The most ancient image - the All-Merciful Savior - stands first to the right of the Royal Doors, made in 1818. Some of the windows in the local row date back to the 16th century. There are also thirty tablets in the iconostasis. Eleven of these are monthly menaions. The rest personify holidays and selected saints revered in the 18th century: the Annunciation, the Adoration of the Magi, the Presentation of the Lord, Baptism, the Transfiguration of the Lord, and others. In the local row, there used to be a particularly revered icon “Our Lady of the Don” of the late 14th century, authored by Theophan the Greek or one of the artists of his circle; Now the icon is kept in the State Tretyakov Gallery.