Kiy Island and the Cross Monastery, Russia

 

Kiy or Kiy-island is a small island located in the Onega Bay of the White Sea, 8 km from the mouth of the Onega River, 15 km from the city of Onega. The length of the island is slightly less than 3 km, the width is from 100 to 500 meters. The area is 0.384 square kilometers. Through a bridge flooded at high tide - Pereima - Kiy-island in the north-west is connected to the neighboring Fares Island. With a small Krestovoy and some other islands, they are combined into the Kiysky archipelago. The island is composed of granite rocks (amphibolites and gabbro of the White Sea series of the Archean basement of the Baltic Shield, 3.5 billion years old), in some places of the coastline there are sandy beaches.

Administratively, Kiy-island belongs to the Onega district of the Arkhangelsk region.

 

Onega Cross Monastery

The Onega (Kiysky) Holy Monastery is a monastery located on the island of Kiy (Onega Bay of the White Sea). Founded in 1656 by Patriarch Nikon.

Foundation of the monastery
In 1639, hieromonk (future patriarch) Nikon, when escaping from the Solovetsky Monastery, suffered a disaster near the rocks on the way to the mouth of the Onega, but escaped in the bay of Kiy-Ostrov.
In the past year of 1639, we, the future Hieromonk, were making a procession along the sea from the Anzersky skete, and during that time, from the great sea excitement, we almost drowned; but, relying on the power of the Divine Life-Giving Cross, salvation by the recipients before the Onega mouth, to a haven to Kiy Island, and the glory of the sigh to our Lord Jesus Christ, who was crucified on the Cross, about this deliverance.
The future, then, on that island, in remembrance of that one’s salvation by hoisting the Holy and Life-Giving Cross in that place ...

In memory of his salvation, Nikon, according to the Pomeranian custom, erected a bow cross on the island and vowed to erect a monastery on this island. Thirteen years later, in 1652, Nikon (at that time already Metropolitan of Novgorod) was sent to the Solovetsky Monastery to transfer the relics of St. Philip to Moscow. On the way back, he again visited Kiy-island and, in memory of this event, erected a chapel on the other end of the island, closest to the mainland, with a cross inside it. Here he renewed his vows, and in 1656, already being a patriarch, he obtained permission from the king to found a monastery on Kiy-island in the name of the Exaltation of the Cross of the Lord. The monastery was officially founded on the charter of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, given on June 13, 1656.

To raise funds for the construction of the monastery, Nikon turned to the people. A huge amount for that time was collected - about 6,000 rubles. The construction of the first structures on the island from 1656 to 1659 was led by the elders Nifont Terebinsky and Isaiah, as well as the steward Vasily Poskochin, Nikon's confidants. The first wooden temple of the monastery was probably the Church of the Exaltation (inventory March 1657), it was re-consecrated in 1661 into the church of the Cathedral of St. Michael the Archangel. Iverskaya wooden church was built in 1659. In 1660, Nikon himself came to Kiy-island and lived here, supervising the construction, for almost the entire year. In particular, here he arranged a system for collecting fresh water on the model of Palestinian monasteries. On September 2, 1660, he personally consecrated the central Holy Cross Cathedral of the monastery. On September 8, 1660, he also consecrated the third wooden church of All Saints; it has survived to this day. Subsequently, wooden temples were no longer erected, only chapels were built. At the end of September 1660, Nikon went to Moscow and never returned to Kiy-island.

The politically new monastery was conceived as an alternative to Solovetsky, which had become one of the centers of the Old Believers. In particular, a part of the patrimony with serfs, which previously belonged to the Solovetsky Monastery, was transferred to the Onega Cross Monastery. The outstanding significance of the monastery was also confirmed by the fact that from the very beginning it was stauropegial (patriarchal) and it was immediately ruled by archimandrites - an unprecedented case for that time.

The most revered relic of the monastery is the “Kien Cross”, a cypress cross made by order of Nikon, which was supposed to be equal in size to the Cross of the Lord, and containing up to 300 different shrines in the inner reliquaries (particles of the relics of various saints, earth from holy places, and so on). Now the Kiysky cross is located in Moscow, in the church of St. Sergius of Radonezh in Krapivniki.

Before the destruction of the monastery by the Bolsheviks, gold and silver sacred vessels were also kept in the monastery - the contribution of Patriarch Nikon, his wooden staff and a chiseled candlestick. The monastic library kept the life of the patriarch in 250 sheets, written in semi-ustav by his staurophore Ivan Shusherin.

Further history of the monastery
At the end of 1730, it was decided to exile the former Bishop of Voronezh Lev (Yurlov), deprived of his dignity and monasticism, to the monastery under strict supervision, who was released from prison on the island only after the accession to the throne of Elizabeth Petrovna.

After the secularization carried out by Catherine II, the monastery fell into decay.

In 1756, a timber exchange and customs were established on the territory of the monastery to establish trade in timber with foreigners. Both institutions were abolished with the restoration of the monastery.

In 1764, after secularization, the monastic exploitation of the peasants in the village of Vorzogory ceased, but not completely. Transferred to the state treasury, they were declared "economic" and taxed for the maintenance of the monastery on Kiy-island.

On July 9, 1854, during the Crimean War, he suffered ruin from the British troops who landed on Kiy Island. The following year, the monastery buildings were damaged by fire, but were soon restored.

The monastery was finally abolished in 1922.

 

Architecture

Currently, on Kiy-Island, the following have been preserved in a different state:
Holy Cross Cathedral (1660)
Overhead Church of the Origin of the Honest Trees of the Life-Giving Cross (1660) with an attached utility and cell building (circa 1715)
Church of the Nativity of the Virgin (1689) with a bell tower and a refectory
Right aisle in honor of the Nativity of Christ (1874)
Left chapel in honor of St. Philip, Metropolitan of Moscow (1869)
Stave Church of All Saints converted into living quarters of a holiday home
Wooden rectory building (1871)
Wooden fraternal building
Fragment of a wooden monastery fence

Holy Cross Cathedral of the Holy Cross Monastery
It was built under the leadership of Patriarch Nikon and personally consecrated by him in 1660. Architects Nikon brings to Kiy-island after the completion of work in the Iversky Monastery in Valdai. Most likely, the master Averky Mokeev became the chief architect and direct supervisor of the construction of the stone structures of the monastery.

The lower, most loaded part of the walls is made of imported limestone, the upper, which is paradoxical, is made of a more durable material - brick mixed with granite boulders.

The cathedral is a classic in Russian temple architecture, a four-pillar, three-apse temple with a powerful cube (chetverik) of the main volume. Most likely, the cathedral was built with five domes, but after a series of fires and collapses, two small western domes were not restored and the temple remained three-domed. At present, the base and two eastern domes have been destroyed and covered with a high roof. The central octagon of the drum was light, with mica, and then glass windows, but because of the danger of creating strong draft through the light openings of the drum during a fire, they were bricked up. The current height of the cathedral is about 2 meters less than the former one due to the simplification of the design of the dome on the central drum. The entrances were decorated with traditional multi-arched portals.

Today, the Exaltation of the Cross Cathedral gives an impression that is completely different from what was intended: the cathedral is heavy, powerful and somewhat disproportionate. Initially, with a high central dome on a visually light light drum surrounded by small domes and with a flatter roof, the temple looked much more harmonious and sublime. The significant inclination of the side apses to the central vertical axis of the structure contributed to the greater visual height of the temple.

In the interior of the cathedral, a significant part (up to a third of the area) was fenced off by a high iconostasis (not preserved). The place of the temple icon in the iconostasis was occupied by the Kiysky cross. Wall paintings, apparently, were absent, with the exception of the domed surface - the "sky" (not preserved). A large gallery of choirs was built on the second level of the cathedral. Researchers believe that in the center of the gallery there was a place for Patriarch Nikon himself, placing himself in this way above the worshipers and closer to the "sky". The large (up to 2 meters) thickness of the walls made it possible to make an intra-wall (in the northern and western walls) stairs to the choir stalls. Further, in the northwestern corner of the temple, a narrow spiral staircase led to a domed gallery, rare in Russian architecture, designed to service a huge chandelier ordered by Nikon for the cathedral.

Later, two small aisles were separated in the northern and southern parts of the choir gallery.

Until recently, the cinema booth of the Kiysky rest house worked in the cathedral (now it has been dismantled). Now the cathedral has been re-consecrated, a small iconostasis has been built in the temple. There are no regular services in the cathedral.

 

Other objects of the island

Since 1760, a timber exchange has been operating on Kiy-Ostrov, where the Onega driftwood was reloaded onto sea vessels.
From 1924 to the present, the Kiysky rest house has been located on the island (up to 200 vacationers).
At low tide, the sea recedes hundreds of meters in some places, exposing the algae-covered bottom and allowing travel throughout the archipelago, which can be circumnavigated in just a few hours.

 

Interesting Facts

Contrary to the Finno-Ugric etymology (from the root with the meaning "stone") and pre-Nikonian written sources, the name of the Kiy-island is stubbornly raised to the question of Patriarch Nikon, who crashed here during a storm: "Is this island Kiy?" (that is, which, whose is this island?). There is another assumption: in the Sami language, the word "ki" means the trail of the beast.
The film "Prisoner of the Earth" was filmed on Kiy-island.
Every year, Kiy hosts the Warm Sounds of the North International Jazz Festival.