St.Basil Cathedral. Monument to Minin and Pozharsky

Pokrovsky Cathedral was erected in the years 1565-1561 by decree of Ivan the Terrible, who vowed in the case of the successful capture of Kazan, to build a church in memory of this event. The sculptural group established in front of St. Basil's Cathedral is dedicated to Kuzma Minin and Dmitry Pozharsky, leaders of the second national militia during the Polish intervention, and victory over Poland in 1612.

Architecture, exterior decoration, monumental painting, frescoes, rare monuments of Russian icon painting - all this makes the cathedral a unique beauty and value of the temple of Russia. The cathedral consists of nine churches on one foundation and a bell tower. The main pillar-shaped church in honor of the Intercession of the Mother of God with a tent crowned with a small cupola, is surrounded on four sides by axial churches, between which four more are arranged - smaller. The hip bell tower was built later, in the 1670s. Today, the cathedral is both a temple and a branch of the Historical Museum at the same time.

The architect managed to brilliantly cope with a complex ideological task - to reflect in the architecture all the significant events of the military campaign. Instead of creating a single space with many chapels, Barma Postnik places nine small independent churches on one basement. In the center is the main church dedicated to the Protection of the Virgin, and the other eight are located around it. The composition of the cathedral is not perfectly symmetrical: the shape of the base of each church varies slightly, since the central volume has a large altar space on the east side. This solution had no analogues in Russian architecture.

Initially, it was proposed to install the Monument to Minin and Pozharsky in Nizhny Novgorod, where the militia was assembled. But later it was decided that the victory over Poland was of great importance for all of Russia and it would be more logical to establish a sculpture in the capital. A marble obelisk was presented to Novgorod. Today, the monument to Minin and Pozharsky is one of the main attractions of the capital of Russia.

For the first time in European history, the monument was cast entirely at one time. 1100 pounds of copper were prepared for its manufacture, which was then melted for 10 hours. The granite for the pedestal was delivered to St. Petersburg from Finland, and from there it was transported by water to Moscow. In 1818, the grand opening of the monument was held with the participation of Emperor Alexander and his entire family.

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