Architecture In Russian architecture of the 17th century, as in other spheres of cultural life in Russia at that time, secular motifs began to dominate. Russian architecture of the 17th century is interesting for its decorativeness. Beautiful relief platbands decorate the windows of buildings, stone cutting makes the buildings unusually quaint and picturesque. Tiles give multicolored buildings of Russian architecture of the 17th century.
Tent floors One of the most popular architectural forms of the 17th century is the tent. The refectory church of the Alekseevsky Monastery in Uglich is a striking example of this architectural form. Three slender tents rise above the heavy volume of the refectory. The tents are located on the vaults of the church, and are not associated with its spatial structure.
In the further development of Russian architecture of the 17th century, the tent turns from a structural element into a decorative one. The tent becomes a characteristic architectural element of the 17th century for small town churches. The best example of 17th century architecture of this kind is the Moscow Church of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary in Putinki. Local parishioners began building the church. The parishioners wanted to surprise Moscow with unprecedented wealth and beauty. However, they did not calculate their strength and had to ask the king for help. Alexey Mikhailovich gave a huge sum from the state treasury for the construction of the temple. The temple turned out very good indeed. In 1652, Patriarch Nikon forbade the construction of temples made in hipped roofs. architectural style. Tent floors
Moscow (Naryshkino) Baroque In the last quarter of the 17th century, the Moscow Baroque style became widespread in Russian architecture. This style in the 17th century was characterized by order details, the use of red and white in the painting of buildings, the number of storeys of buildings. Novodevichy Convent: gate church, bell tower. Moscow (Naryshkino) Baroque
Civil architecture In Russian architecture of the 17th century, stone construction became available not only to the royal family. The wealthy boyars and merchants are now able to build themselves “Stone Mansions.” Moscow and the provinces know many stone buildings of noble and wealthy families.
Painting in Russian culture XVII centuries, two mutually exclusive trends collide. On the one hand, this era is marked by the desire to break out from under the yoke of outdated traditions, manifested in realistic quests, in a passionate thirst for knowledge, in the search for new moral norms, new secular genres in literature and art. On the other hand, persistent attempts were made to turn tradition into obligatory dogma, to preserve the old, sanctified by tradition, in all its integrity.
The aggravation of social contradictions caused an increasingly noticeable class differentiation of art and, in particular, painting. Court art began to play a decisive role: paintings of palace chambers, portraits, images of the family tree of Russian tsars, etc. His main idea was the glorification of royal power.
No less significant was church art, which preached greatness church hierarchy. The rise of culture and art began only in the middle of the 17th century. During these years, the Armory Chamber became the main artistic center not only of Moscow, but of the entire Russian state, headed by one of the most educated people of the 17th century, boyar B. M. Khitrovo. The best were concentrated here artistic forces. The masters of the Armory Chamber were tasked with renovating and repainting the palace chambers and churches; icons and miniatures were painted here. At the Armory there was a whole workshop of “banner makers”, that is, draftsmen who created drawings for icons, church banners, regimental banners, sewing, jewelry (about the Armory as a center of decorative and applied arts). In addition, the Armory served as something of a higher art school. Artists came here to improve their skills. All painting works were headed by the royal iconographer Simon Ushakov. In addition to Ushakov, the most significant of the icon painters of the Armory Chamber were Kondratyev, Bezmin, Joseph Vladimirov, Zinoviev, Nikita Pavlovets, Filatov, Fyodor Zubov, Ulanov.
Simon Ushakov One of the central figures of Russian art of the 17th century was, undoubtedly, the artist Simon Ushakov (). The significance of this master is not limited to the numerous works he created, in which he sought to overcome artistic dogma and achieve a truthful depiction of “how life happens.” Evidence of Ushakov’s progressive views is also what he wrote, apparently in the 60s, “A Word to a Lover of Icon Painting.” In this treatise, Ushakov highly values the purpose of the artist, who is capable of creating images of “all creatures,” “to create these images with varying perfection and, through various arts, to make the mental easily visible.” Ushakov considers painting to be higher than all the “arts existing on earth,” which “is superior to all other types because... it more vividly depicts the represented object, more clearly conveying all its qualities.” Ushakov likens painting to a mirror that reflects life and all objects.
Frescoes Painting of the Temple of Elijah the Prophet Painting of the Temple of Elijah the Prophet, the most significant of all Yaroslavl murals, was performed in 1681 by a group of masters under the leadership of Moscow artists Gury Nikitin and Sila Savin. The most interesting in it are the frescoes located on the walls and dedicated to the history of Elijah and his disciple Elisha. The theme in these frescoes is scripture often turns into a fascinating story in which secular aspects prevail over religious content.
Parsuna In the second half of the century, the portrait began to gain an increasingly strong place in Russian art. Back in the middle of the previous century (), a church council discussed the possibility of depicting people “who are more alive” in icons.
Since the 1620s, construction and the activities of the Order of Stone Affairs have noticeably intensified. Construction activity is resuming, becoming more centralized, and connections between individual cities are strengthening. This, in turn, was reflected in a certain erasure of the difference between local architectural schools. The theme of victory and patriotism is heard in works of art of this time. In the 17th century, the construction drawing acquired a certain significance. The architects’ acquaintance with the Western treatises of Vignola and Scamozzi contributed to the development of the classical heritage, the development of the principles of order and regularity. Moscow’s contacts with Western Europe, Ukraine and Belarus were also important. The fruitful development of wooden construction continued architecture on stone. The impact on the development of stone chambers is especially significant.
Terem Palace
Among the largest civil buildings of the 12th century is the Terem Palace in the Moscow Kremlin. Russian architects B. Ogurtsov, T. Sharutin, L. Ushakov, under the “supervision of the sovereign master” Antipa Konstantinov, erected them on high 12-meter white stone basements of the 16th century. a royal palace for the daily life of the autocrat. Elevated above other buildings, the Terem Palace seemed to demonstrate a departure from the time-honored ancient customs. The structure of the Terem Palace retains the features of mansion buildings. The first floor was located on the flat roof-terrace of a building of the last century and, according to custom, had an economic purpose. A “golden” staircase led from the terrace to the second - main floor, where the royal chambers were located. The third floor of the palace consisted of a large room - the tower of the ancient Russian “attic”, which stood, in turn, on a flat roof - the walkway. All three floors of the Terem Palace were connected by an internal staircase. Communication was also provided with the main chambers: Granovita, Zolotaya, and Embankment. The main residential floor included a number of chambers located one behind the other. The usual placement of rooms in a “flock” for the “sovereign’s article” choir here takes on a more official, solemn character of an enfilade, enclosing the monarch’s bedchamber. The royal courtiers awaited the autocrat's exit in the first chamber - the reception room; this was followed by a “room” that served as a living room and study. In the third chamber there was a royal throne, and in the fourth there was a sovereign bed. The stepped-tiered construction of volumes, the spatial isolation of individual parts, the picturesqueness of the porches and the silhouette with the high roof of the tower and the pointed ends of the lockers preserved the principles of wooden mansion architecture.
Elements of regularity are combined with colorful patterns. The carved white stone platbands and portals were painted with bright colors, the strict horizontals of the cornices were enlivened by azure tiles sparkling in the sun, the ridge line of the tower was enriched with a slotted gilded ridge, the architectural order was complemented by picturesqueness. chambers of Duma clerk Averky Kirillov in Moscow
represent a type characteristic of the 17th century. complex of stone choir and temple, connected to each other by a covered passage (1657). All 3 floors are stone. The volumes are freely shifted relative to each other, asymmetrically separated by pilasters. The composition of the church, elongated in height, complements the ensemble, which is based on the principle of harmonious balance of volumes, freely oriented in space. pillarless parish church with kokoshniks. After the reforms of Patriarch Nikon, the use of a tent over the main temple was prohibited and a canonical five-domed structure was erected. A canonical five-domed structure was erected. The main volume was a quadrangle, covered with a closed vault. An important element was the bell tower covered with a tent, often placed above the western entrance or nearby. Often, between the hipped bell tower and the main quadrangle, lower, but quite capacious refectory space, increased the area of the temple. The volumes of the bell tower were usually placed either along an axis or grouped asymmetrically. Decorative patterning enhanced the impression of picturesqueness and plastic richness of the composition. The combination of multi-volume and cheerful in character, based on folk motifs, colorful patterning with the geometric integrity of each of the volumes is a characteristic feature of the tectonic structure of temple compositions in the middle and third half of the 17th century.
Stone Trinity Church in Nikitniki in Moscow(1628–1653) is an example of the free combination of volumes of different shapes and sizes in a composition. It was built at the expense of the wealthy merchants Nikitnikovs. outstanding monument Russian architecture XVII century Church built in 1628-1653. in the center Moscow , V China Town (see vol. 3, fig. 158), at the expense of the merchant Grigory Nikitnikov, who stored his goods in basement temple, and also for a fee accepted for storage the goods of other merchants “from thieves and the red rooster” (fire). Composition typical for Russian architecture of the 17th century and follows the principle of “shape formation”, when to the main volume, according to symmetry , but freely and picturesque , "increment", aisles, stairs galleries . In this case, a symmetrical volume (“quadruple” with five chapters ) is equipped with chapels, a gallery with refectory , connected to tent bell tower and external staircase with hipped porch. The church is decorated with many kokoshnikov , white stone carving , metal forged decor And murals . Individual elements reproduce the decor royal Terem Palace in Moscow Kremlin
General stylistic features of 17th century architecture. were enriched by local artistic traditions and original compositional techniques, a clear example of which are the architectural monuments of the Middle Volga region, especially Yaroslavl. This city, which stood at the crossroads of trade routes from Moscow to Arkhangelsk and Astrakhan, experienced its “golden age” in the 17th century. In the “Book of the Great Drawing,” a remarkable geographical document of 1627, it is written: “Yaroslavl is decorated with great church buildings and great plantings.” In the middle of the 17th century. specific features of Yaroslavl architecture are formed.
Church of Elijah the Prophet(1647-1650), built in the courtyard of the eminent merchants Skripin, is not much different in plan from the Moscow Posad churches. The craftsmen used a more familiar cathedral-type scheme with two pillars and a load-bearing wall with openings that covered the altar and facilitated the construction of the iconostasis.
The slender tented bell tower served as a spatial landmark, as if fixing the intersection of roads. The main western facade was frontal in nature, its flanks were closed by the tents of the bell tower and the chapel.
Temple of John Chrysostom
The first church of St. John Chrysostom was built here in 1649-1654, the second - Vladimir (warm) was built in 1669, in the interval between the construction of these churches a bell tower was built. Five-domed cathedral-type churches with close dimensions of the main volumes are placed along one line at a distance equal to their height.
In the middle between them there is a gate with a miniature tiered top, contrasting with the monumental volumes of the temples. The axis marked by the vertical of the gate is secured by a high (38 m) bell tower in the depths of the square. The unusually slender octagonal pillar of one of the most beautiful hipped bell towers of the 17th century, towering above the heads of the churches, united the entire composition. Facing the Volga, the majestic ensemble, looking great from its expanses, amazes with its balance, combining the regularity of geometric shapes with picturesqueness.
The Church of St. John Chrysostom represents an already established architectural work of the Yaroslavl school. The cubic mass of the temple is surrounded on three sides by a gallery, the eastern ends of which are completed with chapels. The architects also preserved the finishing of the walls with zakomari, corresponding to the nature of the vaulted covering. Yaroslavl residents also fell in love with the tents, symmetrically located on the sides of the five-domed church on the side chapels. 
The color scheme of the facades is also unique. Brick architectural divisions and details stand out brightly on the white plane of the walls. The contrast of the white background and red frames did not destroy the tectonics of the wall, nor did the individual flat spots of blue-green and yellow tiles.
Even more colorful decoration Church of John the Baptist in Tolchkovskaya Sloboda(1671 -1687). The temple, built at the expense of parishioners, reflected the rivalry of rich Yaroslavl settlements.
The eastern facade is especially striking. Above the strip of large semicircular apses rises a wall, as if embroidered with figured bricks. Fifteen domes are lined up on this majestic pedestal. The rhythm of horizontal volumes and planes gives this unique work a special stability and majesty, despite the abundance of decorative forms. It is the amazing combination of the structural principle with the flowery painting of the apses, with intricate brick patterns and colorful spots of tiles that makes up the distinctive feature of the temple in Tolchkovskaya Sloboda.
A special place in the religious architecture of the 17th century is occupied by tented churches, which from the middle of the century gradually lost their purpose (reasons for the schism of the Orthodox Church, the reforms of Patriarch Nikon); state ideas were again personified with the 5th chapter.
Tent completions are increasingly being erected for the expressiveness of the silhouette, so beloved by folk craftsmen. They begin to acquire a decorative character, losing their monumentality and organic nature.
Church of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary in Putinki 1649-1652
By the middle of the 17th century, the tents finally turned into a decorative finish, which was placed on top of the vaults in churches of various types. So in Moscow, three toy tents decorated the parish church of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary in Putinki 1649-1652.
The tent-roofed church of the Ferapontov Monastery with its tent-roofed twins.
Assumption Church in the Alekseevsky Monastery in Uglich 1628. Tent 3=three.
At the end of the 17th century, the secular principle penetrated deeper and deeper into religious architecture, steadily making its way through the jungle of religious obscurantism. The reactionary church-feudal culture was still slowing down social development, but could no longer hold back the forward march of history. The horizons of the population, especially the townspeople, expanded. The reunification of the Ukrainian people with the Russians in 1654 and the return of Belarusian lands contribute to the cultural ties of the three fraternal peoples. Ukrainian theologians write their works in Russia; Belarusian carvers, well familiar with Western European architectural forms, carefully carve columns in the iconostasis of Moscow churches; There is an exchange of architects between Moscow and Kiev, mutually enriching architecture.
The principles of rationalism, conditioned by life, are increasingly penetrating into architecture, combined with festive decorativeness, which gives the works of the late 17th century. special attractiveness and uniqueness. New requirements for religious buildings are emerging. The growth of the urban population necessitates an increase in the capacity of churches, and the trends of the times are reflected in a more regular organization of the volumetric-spatial structure and an increase in illumination. The low, cramped and dimly lit space of the temple no longer met the needs of the parishioners and their aesthetic tastes. The strength of secular realistic tendencies forced to increase the size of pillarless temples, to arrange several tiers of window openings, dividing the wall into a kind of floors with strictly symmetrically located large windows. The significant height and span of pillarless temples lead to the improvement of their vaulted coverings. For greater spatial rigidity, deep formwork is made in ordinary closed vaults.
The interiors of temples begin to lose their isolation, detachment from real world. Tall spacious rooms, flooded with light, with multi-tiered sparkling gilded order iconostases and multi-colored iconography, including everyday scenes, are already far from the medieval appearance of the church. The façade decoration of churches is also changing. Festive decor obeys the laws of symmetry and acquires greater solemnity, the number of Western European architectural details increases;
In the last years of the 17th century. As the swan song of ancient Russian religious architecture, another type of church-bell tower appears, combining the composition of tiered wooden buildings with the idea of churches “with bells.”
The idea of a centric high-rise church with tiers of octagons located on a quadrangle received a brilliant completion in churches “to the sound of bells” at the turn of modern times. On a more advanced technical basis, Russian architects are reviving the old idea of combining a bell tower with a temple into a single composition.
The most organically type of church-bell tower is expressed in the temple Intercession (1693-1694) in the village of Filyakh, which became famous after 1812. Moscow. In the unusually harmonious composition, full of dynamism and solemnity, one can feel the continuity coming from the pillar-shaped churches of the 16th century. and their wooden prototypes.
The basis for the tower-like structure is a cubic volume, which is adjoined on four sides by semicircles of lower vestibules and an apse. The resulting four-petal shape gave special rigidity to the lower part of the temple. On the quadrangle there is a light octagon, covered with an eight-tray closed vault, and on it there is a bell tower topped with a head on an octagonal drum. Four smaller chapters completed the semicircular volumes.
Novodevichy Convent in Moscow. (Read in the lectures there is something incomprehensible there)
Sukharev Tower (1692-701)
"Architecture of the 17th century"
The 17th century was a century of upheavals and enormous changes in Russia. This is an age of unrest, uprisings, the appearance of an impostor, the invasion of foreigners, but at the same time, the age is glorified by the extraordinary resilience and ability of the Russian people to revive. Numerous shocks in Russia early XVII century, its entry into the modern era also affected the culture, main feature which was a departure from church canonicity. In all areas of culture there was a struggle between the old church churches and the new ones. secular forms, which gradually won, which led to a further strengthening of realistic trends in art.
Russian science in the 17th century. felt uplifted. Changes have also occurred in the field of architecture. New styles began to emerge
Architecture is a phenomenon derived from a specific functional need, depending both on construction and technical capabilities (building materials and structures), and on aesthetic ideas, determined by the artistic views and tastes of the people, their creative ideas.
Architecture of Rus'
In the 17th century The transition to a commodity economy, the development of domestic and foreign trade, the strengthening of central power and the expansion of the country's borders led to the growth of old cities and the emergence of new ones in the south and east, to the construction of guest courtyards and administrative buildings, stone residential houses of boyars and merchants. The development of old cities took place within the framework of an already established layout, and in the new fortified cities they tried to introduce regularity into the layout of streets and the shape of neighborhoods. In connection with the development of artillery, cities were surrounded by earthen ramparts with bastions. In the south and in Siberia, wooden walls with earthen filling were also built, which had towers with hinged battlements and low hipped roofs. At the same time, the stone walls of Central Russian monasteries lost their old defensive devices and became more elegant. Monastery plans became more regular. The enlargement of the scale of Moscow caused the addition of a number of Kremlin buildings. At the same time, more thought was given to the expressiveness of the silhouette and the elegance of the decoration than to improving the defensive qualities of the fortifications. The tower palace built in the Kremlin received a complex silhouette and rich white stone carvings of cornices, porches and figured platbands. The number of stone residential buildings is increasing. B XVII century they were usually built according to a three-part scheme (with a vestibule in the middle), had utility rooms on the lower floor and an outer porch. The third floor in wooden buildings was often framed, and in stone ones it had a wooden ceiling instead of vaults. Sometimes the upper floors of stone houses were made of wood. In Pskov there are houses from the 17th century. almost devoid of decorative decoration, and only in rare cases were the windows framed with platbands. Central Russian brick houses, often asymmetrical, with roofs of different heights and shapes, had cornices, interfloor belts, relief window frames made of profile bricks and were decorated with painting and tiled inserts. Sometimes a cruciform plan was used, connecting three-part buildings at right angles, and internal staircases instead of external ones.
Palaces in the 17th century evolved from picturesque scatteredness to compactness and symmetry. This can be seen from a comparison of the wooden palace in the village of Kolomenskoye with the Lefortovo Palace in Moscow. The palaces of church rulers included a church, and sometimes, consisting of a number of buildings, were surrounded by a wall with towers and had the appearance of a kremlin or monastery. Monastic cells often consisted of tripartite sections forming long bodies. Administrative buildings of the 17th century. looked like residential buildings. Gostiny Dvor in Arkhangelsk, which had 2-story buildings with housing above and warehouses below, was at the same time a fortress with towers that dominated the surrounding buildings. The expansion of cultural ties between Russia and the West contributed to the appearance of order forms and glazed tiles on the facades of houses and palaces, in the distribution of which Belarusian ceramists who worked for Patriarch Nikon played a certain role in the construction New Jerusalem Monastery in Istra. Decoration Patriarchal Cathedral They began to imitate and even tried to surpass him in elegance. At the end of the 17th century. order forms were made in white stone.
In churches throughout the 17th century. the same evolution took place from complex and asymmetrical compositions to clear and balanced ones, from the picturesque brick “pattern” of the facades to clearly placed order decoration on them. For the first half of the 17th century. typical pillarless churches with a closed vault are “patterned” churches with a refectory, chapels and a bell tower. They have five chapters, cupolas over the chapels, tents over the porches and bell tower, tiers of kokoshniks and cornices, platbands, and milled belts inspired by residential architecture. With their fractional decoration, picturesque silhouette and complexity of volume, these churches resemble multi-timbered rich mansions, reflecting the penetration of secular principles into church architecture and losing the monumental clarity of the composition.
The architecture of Moscow, inheriting the architectural features of the most developed feudal principalities, also acquires its own distinctive style, in which architectural traditions are intertwined pre-Mongol Rus', and the urban planning achievements of Novgorod and Pskov, and also reflect the ideas of unification and liberation of lands, centralization of the state and the formation of a single nation. The architecture of the Moscow state was distinguished by the comparative constancy of the main types of construction characteristic of the feudal structure. These are residential buildings and outbuildings, churches and belfries, chambers and monastery buildings, fortifications, however, the structure of buildings and structures, their stylistic character developed along with changes in life realities, social and ideological conditions, and defensive requirements. Designs and building materials changed, and with them the architectonics of buildings and structures. Along with stone ones, wooden buildings were of great importance, which in Rus' have always remained the main type of mass construction, influencing the development of stone buildings and structures.
The general rise of national culture, caused by the strengthening of the Russian national state, was expressed in the development of architecture. By the second half of the 17th century. includes the construction of a number of remarkable architectural monuments: the royal palace in Kolomenskoye, the grandiose and original complex of architectural structures of the so-called New Jerusalem in the Resurrection Monastery near Moscow, the Georgian churches Mother of God in Moscow and Pokrova in Fili, many interesting works of civil and church architecture in Zvenigorod, Yaroslavl, Vologda and other cities. Characteristics, inherent in works of architecture that varied in purpose and artistic form, were elegant splendor, effective decorativeness, colorfulness and richness of decoration, which well convey the general life-affirming character of the rapidly developing Russian national art of the 17th century.
Characteristic of Russian architecture of the 17th century. the desire for pomp and elegance is clearly expressed in the decoration of the monumental Kremlin towers with tents that have a purely decorative meaning, as well as in the decoration of the white walls of the Intercession Cathedral on Red Square (St. Basil's Cathedral) with a motley and bright ornamental pattern (2). Architects Bazhen Ogurtsov, Antip Konstantinov, Trefil Sharutin and Larion Ushakov built the Terem Palace of the Moscow Kremlin in 1635-1636. Its three-story volume has a clearly identified stepped character. The palace is surrounded on all sides by a walkway. Two belts of multi-colored glazed tiles crown upper tier building. Initially, the walls of the palace, whose interior is especially cozy, were painted.
For the second half of the century, a small temple became typical - five-domed and pillarless, with a refectory, chapels, a gallery, a bell tower and porches with tents. Such are the churches of the Trinity in Nikitniki and the Nativity of the Virgin in Putniki (Moscow), the cathedrals of the Rostov Kremlin.
During these years, in Yaroslavl, which was especially flourishing and growing rich, temple construction was widely carried out. The churches of St. John Chrysostom in Korovniki and St. John the Baptist in Tolchkovo are characterized by the introduction of a bright pattern of glazed tiles. Tiles of various shapes make up ornaments; fantastic animals or plants are often depicted in relief. The color scheme is dominated by a combination of yellow with green and blue tones. Bright colored tiles give the buildings a distinctly elegant character. A typical monument of Yaroslavl architecture - the Church of Elijah the Prophet in Yaroslavl - is a vast, well-lit tetrameter temple surrounded by covered galleries.
XVII century was the heyday of wooden architecture. The most significant secular buildings included the unpreserved palace of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich in Kolomenskoye. The palace consisted of seven mansions and was a building of complex composition, combining a large number of log cabins adjacent to each other and connected by passages.
Summing up the development of architecture in the 17th century, one cannot help but note the constant emergence of new types, forms, techniques, and the ongoing search for means of moving to a qualitatively new level - that is, the preparation of the architecture of the New Age. It is fundamentally important that, despite all the differences in local variants, this architecture had significant artistic unity; it reflected the same trends, refracted differently depending on the material, type of construction, local traditions and tastes. Therefore, the architecture of the 17th century. can be considered as an integral stage in the history of Russian architecture, which formed its own values, different from both the traditional ancient Russian ones and the architectural ideals of the Peter the Great era that replaced them.
Architecture was transformed over time, but, nevertheless, some features of Russian architecture existed and developed over the centuries, maintaining traditional stability until the 20th century, when the cosmopolitan essence of imperialism began to gradually erase them.
The Terem Palace of the Moscow Kremlin was built in 1635-1636. for the royal children. Ba-zhen Ogurtsov, Trefil Sharutin, Antip Konstantinov, Larion Usha-kov took part in its creation. The three-story stone building was crowned with a high “tower.” Hence the name of the palace.
Two belts of azure tiled cornices in combination with a gilded roof gave the palace an elegant, fabulous look. The building was richly decorated with white stone carvings.
Spasskaya Tower of the Moscow Kremlin
Built in the 17th century. The Spasskaya (Frolovskaya) tower of the Moscow Kremlin has survived to this day (the English architect Christopher Galovey and the Russian master Bazhen Ogurtsov).
Secular features in architecture were clearly visible in church architecture. There is an increasing movement away from medieval rigor and simplicity. Many churches began to be built by order of merchants in accordance with their tastes and desires.
Trinity Church in Nikitniki
Trinity Church in Nikitniki in Moscow was built in the mid-17th century. by order of the merchant Nikitnikov (he himself is from Yaroslavl). The architecture of the temple highlights bright, festive elements. The decoration of the temple is rich and colorful: pillars entwined with belts; three tiers of kokoshniks; arches with hanging weights; decorated tent. This building has survived in Moscow to this day.
Church of Elijah the Prophet in Yaroslavl
The Church of Elijah the Prophet in Yaroslavl was built by order of merchants in the mid-17th century. During the construction of the temple, much attention was paid to wealth and splendor. This was supposed to emphasize the wealth and importance of the customers. The five-domed temple is surrounded by a porch, a gallery, a tent-roofed aisle and a bell tower. The red brick decoration against the white wall adds beauty to the temple. In addition, the temple is decorated with green, blue and yellow tiles. Material from the site
In Russia in the 17th century, four independent architectural schools can be distinguished, each of which has its own principles of compositional design and decorative decoration of churches: Moscow, Yaroslavl, Naryshkino (Moscow) Baroque, Stroganov.
Moscow architectural school
The Moscow school was distinguished by its predilection for the pillarless design of the building: its vaults rested only on the walls. The absence of pillars supporting the vaults made the interior of the temple more solid, and the temple itself more spacious. However, the weakened vaults could withstand only relatively small loads. As a result, churches of the Moscow school usually have small domes and are generally small in size. They are best viewed at close range, when all the advantages of complex and multi-colored facade decor are revealed. Examples of this style are the Moscow churches of St. Nicholas on Bersenevka (1657), St. Nicholas in Pyzhi (1670), and St. Nicholas in Khamovniki (1682).
The 17th century became a century of serious upheavals and great changes for Russia. All this could not but affect the development of culture. Attitudes towards religion changed, ties with Europe strengthened, and new styles emerged in architecture. It was during this period that the transition of architecture from the strict forms of the Middle Ages to decorativeness, from the church to the secular was noticed. Carved platbands, stone cuttings, and multi-colored tiles appear on the facades of buildings.
At the beginning of the 17th century, tent compositions continued. One of the striking examples of that era is the Wonderful Assumption Church on the territory of the Alekseevsky Monastery in Uglich.
Assumption Wonderful Church on the territory of the Alekseevsky Monastery in Uglich
In later construction, the tent ceases to be a structural element and begins to serve more of a decorative function. It can be seen on small churches and secular buildings of that era. The last tent-type temple is the Moscow Church of the Birth of the Virgin Mary in Putinki, dating back to the mid-17th century. The fact is that it was during this period that the church, led by Patriarch Nikon, recognized many old church dogmas as erroneous, and a ban was imposed on the construction of tented cathedrals and churches. From now on, they had to be five-headed and with crowns.
In addition to tented ones, in the 17th century they also built pillarless cubic cathedrals and churches, also called ships, as well as round temples.
The popularization of stone buildings, which began in the 16th century, continues. In the 17th century, such construction no longer became only the privilege of kings. Now boyars and merchants could build stone mansions for themselves. Many residential stone houses were built in the 17th century both in the capital and in the provinces. But the kings, as it turned out, on the contrary, preferred wooden architecture. Despite the widespread use of stone as the main building material, the 17th century can rightfully be considered the century of the heyday of Russian wooden architecture. The royal palace in Kolomenskoye was considered a masterpiece of wooden architecture and architecture of the 17th century. At that time, the residence had 270 rooms and about 3,000 windows. Unfortunately, in the mid-18th century it was dismantled due to disrepair on the orders of Empress Catherine II. In our time, it has been recreated from records and drawings, allowing us to judge the beauty and grandeur of the architecture of that time, but in this form it no longer represents the same architectural value as if it were the original.
By the end of the 17th century, a new style appeared in Russian cathedral architecture, called. The style got its name from the name of the main customer. This style corresponds to the combination of white and red colors in the painting of building facades and the number of floors of buildings. Examples of buildings in this style are the churches and palaces of Sergiev Posad, the Church of the Intercession in Fili, bell towers, the refectory and gate churches in the Novodevichy Convent.
Changes in the life of the country, the development of trade relations with neighbors, and some other factors provided the preconditions for the fact that Russian cities began to expand. New cities appeared in the south and east of the country. The first attempts to create city plans and streamline urban planning appeared.
In connection with the expansion of the borders of the state and the cessation of Tatar raids on Rus', the center of the country no longer needed such protection as in the Middle Ages. Many city fortresses and monastery walls in the central part of the country ceased to perform defensive functions. This period in the life of the country coincided with the emergence of a new direction in architecture, a move away from strict lines and a transition to decoration. That is why in the 17th century many Kremlin buildings and monasteries were completed with a special flavor. Now the architects thought more about appearance, elegance of decoration, expressiveness of lines, than about the defensive quality of towers and buildings.
In the 17th century, both residential houses of merchants and boyars and administrative buildings began to be built with two or three floors. With a stone foundation, the upper floor could be made of wood; often the building was made entirely of wood. The lower floor of such buildings was usually used for household needs.
In the middle of the century, under the patronage of Patriarch Nikon, the holy places of Palestine began to be recreated in Moscow. The project results in the construction of the New Jerusalem Monastery on the Istra River. The monastery was supplemented by a traditional complex of wooden structures, the Resurrection Cathedral. Later, due to Nikon's disgrace, construction works were stopped. The Belarusian craftsmen who worked on the construction introduced the use of ceramics and tiles for finishing facades into Russian architecture. Subsequently, many tried to imitate the monastery cathedral in every possible way, trying to surpass it in elegance.
Despite the fact that many cities had their own characteristics in architecture and urban planning, elegant pomp and spectacular decorative forms and facade design began to spread everywhere. Russia, having survived the period of turmoil, seemed to be reborn, looking forward with hope for the future. During this period, the desire for decoration resulted in the decoration of the towers of the Moscow Kremlin with tents, as well as in the decoration of the white walls of St. Basil's Cathedral (Pokrovsky Cathedral) with bright and colorful patterns. In 1635-1636, a three-story Terem Palace with a clearly defined stepped design was built in the Kremlin. Initially, its walls were painted both inside and outside; the upper tier of the palace was decorated with tiles. The cathedral on the territory of the complex is a typical representative of the Baroque style, which at that time began to spread in Russian architecture of the 17th century.
At that time, the second most important city in Rus' was Yaroslavl. Tiles were actively used in decorating the churches of St. John the Baptist in Tolchkovo, as well as St. John Chrysostom in Korovniki. These buildings are characterized by the use of bright patterns created using glazed tiles. A typical monument The Church of Elijah the Prophet is considered to belong to this period of architecture in Yaroslavl.
During the 17th century, there was widespread construction of new stone temples, monasteries and in Murom. Two monasteries were built - the Trinity monastery for women and the Blagoveshchensky monastery for men. Instead of wooden buildings, stone temples were erected in the women's Resurrection Monastery, the St. George Church, destroyed in the 30s of the 20th century, as well as the five-domed Kazan or St. Nicholas Church and the one-domed St. Nicholas Church. The Nikolo-Zaryadsky Temple also did not survive, but in those years it was one of the best examples of Russian architecture of the second half of the 17th century. The last stone church of the Intercession to be built in Murom this century, located on the territory of Spassky monastery. The monastic residential building, namely the abbot's building of the Spassky Monastery, is the only example in the city that allows one to imagine the civil architecture of the city in the 17th century. Not far from Murom in the Boris and Gleb Monastery, instead of dilapidated wooden temples in the 17th century, a beautiful ensemble of stone buildings was erected - the Church of the Nativity, the Ascension (Boris and Gleb) and St. Nicholas Church. Of these, only the Church of the Nativity has survived to this day.
Many temple buildings of that time have been preserved in other provincial cities - in Uglich, Saratov, Veliky Ustyug, Ryazan, Kostroma, Suzdal and others. From large architectural ensembles Dating back to the 17th century, we can highlight the Kremlin building in Rostov the Great.
A large number of secular buildings have survived to our times, allowing us to judge the architecture of that time. These are the wooden Kremlin towers, the Krutitsky tower and the Golitsyn house in Moscow, the stone Pogankin chambers in Pskov, like many buildings of that era, indicating the high degree of whimsical tastes that reigned in the architecture of the 17th century.
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