Construction of churches in Constantinople and their decorations

With the fall of Constantinople on May 29, 1453, the famous city of St. Constantine became the capital of the Turkish state and gradually turned from Christian to Mohammedan. The most magnificent temples of Constantinople, which were the subject of amazement of contemporaries and a role model for later generations, are transformed, by the will of the conquerors, into mosques. First of all, the beauty of Constantinople and the pride of the builder of Emperor Justinian, the church of St., suffered this fate. Sofia. As for other Constantinople churches, they were temporarily spared for purely political purposes. Sultan Mohammed II, the conqueror of Constantinople, wishing to win over the Greek patriarch and the Greek clergy in order to populate the devastated city with Greek inhabitants, on June 1, 1453, approved the election of the famous monk, fighter of Orthodoxy, Gennady II scholar (1453–1460) as patriarch and gave him two firmans, which guaranteed the rights and privileges of the Church in all subsequent times. One of the firmans regarding Christian churches directly states: “Christian churches enjoy security and under no circumstances should they be turned into mosques.” “The inhabitants,” said the conqueror of Constantinople, when Galata surrendered to the capitulation, retain their faith and their singing, but they are forbidden to ring the bells and boards; I will not convert churches into mosques, but they cannot build new Churches, as is observed in all areas now subject to my dominion.” But Mohammed’s successors did not share the views of the wise conqueror, and little by little they began to encroach on the inviolability of Christian churches. So, for example Bayazet II (1481–1512), the first to decide to close several Christian churches, and almost deprived Patriarch Joachim (1500–1504, 1505–1506) of his chair because he decided to cover his cathedral with gilded tiles without the permission of the Sultan. Selim I (1512–1520), Bayazet's successor, had already encroached on what the conqueror had promised to observe, that is, he prohibited Christian worship and ordered the conversion of Christian churches into mosques. Suleiman (1520–1566) forbade Christians to build stone churches again and ordered the golden shiny cross to be removed from the Church of the All-Blessed, which after the Church of the Twelve Apostles became a cathedral. His successor Selim II (1566–1574) barely, only after a significant ransom, built a Muslim mosque on the site of the Temple of the All-Blessed. Murad III (1574–1595), who at first favorably treated Christians and allowed Patriarch Jeremiah II (1572–1579, 1580–1584, 1586–1594) to make a rich patriarchal throne and place a golden image of Jesus Christ over the dome, then, according to the mufti, issued an order to convert 30 Christian churches into mosques, so how, according to Murad, “the confessors of Islam have multiplied and are in need of mosques.” Among the churches of Constantinople, the Patriarchal Church suffered terrible destruction, from which the Patriarchal Exarch managed to remove only its current treasures, namely: mosaic icons of the Mother of God and the Forerunner, the patriarchal throne, according to legend belonging to John Chrysostom, and the relics of St. Euphrosyne, Solomonia, mother of the Maccabees, and Queen Theophania. Therefore, there is nothing exaggerated in the fact that, according to some (Gerlach in a letter to Martin Crusius), by the beginning of the 17th century there were 44 churches left in Constantinople out of the previous 86 1, and by the end of this century there were only 26 churches and, moreover, the poorest ones. This systematic transformation of a Christian city into a Muslim one was so sad in its consequences that it involuntarily amazed travelers who happened to visit this once glorious city. “To the common regret of all Christians,” the famous traveler to the east V. Grigorovich-Barsky wrote to us in 1744, this glorious city has fallen into unspeakable decline. The beauty of the royal chambers, the splendor that probably surpassed the treasures of God's holy churches, the Christian churches and monasteries decorated with marble, paintings, museums, gold and silver, the great houses of princes and the most noble citizens, the sciences and arts that had risen to the highest degree, which had come to almost complete destruction. The holy churches have been converted into Mohammedan temples and Muslim mosques since 1453 2 . But the fanaticism of the Muslim rulers not only influenced the reduction of Christian churches in quantitative terms, but also had a direct impact on their design and architectural form. The Turkish sultans, wanting to make Constantinople the capital of the Muslim world, tried in every possible way to humiliate Christianity and destroy everything in it that would remind them that this is an ancient Christian city. Therefore, turning many Constantinople churches into Muslim mosques, they did not allow Christians to build new churches, and if they managed to achieve permission through bribery and gifts by the authorities of Constantinople, they made it an indispensable condition that these temples should not be taller than ordinary residential buildings and would not have signs on them indicating their religious significance, such as domes, crosses, etc. Therefore, the Christians of Constantinople had to turn for their churches to those architectural forms that were developed in Christianity in the early days of its difficult existence, among the dominant paganism, when they did not and could not think about the domed form of Justinian’s churches, i.e. to basilic forms. An ancient Christian three-nave basilica with a prominent one or three apses (semicircles) on the side opposite the entrance, represented a very decent and convenient place for worship of the persecuted Christians of Constantinople on the one hand, and on the other, being a low building with a gable tiled roof with a triangular pediment on the front and rear facades, this building just satisfied the taste the Turkish government, which wanted to lose Christian churches in the mass of crowded houses of Constantinople. Almost all the churches of Constantinople 3 now have such a basilica form, starting with the “Great Church” or the Patriarchal Church and ending with the very last in the most remote and poorest corners of Constantinople, Fenor or Phanar. Hence, it is not surprising that a modern tourist, traveling in the dirty and unusually narrow alleys of the padishah’s capital, very often does not even suspect that he is near an Orthodox church, which can only be recognized from the gallery of some five- or six-story building by the shape of the building’s roof and, perhaps, a barely luminous gilded iron cross on the ridge of the roof near the altar apse. The Christian churches in Constantinople are pitiful and so poor in appearance that in many ways they are inferior even to the neighboring houses of private owners, especially if these neighbors are foreigners... The entire building of the modern Church of Constantinople is a small oblong quadrangle with two short sides. The building is divided into three ships or naves by two rows of columns running parallel to the long sides. The middle ship is twice as wide as the side ones and significantly higher than them, and is limited at the bottom by two rows of parallel columns, and at the top by walls, which rest on architraves or beams connecting the columns and supporting the ceiling. In the upper parts of the walls, small windows are installed in parallel on the sides to illuminate the interior of the building. There are large windows in the main long walls and in the apse walls. The columns are made of marble and mostly of different colors, with Doric and sometimes Byzantine capitals. On the side opposite the entrance there is one or three semicircular apses protruding outward. In some churches, the middle and main apse serves as an altar, and the side ones serve as a deacon and a sacrificial compartment, or skovophilakium, while in others the side apses are also occupied by altars, and thus the entire church consists of three main altars and two side altars. Along the line separating the apse from the middle of the church there is an iconostasis. It is not large, usually single-tiered with the addition of one and occasionally two tiers of small icons depicting the twelve feasts, prophets and apostles. A crucifix is ​​placed above the iconostasis with the upcoming wives and sometimes without them. There is no order in the placement of icons in the main tier of the iconostasis. The Savior is depicted on the right side, the Mother of God on the left, and then complete arbitrariness reigns. In the place where we usually have a church icon, we have not seen anything like it. Three doors lead to the altar. The middle or royal doors 4 consist of two small halves, with a waist-length cutout of the priest at the top, so that through this, when the catapetasma is opened, the actions of the priest in the altar are visible to all those praying. The halves end with a Byzantine eagle with the image of the saint to whose name the church is dedicated. In addition to the Annunciation, St. is depicted on the royal doors. John Chrysostom and Gregory the Theologian (nair, in the patriarchal church) and some other saints. We did not see any images of the evangelists here. Instead of curtains, 5 shutters are installed for the most part to cover the entire height of the iconostasis. These latches represent a quadrangular frame, covered with velvet or black cloth with images of the blessing Savior in the chalice embroidered on it in gold (this is in most churches and on the curtain for weekdays), and for holidays images of the Last Supper. In a patriarchal church, for patriarchal service, a catapetasma or latch with images of the Mother of God called “All-Holy" is used, to the right of her are Aaron, David and Moses, and to the left are the prophets, at the top is an image of the Trinity. For weekdays, the latch on the outside has an image of the Annunciation of the Mother of God by the Archangel Gabriel, and on the inside - the Last Supper. Inside the altar, in the middle, there is a throne under a ciborium or canopy, resting on four pillars, close to the four corners of the throne. The throne of the churches of Constantinople is placed not directly on the floor of the altar, but on a more or less high column or pedestal placed under it. That is, the throne consists of a board laid horizontally on a stand. On the altar in ordinary times there is a Gospel tabernacle and several candlesticks. In the niche of the main apse, behind the throne, there is a pulpit for the bishop. In the patriarchal church, the pulpit is decorated at the top with an eagle, and supported by angels. The so-called mountain place is decorated with many small icons placed on the walls. On the left side of the throne in a niche in the wall of the same apse, when the side apses serve as altars and do not fulfill their direct purpose, there is an altar on which there is nothing during non-liturgical services. In the niche itself, along the plaster, there are images of the Nativity of Christ, the adoration of the shepherds and the announcement of the angels to the shepherds about the birth of the Savior. In the middle part of the church, on the right and left sides, on a large sola, rising only one step and located almost close to the royal doors, there are significant elevations for the right and left choirs 6, with the usual lecterns for liturgical books in front and with stasidiums behind for singers and clergy. Behind the right choir is in all churches the bishop's pulpit with two steps from the floor and a canopy at the top. In the patriarchal church, in front of this pulpit there is a pulpit made of ebony with motley ivory carvings, attributed to St. John Chrysostom. Behind the episcopal see, on both sides of the columns with only a slight separation in the middle, and along the walls of the side naves there are stasidia for people to stand in. In the patriarchal church, behind the episcopal see, there are now stasidia covered with green cloth for members of the Synod, and on the right side there are stasidia for ambassadors of the Christian powers. On the left side, near one of the rear columns, there is an ambo in the form of a hanging balcony, sometimes with a covering on top, for reading the Gospel and delivering sermons. A staircase with several steps leads to this pulpit in a small zigzag. Its structure is similar to similar pulpits in St. Andrew's Cathedral in Kyiv, in Kazan Cathedral in St. Petersburg and in Catholic churches. At the top of the pulpit, in the place where the Gospel should lie, is an eagle with outstretched wings. The outer and front sides of the pulpit are decorated with paintings corresponding to the purpose of this place. In the middle nave, several chandeliers are suspended from the ceiling, of which the middle one is usually larger and richer than the rest. The ceiling is sometimes (for example, in the patriarchate) painted in Byzantine style with various kinds of arabesi figures. In the patriarchate, at the back of the church to the right, there is an elevated stasidia for the great logothete. Above the entrance to the church, at the top, across the entire width of the building, there is a gynecon or seats for women who want to attend the service. The Ginecon is supported by the last standing columns to the exit. A frequent wooden lattice in the form of a grid, convex into the church and reaching almost to the ceiling, hides the female pilgrims from the prying eyes of the male pilgrims. A staircase leads to the gynecon either from the porch, or the vestibule, or from the courtyard directly. The entrance to the church building is made from the narrow and long sides. On the narrow side there are sometimes three doors, of which the middle one is covered with a carpet. In front of the church there is a covered narphix, from which they enter the church. In addition to the icons in the iconostasis, there are also images of the faces of saints in the church, although not in large numbers, placed in the walls between the windows of the side naves. In front of each of the icons there are candlesticks with large candles. The painting of Constantinople churches is twofold: Greek and Russian. Icons of the latter kind are often found in Constantinople churches, and they even have Russian inscriptions. As for the icons of Greek painting, its character and subjects in many respects remind us of Athonite painting, so it is not without probability that we can assume that the artists who decorated the churches of Constantinople with paintings were, by the way, also Athonite iconographers-hermits. Therefore, we will make a judgment about the nature of this painting below, when reviewing the iconography of modern Athos. A complete list of the most ancient churches of Constantinople is written in the book by Grigorovich-Barsky “Putesh. to the saint places" pp. 498–505. According to his calculations, 12 churches were dedicated to the name of Christ, 48 to the name of the Mother of God and 17 to the Angels. Let's go. to the saints, in places. St. Petersburg. 1778, p. 506. “There are not many Orthodox churches in Constantinople,” writes the famous saint of the Holy Mountain, and if there are, then they are like brownie churches without domes and without bells” Sochin. saint Letters to friends. about the holy Mount Athos. M. 1883, p. 10. Currently, people ring freely in Constantinople, to which Constantinople Christians received the right only in 1856, and small belfries or bell towers have been built at churches, on which two or three small bells hang. In its form (see the drawing in the Proceedings of the first archiological congress in Moscow, 1867, published in Moscow, 1871, p. 306, part 1), the Constantinople bell tower is a small wooden tower of one floor with a pointed top crowned with a small cross. The clergy of some churches (for example, St. Nicholas in Galata) are beginning to think about building real bell towers, and donations are already being collected for this purpose. In Constantinople, in addition, in some churches and even in villages they use beats (see the image of the beater of Constantinople churches there), which are somewhat different from those of Athonite. An iron beater (σ ί δηρον) has the appearance of an arc with ends in the form of triangles and sometimes the appearance of an ordinary board, and a wooden beater (σ ή μαντρον) has the appearance of a board with rounded edges (images of these beaters are there). The Greeks do not call these doors royal, but simply holy (ἅ γιαι θ ό ραι). During the service, when the need arises, this catapetasm moves into the space between the iconostasis and the altar wall or pillar and from there it moves out to cover the holy church. doors. This catapetas is controlled by a simple boy who serves a priest at the altar. Prof. Golubinsy claims in vain that there are no choirs in the churches of Constantinople (Historical Russian Church, vol. 1, half 2, p. 210, note 3). There are choirs in the Church of St. Nicholas in Galata.