The Saint Sofia Cathedral

The unique Kyiv’s Saint Sofia belongs to the world’s masterpieces of the architecture, monuments of the history, culture and religion cults. Kyiv has been compared with Jerusalem, Konstantinopol or Rome along almost a thousand years. In 1990 all complex of Saint Sofia’s cathedral had put down in the List of world cultural inheritance of UNESCO as the unique monument of architecture and monumental painting.

The founder of this temple was the great Kyiv’s Prince Yaroslav the Wise. According to the manuscripts the temple has been laid in 1017 or in 1037.

The general structure of architectural composition is typical for this temple, the length of the central part is almost equal to the width, and the height – to the length of the temple. From the east side it has five naves, and three others – two-storied galleries. In the west gallery two towers are composed for the situation of lifting to the galleries. The new principals have been used also for the stone-laying of the temple. The achievements of the Byzantine, Near Eastern and Romanic architecture of the Middle Ages have been used in the building of Kyiv’s Saint Sofia. The builders’ names are unknown.

The Kyiv’s St.Sofia is as long as 29,5 meters, as wide as 29,3 meters, the square of the cathedral is near 600 square meters. Around the central cupola with big windows four small ones are situated on the diagonal. The cathedral has the thirteen cupolas with semicircular heads. All building has the pyramidal composition in the profile, which underlines its greatness and completeness connecting the numerous decorated columns, bays, the windows in unique complex.

The building works have finished in 1042, and the paintings of internal walls have been beginning. The central part of the temple with undercupola surface, the main apsyde and the floor were covered with mosaic painting and the side parts – decorated with the fresco.

The St. Sofia’s cathedral has played the great role in the history of Ukraine. It has been the one of the main spiritual, social and political, the cultural centres in the East Europe along almost one thousand years. The most important events have been taking place in it such as the Prince’s coming to the throne ceremony, the bishop’s and metropolitan’s confirmation. There was the metropolitan department, the first library in Old Rus.

The whole system of painting, the plots and their situation have been agreed with the general idea of the cathedral in Old Russian state – the strengthening of the conceptions about the Christian’s religious doctrine. The St. Sofia’s cathedral is decorated with mosaics – 640 square meters ( kept only 260 square meters). There is a big Christ’s portrayal (diameter 41 meters ), around which there are four archangels. On the columns of east arch the picture “The Annunciation” is situated, then - “The Archangel Gabriel” and “The Virgin Mary”. The ensemble of the mosaic images is fulfilled in the altar. Among them there is the icon of God’s Mother – Oranta (5,45 m high).

In the cathedral, besides the general altar, two side ones the northern and the southern are situated. The northern altar is dedicated to St.George, the main saint father of Yaroslav the Wise. On the fresco of southern altar the images with the great deeds of Archangel Michael are situated. He was supposed to be the saint father of the prince’s power and Kyiv city as the capital of the state.

The special value of the cathedral makes the images of many plots of the temporal character. Among them the central place belongs to the family portrait of Prince Yaroslav the Wise. The Prince is portrayed with his wife Irina, his sons Sviatoslav and Vsevolod and his daughters Elizabeth, Anna and Anastasia.

The whole interior of the cathedral makes an impression of the well-proportioned system of the architecture with harmonized panoramas of the religious and temporal context.

Nowadays the National preserve “Kyiv’s Saint Sofia” is the complex of old architecture and the fullest collection of the original mosaics and frescoes of XI century in the world. The monastery’s buildings such as the belfry, the metropolitan house, refectory, Southern Tower, Zaborovski Gates, erected in XVIII-XIX centuries belong to the complex of Kyiv’s Saint Sofia.