A little about the Kazan Cathedral

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-01-10 19:46

Today there was nothing to do, I went to the Kazan Cathedral. For the first time in my life, to my shame.:) Immediately struck a huge amount of pagan symbols, when I came home I looked at reference books and Wikipedia, and, it turns out, the history of its construction is also muddy. The first archpriest is only supposed, already 20 years after construction, a large-scale alteration inside.

Almost nothing has survived from the original version of the interior decoration. Miracles, like a carbon copy with Isaac. In fact, it turns out that from the original there are only columns and marble on the floor. Perhaps there are "all-seeing eyes" in different corners, of which there are a lot, even on icons. Okay, on the topic. The first is that the columns inside are also granite. But not the same as on Isaac, as on the Alexander Column or other pavements and embankments. He's some kind of too large brine (round pieces), I honestly say that I have not seen anything like this anywhere else. Although I climbed a lot on granites. At first I even thought it was an imitation, but no, a natural stone. There is a distinct texture pattern here.

The edge has been broken off here, no foreign traces.

It is dark in the cathedral, twilight and it is impossible to photograph normally. But nevertheless it is natural granite for sure. In some places, the grout has disappeared, and if you highlight in the gap under the column, you can clearly see that the columns stand on a granite base of a smaller diameter. Approximately 10 cm smaller by eye. These are round columns, of which, by the way, there are already 56 pieces. I carefully examined how level they were in the rows, I did not notice any deviations, everything was exactly like a laser.

With rectangular columns, or more correctly with pylons, the situation is different.

They are plastered. And the plaster falls off as it should. In many places.

It is not clear what material the base of the pylons is made of, it is very similar to modern concrete. Exactly not a brick. Perhaps these places have already been restored earlier and we see a truly modern cement mortar.

While photographing, a man of an intelligent appearance of Balzac's age approached me, like what I'm looking for here. I hinted that I was a lover of history, they say there are no materials on the cathedral, but I want to know, etc. The man turned out to be very talkative, gave his last name (like that of a sunny clown), hinted that he was the son of famous parents. He also did not forget about his regalia, and the scientist, and the architect, and the restorer, and with the leadership of the country on "you", etc., etc. He tortured me for two hours, with all sorts of garbage, going very far from the theme of the cathedral which interested me first of all. But he managed to get some useful information out of him, although every time he dodged answers and said that it was a great secret. We will assume that this is really a secret and everything is in the classified archives as he claims. Although at times it seemed to me that he was rather paranoid with signs of schizophrenia, because he told absolutely incredible or fantastic things from different areas and even how in Afghanistan he once shot a Mujahid from a Stechkin (with details). But in a suit, he gave instructions to the hard workers with a stepladder, periodically distracting from the conversation with me, in general, in the cathedral he is clearly not a stranger and it seems that he is not small. Or maybe he was telling the truth, then it becomes scary from the scale of what we do not know. What did we get to learn from him. As I expected, the round columns stand on some kind of thorns so that they do not move and do not fall if something happens. The cathedral was built as a defensive structure, from this huge window spans, that is, in the event of a shock wave, glass will fly out, and not walls or columns. There are firing points under the windows near the ground. And like in the center of St. Petersburg, many buildings are built as defensive, with firing points in the basement area. The cathedral stands not just on a pile foundation, but on sockets. That is, the piles are driven not vertically, but at an inclination crosswise, this creates a floating effect. On the piles there is a stone cushion made of granite blocks of small (relatively) size in a castle form with a thickness (height) of 7 meters. I think he was talking about polygonal masonry. Also from rapakivi, like columns. According to him, the Griboyedov Canal is a former river with the sonorous name of Krivush. The banks of the river (channel) in the upper layers are sand and a mixture of sand and clay, under them is a thick layer of some kind of strong (dense) clay, due to the fact that the upper layers of the soil are weak, some houses in the 20th century were rebuilt to the ground, and the foundations were strengthened large volumes of concrete. The upper part of the cathedral (above the columns) has a metal frame, he explained vaguely, but what I understood was that the stone blocks on mortar were fastened with metal rods and plates. It is very similar to the truth, for this technology is very common for buildings of the 18-19 centuries. With plaster falling off it is interesting. According to him, the technology has been lost, but somewhere in China (he said, I did not remember) there is a structure with a similar plaster for granite, and like the Chinese, scouts crawl in the cathedral and investigate what was done and how and break off pieces of plaster for analysis. And at first he took me for a Chinese spy, and from that he ran to the showdown. On my own I note that I did not notice anything special in this plaster. In appearance, it differs from natural stone, it is clear that it is not a stone, but a kind of composite. The technology is quite clear to me personally. A certain binder solution with granite chips of different fractions, which, after hardening, is simply mechanically processed with a cutting tool. That is, it is ground down to a flat plane and sanded. It is quite possible that this is a technology from a handicraft reference. Whenever I tried to bring the conversation to the technologies of making and polishing granite columns, the man gently avoided answering. In general, a taboo. At first, of course, he drilled something about Samson Sukhanov, but then he simply avoided any transition to this topic.

Okay, to the pylons. Bronze attachments are a common tin can. Under them is a kind of foundation, again of an incomprehensible appearance, similar in appearance to modern cement concrete. Perhaps also a remake, restoration.

As I wrote at the beginning of the article, the interior of the cathedral has many pagan symbols.

Circles with stars, of which there are a lot, in rows. And in the center under the dome, of course, is the same.

I asked the man what this means. The answer was trivial. This is the star of Bethlehem. I - why so many? In rows? The answer is, this is the way. And why do the rows turn towards the exits, and not towards the altar? There was no answer. In general, as I understood the person is a believer, and I did not torture him.

Also, about heating. It's the same shit here as in Isaac. Here there were stoves, here inside the walls there were chimneys and air ducts, here there were cast-iron balls that were heated by hot air and supported heat transfer, here is a hole from which warm air came. Everything seems to be logical. But the questions are - why is the air supply so high? Where are the roof outlet pipes? And what did the recirculation come from? - puzzled. Rather, at first there was some kind of irritation and a sharp change in topic. OK. I couldn't explain it either. Yes, exhaust grilles through which warm air was supposedly supplied at about 10 meters above the floor. Maybe higher, but definitely not lower. There are no holes anywhere in the floor and near the floor.

What else. The geometry of the columns is perfect. If the columns of Isaac, upon close examination, have a certain curvature, then everything is on line. True, there is not enough light, it is dark in the cathedral. In daylight, something might have surfaced, but alas. And no one will let the searchlight to the column to be allowed to illuminate it along. The flooring is very similar to that of Isaac and the floors of many other buildings in St. Petersburg, in particular the famous Wedding Palace No. 1 on the Promenade des Anglais. The same options for stones, approximately the same geometry of the ornament. Here is a photo from the wedding palace. And again paganism.

The columns themselves are much smaller than the columns of Isaac. By weight almost 5 times - "only" 26 tons.

Further. Let's see the engravings of the Kazan Cathedral, what crosses they painted. You will be surprised, but there are many different ones.

Here the oblique stick with the upper end to the west.

Here is a slanting stick to the east.

There is generally a spire instead of a cross. And the dome is interesting, or rather the entire tower part, and the signature under the drawing is quite remarkable. The author of the drawing (officer A. G. Vickers) calls the cathedral a church, maybe not for nothing? And a row of houses to the left of the cathedral, for some reason, is two stories high and without roofs. Can you say the stage of construction or reconstruction is captured? Too lazy to draw? Questions…

How do you like this option? I see the classic pagan temple of Makosha the Virgin. Blue dome, pagan equilateral cross. By the way, the dome is again of a different shape. And pay attention to the shadows. They are strictly along the axis of Nevsky Prospekt, that is, it turns out that the sun is shining from the northwest. And all right, the shadows were long, then it would be possible to accept, for the white nights. But the shadows are short, like noon. Oh, these artists.

And such a cross is now.

Apparently, before the reconstruction of the 30s of the 19th century, the Kazan Cathedral, like most of the cathedrals of St. Petersburg, was pagan. It would be more correct to say Vedic. Then all the puzzles add up. And the architectural style, and interior decoration, etc… Later it was converted to Christianity, and there were several such alterations. It is possible that at some stage the temple was Lutheran or Juniatic.

That's all for now. The analysis is superficial, more thorough work on this cathedral is required, it is undeservedly deprived of attention against the background of its older brother - St. Isaac's Cathedral.