MOSCOW'S LOST TREASURES

North Otago Times, Volume CVI, Issue 14070, 11 March 1918, Page 3

MOSCOW'S LOST TREASURES

■;^(&^;;-BELf& ; ijj^Tiftofa-'.;. *y It is ! ..:(liffleult--'. ! io;' believ6,\:says \thePotrogr'ad '.'correspondent of -the- : Daily Ru'ssiai! hands have 1 tlestroyetltlie Cathedral of the Assumption ainHh'c tower lyau Veliki. These 'livo'.'liinHliiigs" were'the- very heart of the JvreinHii.'aild were to Moscow'what iSlVAlarkV-ani'l the.Campanile are.to j-Vhiii.e.' Tlioy liail.looked ilown,on centuries'of Russian'history, and seemed lb .form an'almost ]h;iii|r link between present, it 'waiiit the' eatliedrartiiat.tlie'Tsai's were crowned/'andi'in -formerdays the Patriarch's wefe jiuried there. Jn conformity with its atigust national uses,; it was a trea-sure-house of sacred relies ami priceless works of ecclesiastical art. Here were kept the' slir'oiwl of Christ, a robeVorn' by the; Virgin, "one of the hails of'the True. Cross, and a .picture said to have been painted by 'St. Luke. It would' hardly be an exaggeration to say that the interior walls were' inci'iistcd with gold ami jewels. There is said to have been iLDOfllb of the precious metal in ■ the ikonoatas,: the altar vessels,. iiml'. other objects which adorned the cathodal. This treasure was looted by the. French iu 1812, but was recovered 1 by the Cossacks, who commemorated Ihe rescue by presenting.to Hie cathedral,a silver ■taiidfilhbnini'weighing-SSdlli; Like many of the most prominent-features of the Kremlin, the building was the work/of a foreign architect. Its designer j was a Pologneso named Kioravcnli, Erected in the last' cpmrter of the fifteenth; century, it-had sult'ercd nmch in war?,! foreign and civil, but it. had always been restored on Ihe original lines.'

The tower "John the Great'-' was completed in'1(100■ by Boris Godunou', and was .'!2oft high. It consisted of the five stories, all octagonal except the top one, which was round. In it were I hung VI- bells, the largest of which weighed (15 tons. The. French seriously damaged the tower_ in 1512 by tearing down the .gilded cross which crowned its dome in the mistaken notion that it. was made of solid gold, Few visitors can have left Moscow without climbing to the top of Ivan Veliki to see the; wonderful view of the city and llic surrounding country which is to be had from the top of it, . The Cathedral of St, Basil is one of the architectural curiosities of the world. His crowned by a forest 1 of onionshaped domes, which' arc as varied in hue as in size. The colours have the one thing in common that they are nil extraordinarily vivid, and the idea is current that their brilliancy is due to' some process of making enamel, the secret of which has been lost. The interior of the building is almost as strange as the exterior. It consists of 11 chapels, sonic of which are as dark as valuts, grouped together in such a way a t-o recall the ramifications of a rabbit warren. The building was designed by two Kussian Architects and was, begun iii 1554 by Ivan the Terrible to cOmiiieiimorate tin- compiest of Kazan. 11 standstill the lied Square outside Hie 'Ua W«'fHl Sval'ls"of "iWiultf ihU

These buildings were so sacred in the eyes yf Russians that the outrage done to theirr will send a shudder of horror through the whole laud. 1