Fedorovsky Monastery in Gorodets. Feodorovsky Monastery in the town of Gorodetsky Feodorovsky Monastery

Feodorovsky Monastery in Gorodets (Russia) - description, history, location. Exact address and website. Tourist reviews, photos and videos.

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The ancient monastery in Gorodets is the legendary place where the Theodore Icon of the Mother of God was found. The men's monastery has one functioning temple, a necropolis and a worship cross in honor of Alexander Nevsky. According to legend, he died at this place, having previously become a monk with the name Alexy. The main shrine of the monastery is a copy of the Theodore Icon, the original of which is located in Kostroma. According to legend, it was found by Prince Yuri Dolgoruky in a wooden chapel near Gorodets back in the 11th century. Over the years, the teacher and assistant of Andrei Rublev and Theophan the Greek Prokhor, the student of Sergius of Radonezh Pavel, who later founded the Obnorsky Monastery, Timon Nadeevsky, as well as the orientalist Peter Kamensky lived in the monastery. Today, the monastery operates a museum, a library and a guest house for pilgrims.

Story

Since its foundation, around 1150, the monastery was ruined and rebuilt three times. It was burned twice by troops of the Tatar-Mongol yoke - in 1238 and 1408. In the 20th century, the Bolsheviks closed the monastery and demolished all its churches. The Feodorovsky Cathedral, built of stone in 1765, was restored in 2009, the monastery bell tower and the Church of Alexander Nevsky are still lost. The district hospital now stands on the site of the latter. Among the surviving buildings are the eastern and southern fraternal buildings of the 19th century.

The revival of the monastery began in 2008, and in May 2009 services began to be held there again.

What to see

The snow-white church of the monastery with 5 small round gilded domes and a pointed bell tower is quite unusual, reminiscent of both an 18th century church in the neo-Russian style and works of architecture of Ancient Rus'. The iconostasis is made of 4 tiers of faience. The icons were painted by novices of the Tikhvin Monastery. 12 bells were cast especially for the temple from a mixture of copper, tin and silver.

A copy of the Feodorovskaya miraculous icon of the Mother of God was painted in 1800. Every year a religious procession is held with it in Gorodets.

There is a Museum of the History of the Monastery at the monastery, which conducts excursions and organizes exhibitions. There is also a cinema hall, a library with a large collection of spiritual literature, a reading room, and several classrooms. Pilgrims can stay in a guest house or, with the permission of the abbot, live in the monastery along with the monks, performing services and observing the daily routine.

Practical information

Address of the Museum of the History of the Monastery: Gorodets, st. Titova, 2 (territory of the monastery, building of the Orthodox Missionary Scientific and Educational Educational Center).

Gorodetsky Fedorovsky Monastery- according to its original foundation, the oldest of the monasteries of the Nizhny Novgorod diocese.

Before its destruction at the beginning of the 20th century, the monastery was a quadrangular architectural ensemble surrounded by a stone fence. There were churches at the monastery: a five-domed one, dedicated to the miraculous Fedorov Icon of the Mother of God (1765), the second - in honor of the holy noble prince A. Nevsky (1798), two churches in honor of Theodore Stratilates and the healer Panteleimon.

Of the historical buildings of the monastery, only the refectory and the monastic cell building have survived to this day.

There is an Orthodox missionary center at the monastery. It includes: a museum of the history of the monastery, a research room of the museum of the history of the monastery, a museum excursion service, an exhibition gallery, a cinema hall, a library with a reading room, a conference room, classrooms. There is a hotel for pilgrims. The monastery is actively working with nursing homes, orphanages, military units and educational institutions in both the Gorodets district and the entire Nizhny Novgorod region.

History of the Fedorovsky Monastery

The monastery was founded by the prince Yuri Dolgoruky like the Mother of God-Feodorovsky Monastery at the beginning of the 13th century on the site of a wooden chapel in which the Feodorovskaya Icon of the Mother of God was located. Later it was moved to the monastery.

It is believed that the monastery was founded in 1152, but this date continues to be a subject of debate.

In 1238, during Batu’s invasion of North-Eastern Rus', the monastery burned down, and the Feodorovskaya Icon of the Mother of God ended up in Kostroma. The monastery currently houses a copy of the icon, written in 1800.

In 1263 he took monastic vows at the monastery and died. Prince Alexander Nevsky, returning from the Golden Horde.

In 1354-1410, a disciple of Sergius of Radonezh, the reverend Pavel Obnorsky(Komelsky miracle worker).

In 1408, the monastery was invaded by the Horde Khan Edigei.

At the turn of the XIV-XV centuries, there lived in the Fedorovsky Monastery icon painter Prokhor from Gorodets - one of the authors of the painting of the Annunciation Cathedral in the Moscow Kremlin, teacher of Andrei Rublev and ally of Theophanes the Greek.

In the 15th and early 17th centuries, the monastery was abolished.

It was revived again in 1700 and in the same year a wooden church was built in honor of the Feodorovskaya Icon of the Mother of God with a chapel in the name of St. Prince Alexander Nevsky.

In 1764 an attempt was made to close the monastery, but thanks to the support of the local population this did not happen. However, now the monastery is acquiring the status of a supernumerary, that is, self-supporting, without state support.

In 1834 the Emperor Nicholas I allocated 211,652 rubles in banknotes for monastic needs and endowed the monastery with lands.

In 1870, the monastery was given the status of a full-time monastery of the second class, and the abbot received the rank of archimandrite.

Monastery after the revolution

In 1927, the Fedorovsky Monastery was closed. A school was located in the former cells of the monks, and the 80-meter bell tower (the tallest that existed in Nizhny Novgorod) was decorated with a star and turned into a water tower. And in 1934, almost all the buildings of the monastery were destroyed as “not of cultural value.”

Later, a post office, a school, and a prison colony for delinquents were located on the territory of the monastery. The Gorodets regional hospital was built on the territory of the former Alexander Nevsky Church.

Revival of the monastery

Since 2007, thanks to the program for the integrated development of the territory of the Gorodets district “Gorodets - XXI century”, it became possible to restore the monastery, and in 2008 the construction of a temple in honor of the Fedorov Icon of the Mother of God began.

On May 27, 2009, the Holy Synod blessed the opening of a monastery in Gorodets in honor of the Feodorovskaya Icon of the Mother of God.

Previously, it was located on the banks of the Volga; from 1700 - away from it, due to changes in the flow of the river. Founded in 1164 book Georgy Vsevolodovich on the place consecrated by the presence of the Feodorovskaya Icon of the Mother of God, which from ancient times was located not far from Gorodets in the chapel where the Gorodets Monastery was built.


General view of the Fedorovsky Monastery. 1894 Gorodets, Nizhny Novgorod province

Monastery Church in the name of Theodore Icon of the Mother of God - an ancient building; upon renewal, it was consecrated in 1767 in the presence of the emperor. Catherine II, who visited the monastery during her trip along the Volga.

Here was the miraculous Feodorovskaya icon of the Mother of God, famous in 1830 for delivering Balakhna from cholera - a copy of the above-mentioned ancient Feodorovskaya icon, which was in the monastery, and after its destruction by the Tatars appeared in 1239 on the site where the Zaprudnensky Spassky Monastery was founded (in Kostroma).




The death of the leader followed in the monastery. book Alexander Nevsky, returning from the Horde; The temple in the monastery in his name, according to legend, was built on the site of the cell where he died.



The history of the Feodorovsky Monastery knows many significant events; on May 19, 1737, Empress Catherine II visited it, attended the consecration of the temple in the name of the Mother of God Theodora and donated a significant amount of money for the restoration of the destroyed buildings of the monastery.
During the years of Soviet power, the monastery's churches were lost.
On September 12, 2009, the Feodorovsky Monastery was revived on Gorodets land.

Icon of the Mother of God THE MIRACLE WORKING FEODOROVSKAYA

THE MIRACLE-WORKING THEODOROVSKIY ICON OF THE HOLY VIRGIN has been known since the 12th century. She was in a chapel near the ancient Volga town of Gorodets. Where a men's monastery was founded, called the Mother of God-Feodorovsky. The miraculous image was the main shrine. In 1239, during the invasion of the Mongol-Tatar invaders, the icon disappeared from the city. In the same year, the Feodorovskaya Icon of the Mother of God became a prayer image of the Holy Blessed Prince Alexander Nevsky, and it was with this icon that in 1239 Grand Duke Yaroslav Vsevolodovich blessed his son, Holy Prince Alexander, for marriage with the Polotsk Princess Paraskeva. At the end of the 50s and the beginning of the 60s of the 13th century. A miraculous image appeared to the brother of Alexander Nevsky. On the eve of the apparition, many residents of Kostroma saw a warrior with an icon of the Mother of God in his arms. Many recognized Theodore Stratelates in the Warrior. This event took place on the day of the DORMSION OF THE HOLY VIRGIN. On the trail. day, Prince Vasily Yaroslavovich, while hunting, saw this icon on the branches of a tree, near the Zaprudnya river. THE DISCOVERED SHRINE WAS BROUGHT TO KOSTROMA IN A PROCESS OF THE CROSS. and placed in the cathedral church in the name of the GREAT MARTYR THEODOR STRATILATES, after which it began to be called FEODOROVSKAYA

March 14 Star Style. In 1613, in the Kostroma HOLY TRINITY IPATEVSKY monastery, MIKHAIL FEDOROVICH ROMANOV, in front of the face of the miraculous FEODOROV Icon, accepted His election by the Zemsky Sobor to the Throne of the Russian State. SINCE THIS TIME, THE FEODOROV IMAGE OF THE MOTHER OF GOD BECAME A SPECIALLY venerated shrine of the RUNNING HOUSE OF ROMANOV. And in memory of the events of 1613, the church holiday of this image of the Blessed Virgin Mary was established on March 14.

Currently, the Miraculous Feodorovskaya Icon of the Mother of God is kept as a great shrine in the Epiphany-Anastasinsky Cathedral of Kostroma.

THE MIRACLE-WORKING THEODOROVSKIY ICON OF THE MOTHER OF GOD HAS BEEN READED BY ORTHODOX SINCE LONG TIMES AS A PATRONER OF FAMILY WELL-BEING, THE BIRTH AND UPBRINGING OF CHILDREN, AND HELPING IN DIFFICULT BIRTH. This miraculous help from the icon of the Most Holy Theotokos, the celebration of which was established on the day of the beginning of the service of the House of Romanov to God and the Russian People, testifies that the House of ROMANOV continues to be the Reigning House in the eyes of God. And the church holiday of the FEODOROV ICON OF THE MOTHER OF GOD on the day of the entry of the Romanov Family into the Tsar’s service testifies to the fact that the Russian Orthodox Church remains faithful to the Council Vow of 1613, despite the fact that the priesthood of the Russian Orthodox Church practically nowhere offers prayers for the coming Tsar - the winner from the Royal House of Romanov (in the female line), nor for the deceased Tsars and Queens, including those from the Royal House of Romanov.

The Gorodetsky Fedorovsky Monastery, according to its original foundation, is the most ancient of the monasteries of the Nizhny Novgorod diocese. He is more than 200 years older than each of them (Krestovozdvizhensky convent, Pechersky and Annunciation monasteries in Nizhny Novgorod, Spassky in Arzamas and Oransky in Bogorodsk). The founding of the monastic monastery, as well as Gorodets itself, is attributed to Prince Yuri (George) Vladimirovich Dolgoruky. The estimated founding date is 1154. According to legend, the place for the monastery was indicated by the miraculous icon of the Mother of God Hodegetria, ancient even at that time, which was kept in a chapel located on the eastern side of Gorodets, outside the rampart. It was believed that the icon was painted by the Evangelist Luke himself. The Orthodox especially revered this shrine and wanted to move it to the newly built Church of the Archangel Michael. But it was not possible to raise the iconographic image - it was held in place miraculously. Then, by order of the prince, a monastic monastery was built in honor of the Most Holy Theotokos on the site of the chapel.

During its existence, the monastery was twice destroyed by Tatar-Mongol hordes (in 1238 by Batu Khan, in 1408 by Edigei Khan), once burned, but was always rebuilt. It is also significant that the great commander and patriot of the Russian land, Prince Alexander Nevsky, completed his earthly journey within the walls of this monastery. Since that time, the monastery has been especially revered by Orthodox believers. It is no coincidence that in 1767, Empress Catherine II was personally present at the consecration of the church in honor of the holy, miraculous Fedorov Icon of the Mother of God, restored after a fire. Later, the monastery was entrusted with an important mission - to preserve the memory of the death of the holy noble prince on the Gorodets land. In the second half of the 19th - early 20th centuries, the Fedorovsky Monastery was the main center of spiritual and social life in the village of Gorodets. A missionary brotherhood, a library and a hospital operated at the monastery. In 1867, a school was opened for young novices and children of villagers, in which 50 boys studied. In memory of the prince, the Alexander Nevsky Brotherhood was created in the monastery in 1869, and three years later a primary girls' school was opened. But in 1927, the Fedorovsky Monastery, like many other monasteries, was closed. In the former cells of the monks, a collective farm school was located, and the 80-meter multi-tiered bell tower (the tallest that existed in Nizhny Novgorod) was decorated with a red star and turned into a water tower. Another seven years later, in 1934, almost all the buildings of the monastery were destroyed as “not of cultural value.”

The issue of restoring the Gorodets Fedorovsky Monastery has been raised several times in recent years, but only in 2007, thanks to the program for the integrated development of the territory of the Gorodets district “Gorodets - 21st century”, a real possibility of its restoration arose.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the monastery was a quadrangular architectural ensemble surrounded by a low stone fence. It had two cathedral stone churches: one five-domed, dedicated to the miraculous Feodorovskaya icon of the Mother of God (built in 1765), the other - in honor of the holy noble prince A. Nevsky (1798), and two churches - in honor of Theodore Stratilates and healer Panteleimon. However, only the refectory and the monastic cell building of the monastery have survived to this day.

In 2008, thanks to the sponsorship of the Ural Mining and Metallurgical Company OJSC, construction of a temple in honor of the Fedorov Icon of the Mother of God began in Gorodets. In July of the same year, specialists from the Moscow Institute of Archeology examined the remains of the foundation of the Fedorovskaya Church, dating from the mid-2nd half of the 18th century. After an archaeological examination, the remains of the foundation were removed and a new foundation was poured in exact accordance with the historical location of the temple. The temple has already found its voice: the bell tower has 12 bells cast by Ural craftsmen. The largest “father” bell weighs 1070 kg, the two smallest and most sonorous ones weigh 6 kg each.

Until 1917, the Fedorovsky Monastery was rebuilt several times, and entered the 20th century as a fully formed architectural ensemble. It included 2 cathedral churches: the first - a cold five-domed one - was dedicated to the Most Holy Theotokos, her miraculous Feodorovskaya icon (erected in 1765). In 1872, the southern (in the name of the Great Martyr Catherine) and northern (in honor of the Great Martyr Antipas) aisles were added to it. The second temple is a warm cathedral church in the name of the Holy Blessed and Grand Duke Alexander Nevsky. It was erected in 1798, later rebuilt according to the design of the writer’s son V.I. Dalia. The monastery housed especially revered Orthodox shrines - an ancient list of the Most Holy Theotokos of Fedorov, an icon of Alexander Nevsky with particles of the saint’s relics, etc. The Fedorov monastery was closed in 1927.

The restoration of the monastery began in 2008. On September 12, 2009, His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus' consecrated the first restored temple of the Feodorovsky Monastery - the church in honor of the Feodorovskaya Icon of the Mother of God.

The Fedorovsky Monastery is the pride of the town’s residents, and this is understandable: the fate of several famous personalities (including Prince Alexander Nevsky and the Rev. Pavel Obnorsky) and the discovery of the greatest Russian shrine - the Fedorov Icon of the Mother of God - are connected with it. Meanwhile, many moments remain in the history of the monastery - this applies to a number of historical events, and even to the original location of the monastery. There is no agreement among researchers on this score, and we can only rely on the surviving legends, which in many ways, however, are completely legendary. One of them tells that when Gorodets was founded in the 12th century, outside the fence of the new settlement there was a chapel with an icon of the Mother of God. When, at the prince’s request, they decided to transfer the image to the built cathedral church, they could not move it from its place, which was regarded as an indication from the Mother of God that a monastery should be founded on this place. It was as if the beginning of the Fedorov monastery had been laid. If there is any truth to this legend, then we must assume that the original monastery stood somewhere near Prince’s Mountain, and not in the place where it is now located, and in any case not on the site of the Old Believer Assumption Chapel, as they claim Old Believers. The found icon of the Mother of God, which had not yet received the name Fedorovskaya, became the main shrine of the formed monastery. She stayed there until the middle of the 13th century, after which she ended up in Kostroma. There are two versions about this “journey”. First. In 1238, when Gorodets was ravaged by the Tatars, the icon disappeared and after some time appeared to Alexander Nevsky’s younger brother Vasily Yaroslavich. This happened near Kostroma, where Prince Vasily used to hunt. It is interesting that on the eve of the appearance of the icon, on the day of the Dormition of the Most Holy Theotokos, many Kostroma residents saw on the streets of the city a warrior carrying in his hands the image of the Mother of God. This warrior was recognized - from his image in the Kostroma Cathedral - as the Great Martyr Fyodor Stratelates. The second version is associated with a significant event for the Fedorovsky Monastery - the death of Prince Alexander Nevsky, who was returning from the Golden Horde, in 1263. According to this version, after the death of Prince Yuri in the battle with the Tatars on the Sit River (March 4, 1238), his younger brother Yaroslav Vsevolodovich blessed his son, Alexander Yaroslavich, with the Fedorov Icon to marry the daughter of the Polotsk prince Bryachislav. Since then, the Feodorovskaya icon has been with Alexander Nevsky everywhere, being his prayer image. After the death of the prince in Gorodets, Prince Vasily Yaroslavich, who reigned in Kostroma, took her in memory of his elder brother in prayer. Be that as it may, in Kostroma the miraculous image was placed in the Feodorovsky Cathedral, after which the icon began to be called Feodorovskaya. The townspeople, having visited Kostroma, brought to the monastery an exact list from it, which was also famous for its miracles. The list from this list, made in the mid-nineteenth century, is now kept in the Gorodets Museum of Local Lore.

Finally destroyed in 1408 by Khan Edigei, the Feodorovsky Monastery remained in desolation until the end of the 17th century. By that time, Gorodets itself finally got back on its feet, crafts began to develop in it again, rich villagers appeared, which was the reason for the resumption of the monastery in 1700 - already in its current location (then there was an “old” cemetery with a chapel, in which, according to legend, , the miraculous copy of the Theodore Icon of the Mother of God was preserved). Over the next two centuries, the monastery was rebuilt and improved. Already in 1708, permission was received to build a stone cathedral church in honor of the Feodorovskaya Icon of the Mother of God. In 1719, Fedorovsky Cathedral is mentioned as being rebuilt and consecrated (“about one chapter”). In 1765, the monastery was badly damaged by a fire - all its wooden buildings were destroyed, and the stone cathedral needed to be restored. It was consecrated after a large-scale renovation (it was then that the side domes appeared) in 1767. In 1798, a warm stone church was consecrated in the name of the holy prince Alexander Nevsky - and it was believed that its altar was located on the site of the cell in which the famous prince took schema and died. Looking ahead, let's say that this temple, designed in the style of classicism, by the 1870s had completely become outdated both physically and stylistically and was replaced by the new Alexander Nevsky Church, built according to the design of the famous architect L.V. Dahl (who was the son of the author famous dictionary of the Russian language) and consecrated in 1882. By that time, in addition to these churches, the monastery had another church - in the name of the Great Martyr Theodore Stratilates, built in the lower tier of the bell tower in 1835. At the beginning of the twentieth century, a fourth one appeared - Panteleimonovskaya, in the newly built eastern fraternal building. Around the same time, a five-tiered “candle” bell tower, about 80 meters high, rose above the monastery. Together with four monastic buildings, a monastery school, a hospital and outbuildings, after this the monastery ensemble became complete. Let us note that he had two farmsteads - in Nizhny Novgorod and Tsarskoe Selo. No one then could foresee a terrible disaster for the famous and prosperous monastery.

In 1927 the Bolsheviks closed it. Until 1934, only the warm Alexander Nevsky Cathedral remained active there. Feodorovsky Cathedral became a power plant, the bell tower was turned into a water tower, all the bells were thrown off it and the top was decorated with a huge red star, the premises of the former cells were occupied by a collective farm school. In 1934, all the buildings of the former monastery came under the jurisdiction of the NKVD, and a little later its barbaric destruction began - as “not of cultural value.” All the temples and the bell tower of the monastery were destroyed. Only in 2007, thanks to the program for the integrated development of the territories of the Gorodets district "Gorodets - XXI century", the town residents had the opportunity to recreate a monastery on this site. Since 2008, the Feodorovsky Monastery began to be restored. The St. Feodorovsky Cathedral was also revived in its original place, on the eastern side of which a monument to the blessed Prince Alexander Yaroslavich was recently erected in the monastic schema.

Magazine "Orthodox Temples. Travel to Holy Places." Issue No. 161, 2015.