THE MUSEUM EXCURSIONS (page 5)
City Tours
“This is Sergiev Posad” (a walking tour of the historical part of the town). Cities are like people. According to a Russian saying “each city has its character”. Sergiev Posad was formed of the villages and settlements surrounding the Trinity-St. Sergius Lavra. The Monastery determined the town development, way of life and occupations of its inhabitants. In the 20th century the name of the place was changed several times, but in people’s memory it was always associated with the great Russian devotee – Venerable Sergius of Radonezh. The parish churches, old streets, Blinnaya Mountain, Krasnokorskaya Square, Pafnutiev Garden remind of old Sergiev Posad and preserve its original appearance.
If transport is provided by visiting groups, a bus city tour is offered.
“Ancient Radonezh, the Intercession Monastery in Khotkovo” (a bus tour). Radonezh was an ancient Slav settlement. In the 14th century it was a center of the volost’ and subsequently a capital of the independent appanage principality. There lived young Varfolomei (future Venerable Sergius of Radonezh). The village Church of Transfiguration was built in Empire style in the first half of the 19th century. In 1986, Radonezh was declared a reserve. In 1988, there was unveiled a monument to Venerable Sergius. The Intercession Monastery in Khotkovo – one of the earliest monasteries in the Moscow Region - was founded near Radonezh. Boyar Kirill and
his wife Maria, parents of Venerable Sergius of Radonezh – were buried there. In 2008, the Monastery marked its 700th anniversary. At present it is a functioning stauropegion nunnery
( under the authority of Holy Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia).
“The Chernigovsky Skete” (a bus tour). (ąāņīįóńķą˙ żźńźóšńč˙).This is a remote functioning male monastery with cave cells, founded three kilometers from the Trinity-St. Sergius Lavra in the mid-19th century. The Chernigovsky Skete surpassed all monasteries in charge of Lavra in beauty of its monuments. In the mid- 19th century it became Metropolitan Philaret’s favorite place for solitude and prayers. In the main cathedral, consecrated to the Virgin of Chernigov, the relics of the local saint - Venerable Varnava (Merkulov) – a famous elder, people’s confessor of the late 19th – early 20th century – are preserved. At the small Monastery cemetery near the Cathedral Russian philosophers Konstantin Leontiev and Vasily Rozanov were buried.
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