Kiev's St. Sophia Cathedral Today
Inspired by the Hagia Sophia in Constantinople, the stately church boasts world-reknowned frescoes, murals and mosaics.
The interior and exterior of St. Sophia Cathedral in Kiev have changed drastically since its founding. The architecture and interior decor hint at the original.
St. Sophia Cathedral has had extensive changes made from its original form. Studies have served to reconstruct it as it looked at the time of its completed construction. In this cross-domed church, the nave ended at the east end apse, which was a semicircle on the interior and polygonal on the exterior. The eight flanking aisles had apses which were semicircular on the interior and exterior. The drum of the main dome was pierced by 12 windows and the domes over the outer side aisles were taller than those of the inner aisles.
Shortly after the completion of this construction, the 12th century, there was another storey added to the gallery that gave the prince access from his private palace to the church. (Nickel, 123)
According to Heinrich Nickel, the interior has not changed as drastically as the exterior of the church. The barrel vaulted nave and transept remain the same width, while the aisles are half as wide and their vaulting is not of the same height. Because the commoners and the nobility were separated during church services, it is apparent that the west end galleries were for the family of the prince, while the ground floor was where the common people could worship.
The interior is infused with light, much like its inspiration, the Hagia Sophia in Constantinople, due to the many windows that allow sunlight to pass through into the crossing and galleries. (Nickel, 124)
The decorations, those which still exist, remain the same-being one of the most important artistic elements of the cathedral interior. Although the entire interior was covered with murals (vaults, pillars, and walls), what remains of the original mosaic work is in the main apse and the crossing. The main apse boasts a symbol of the Church on earth-a Virgin with her arms upraised in prayer and worship.
Christ the Pantocrator has a place in the main dome, with his four archangels inhabiting the pendentives supporting the dome. On the triumphal arch is the Deisis, and on its columns are Gabriel and the Virgin. Because of the superb quality of the mosaics, it makes sense that the artists who completed the murals were from Byzantium themselves-and indeed, the inspiration of the figures comes straight out of Constantinople.(Nickel, 124)
The mosaics of St. Sophia have been badly abused. Fire and whitewash are two of the fates that have befallen them, as well as faulty restoration, but there is evidence of scenes depicted that no longer exist. Originally, there were forty medallion busts of martyrs, though now there are only fifteen that remain in the four arches beneath the dome. Scenes from the Passion of Christ also were visible in the time of the completion of the mosaics-these decorated the north and south arms of the narthex.(Anthony, 166-67)
A remarkable aspect of St. Sophia is its depiction of frescoes of secular scenes. While the frescoes were probably painted from life, this depiction of circus games may be a direct allusion to the games that ensued at the Hippodrome in Constantinople. Decorations that consisted of scenes from secular life could be found in Constantinople, and this is one more way in which the Kievans imitated their religious predecessors. (Anthony, 166-67)
Anthony, Edgar Waterman, A History of Mosaics. Boston: P. Sargent, 1935.
Nickel Heinrich L. Medieval Architecture in Eastern Europe, trans. Alisa Jaffa New York: Holmes & Meier, 1981.
