DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.55691#0267
Nowa rotunda w Grodnie - w odnowie tradycji kultu i kultury
263
Jerzy Uścinowicz
New rotonda in Grodno
- in the renewal of the tradition of worship and of the culture
The paper presents a new rotunda - the Orthodox church of St. Spyridon of Trimythous - which is be-
ing constructed at the housing estate “Yuzhniy-15” in Grodno, in the former village of Olshanka. It was
designed by the author of the paper. He shows the modern and, in the same time, the traditional form
of its architecture and the main concept of the interior s spatially-liturgical and iconographic treatment
together with its ideological and theologically symbolic message.
The paper puts it within the context of the Byzantine architectural tradition and construction of first
Christian rotundas, created in 9th - lOth centuries as a result of the mission of the Apostles of Slavs -
St. Cyril and St. Methodius, on the lands of the Slavic Great Moravia and its sphere of influence. It also
refers to the rotundas built on the borderlands of Poland, Lithuania, Belarus and the Ukrainę, especially
the Volhynian ones and the sole rotundas erected on the territory of Belarus in Grodno: the church of
the Exaltation of the Holy Cross and the Podole cemetery chapel of the Orthodox Cathedral, shown on
drawings, prints and maps from 16th - 18th century.
The paper also raises the question of the contemporary understanding of the Orthodox tradition and
ideological identity of its Church architectural forms on the Western borders of Belarus, in terms of the
existence of the phenomenon of a frontier between the Christian East and West.
263
Jerzy Uścinowicz
New rotonda in Grodno
- in the renewal of the tradition of worship and of the culture
The paper presents a new rotunda - the Orthodox church of St. Spyridon of Trimythous - which is be-
ing constructed at the housing estate “Yuzhniy-15” in Grodno, in the former village of Olshanka. It was
designed by the author of the paper. He shows the modern and, in the same time, the traditional form
of its architecture and the main concept of the interior s spatially-liturgical and iconographic treatment
together with its ideological and theologically symbolic message.
The paper puts it within the context of the Byzantine architectural tradition and construction of first
Christian rotundas, created in 9th - lOth centuries as a result of the mission of the Apostles of Slavs -
St. Cyril and St. Methodius, on the lands of the Slavic Great Moravia and its sphere of influence. It also
refers to the rotundas built on the borderlands of Poland, Lithuania, Belarus and the Ukrainę, especially
the Volhynian ones and the sole rotundas erected on the territory of Belarus in Grodno: the church of
the Exaltation of the Holy Cross and the Podole cemetery chapel of the Orthodox Cathedral, shown on
drawings, prints and maps from 16th - 18th century.
The paper also raises the question of the contemporary understanding of the Orthodox tradition and
ideological identity of its Church architectural forms on the Western borders of Belarus, in terms of the
existence of the phenomenon of a frontier between the Christian East and West.