COXE’s TRAVELS IN RUSSIA.

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Chap. IV. — Cathedral of the Afj'umption of the Virgin Mari in the Kremlin.—Tombsof the Ruffian Patriarchs.—Origin and Abolition of the patriarchal Dignity.—Account of the Patriarch Phil aretes , Father of the Houfc of Rcmanof.—Biograghical Anedotesof the Patriarch Nicon.

THE cathedral of the Affumption of the Virgin Mary , appropriated to the corona-tion of the Ruffian fovereigns, alfo fituated in the Ivremlin, is the moft magnificenttemple in Mofcow. The fkreen is in many parts covered with plates of folid filverand gold richly worked. From the centre of the roof hangs an enormous chandelierof maffy filver, weighing two thoufand nine hundred and forty pounds: it was madein England, and prefented by Morofof, prime-minifter of Alexey Michaelovitch *.The facred veffels and epifcopal veftments are extremely rich; but the workmanfhipis in general rude, and by no means equal to the materials.

Many of the painted figures which cover the infide walls are of a coloffal fize, andwere executed fo early as the clofe of the fifteenth century. This church alfo containsa head of the Virgin, fuppofed to have been painted by St. Luke, and greatly cele-brated in this country for the power of working miracles. The face is almoft black ;the head is ornamented with a glory of precious Hones, and the hands and body aregilded, which gives it a grotefque appearance. It is placed in the fkreen, and enclofedwithin a filver cafe, which is never removed but on great feltivals, or to gratify the cu-riofity of flrangers. This Madonna, according to the tradition of the church, wasbrought from Greece to Kiof, transferred from thence to Volodimir, and afterwards toMofcow. It feems to have been a Grecian painting, and was probably anterior to therevival of the art in Italy f.

In this cathedral aredepofited the remains of the Ruffian patriarchs.

The firft was Job, before whofe time the primate of the Ruffian church was fuffrganto the patriarch of Conflantinople. Job, being metropolitan archbiffiop of Mofcow,

* According to Storfch it was a prefent From the Venetians to Boris Godunof, and weighs two thou-fand eight hundred pounds.

+ I faw feveral reprefentations of the Virgin in the north of Italy limilar to this painting: fomewere called the produdtions of St. Luke, others of Cimabue , or his fcholars. The complexion inthefe was likewife of a dulky hue. Probably the Grecian painters reprefented the Virgin of a darkcomplexion, which was copied by Cimabue and the earlieft Italian artiits, who received the art fromthe Greeks. Le Bru.yn, fpeaking of this Madonna at Mofcow, fays, “ It is very gloomy and almoftblack; but whether this proceeds from the effects of time, or thefmoke of tapers, or the fancy of thepainter ; certain it is, there is no great matter in it,” &c. Travels, vol. i. p. 70. An ingenious author,in a late publication, mentions in the monaftery of Monte Virgine, a coloffal portrait of the VirginMary, which paffes for the work of St. Luke the Evangelift, and adds, “ I here are in Italy and elfe-vvhere fome dozens of black ugly Madonnas, which all pafs for the work of his hands, and as fuch arerevered.” To which paffage he fubjoins the following note, but without citing his authority: “Theorigin of this fable, or rather miftake, appears to be, that about the time that paintings of holy fubjedtscame into falhion, there lived at Conflantinople a painter called Luke, who, by many reprefentations ofthe Virgin, acquired a very tranftendant teputation. He was a man of exemplary life, and on accountof his piety, and the edifying ufe he made of his talents, was generally known by the name of the HolyLuke. Jn proctfs of time, when the epocha and circumftances of his life were forgotten by the vulgar,and his performances had acquired by age a fmoky, dulky call, fufficient to perplex the fhort lightedconnoiffeurs of thofe days, devotees aferibed his pictures to the Evangelift, who was pronounced a painterbecaufe they knew of no other faint of the name, and becatife, if he had been a painter, no one couldhave had fuch opportunities of examining and delineating the features of the holy model.” Swinburne’sTravels in the Two Sicilies, p. 123. For proof of the introduction of painting into Ruffia and Italy bythe Greeks, fee the Defoiption of the Cathedral of St. Sophia at Novogorod.

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