The Church of the Icon of the Mother of God “Of the Sign” outside the Petrovsky Gate
The Church of the Icon of the Mother of God “Of the Sign” outside the Petrovsky Gate was founded in the XVI century. The modern building dates back to the second half of the XVII century. It embodies all the beauty of the majestic forms of the Russian pattern: a unique multi-head of eleven domes, a patterned tent bell tower, forged crosses, kokoshniks, platbands, carved portals. In honour of the temple, the lanes surrounding it were called Znamenskiye. Since its foundation, the temple has been a regimental one – uniting the Streletskaya sloboda and the shooters, “sovereign people”. During the years of Soviet power, the Church of ‘Znameniey or Our Lady of the Sign’ of the Icon of the Mother of God outside the Petrovsky Gate miraculously survived and was not blown up. In 1930, the church was closed. During the Great Patriotic War, it housed the laboratory of anisotropic structures of the Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union. In 1968, the renovation of the church and the bell tower began, the restoration of the 1970s and 1980s was carried out with the restoration of such elements of the original appearance as the heads and platbands on the windows. In the kyot (the icon case) above the entrance to the bell tower, around the icon that was once there, a fresco depicting angels has been preserved. On December 10, 1997, on the day of the Sign of the Most Holy Virgin, regular services resumed in the church, the first Divine Liturgy was held after the closure of the church. The Church of ‘Znameniey or Our Lady of the Sign’ of the Icon of the Mother of God outside the Petrovsky Gate turned out to be the only church in Moscow that preserved its historical purpose: to serve the «sovereign people», the modern descendants of the Moscow archers, the soldiers of law and order. In 2015, a monument to Moscow detectives who died in the line of duty was opened on the territory of the temple. The author of the sculpture is the Honoured Artist of Russia Ivan Cherapkin. The monument is made in the form of an archangel Michael armed with a spear and shield (on which there is the coat of arms of Moscow and the inscription «MUR. Criminal investigation»).
Address: Moscow, 1st Kolobovsky lane, 1
