Saint Basil's Cathedral

Cathedral of the Intercession of Most Holy Theotokos on the Moat
Собор Покрова Пресвятой Богородицы, что на Рву (Russian)
Saint Basil's Cathedral as viewed from Red Square
Religion
Affiliation	Russian Orthodox Church
Ecclesiastical or organizational status	State Historical Museum with church services restored since 1991
Year consecrated	12 July 1561; 463 years ago (1561-07-12)
Status	Active
Location
Location	Red Square, Moscow, Russia
Shown within Central Moscow
Geographic coordinates	55°45′9″N 37°37′23″E / 55.75250°N 37.62306°E / 55.75250; 37.62306
Architecture
Architect(s)	Ivan Barma and Postnik Yakovlev[1]
Type	Church
Groundbreaking	1555 (1555)
Specifications
Height (max)	47.5 metres (156 ft)[2]
Dome(s)	10
Dome height (inner)	ff
Spire(s)	2
Materials
UNESCO World Heritage Site
Type	Cultural
Criteria	i, ii, iv, vi
Designated	1990 (14th session)
Part of	Kremlin and Red Square, Moscow
Reference no.	545
Region	Europe
Website
en.shm.ru

The Cathedral of Vasily the Blessed (Russian: Собор Василия Блаженного, romanized: Sobor Vasiliya Blazhennogo), known in English as Saint Basil's Cathedral, is an Orthodox church in Red Square of Moscow, and is one of the most popular cultural symbols of Russia. The building, now a museum, is officially known as the Cathedral of the Intercession of the Most Holy Theotokos on the Moat, or Pokrovsky Cathedral.^[3] It was built from 1555 to 1561 on orders from Ivan the Terrible and commemorates the capture of Kazan and Astrakhan. Its completion, with its colors, was made in 1683. It was the city's tallest building until the completion of the Ivan the Great Bell Tower in 1600.^[4]

The original building, known as Trinity Church and later Trinity Cathedral, contained eight chapels arranged around a ninth, central chapel dedicated to the Intercession; a tenth chapel was erected in 1588 over the grave of the venerated local saint Vasily (Basil). In the 16th and 17th centuries, it was perceived as the earthly symbol of the Heavenly City. Like all churches in Byzantine Christianity, the church^[5] was popularly known as the "Jerusalem" and served as an allegory of the Jerusalem Temple in the annual Palm Sunday parade attended by the Patriarch of Moscow and the Tsar.^[6]

The cathedral has nine domes (each one corresponding to a different church) and is shaped like the flame of a bonfire rising into the sky.^[7] Dmitry Shvidkovsky, in his book Russian Architecture and the West, states that "it is like no other Russian building. Nothing similar can be found in the entire millennium of Byzantine tradition from the fifth to the fifteenth century ... a strangeness that astonishes by its unexpectedness, complexity and dazzling interleaving of the manifold details of its design."^[8] The cathedral foreshadowed the climax of Russian national architecture in the 17th century,^[9] and it is considered as a prime example of Russian Renaissance architecture.^[10]

As part of the program of state atheism, the church was confiscated from the Russian Orthodox community as part of the Soviet Union's antireligious campaigns and has operated as a division of the State Historical Museum since 1928.^[11] It was completely secularized in 1929,^[11] and remains a federal property of the Russian Federation. The church has been part of the Moscow Kremlin and Red Square UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1990.^[12][13] With the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, weekly Orthodox Christian services with prayer to St. Basil have been restored since 1997.^[14]