Building and architecture /2. Architectural solutions

construction and reconstruction

Doctor of architectural Sciences Ponomarenko EV.

Research Institute of theory and history of architecture and town-planning of the Russian Academy of architecture and construction Sciences, Branch Office in Samara, Russia

Architecture of half-timbered churches of southern Urals 18th-mid 19th century

Wooden timber frame building design was typical for Western Europe. Such designs were common in secular architecture of the German lands almost everywhere.

Figure 1. Church in Longsols

The traditions of the half-timbered houses were strong in England and Normandy. In Germany and in France there are a few small half-timbered churches. A typical example is the Church of Saint Giuliano and Vlasii (church Saint-Julian et Saint-Blaise) in the village of Longsols in Champagne (Figure 1).

Figure 2. Trinity Church in Orenburg

Half-timbered houses in Russia under the name «wattle and daub» or «grid construction» has been known since the beginning of the 17th century. The construction was wooden frame of pillars, beams and Struts, the space between them filled with broken brick, stone, and other materials. In addition, half-timbered buildings were erected in Moscow, for example, in the seventies of the 17th century in the so-called Novoinozemskoj (German) Sloboda, populated by immigrants from Western and Central Europe. But in Russia, it was a small number of buildings with such construction.

The fortress-city of Orenburg was laid April 19, 1743 onwards. Its construction was completed before the onset of cold weather.

Figure 3. The Church of St. Nicholas in Orenburg

Therefore, public buildings were built with a wooden frame. In the steppe zone near the forest fortress under construction was not enough, in addition the quality of the forests is not allowed to use for the construction of large buildings. State-owned buildings were temporary. For their construction did not require a large amount of construction wood.

The most interesting architectural buildings were the Church. In the fortress of them built three (figures 2, 3). The first church with frame of logs was erected in just five months. In September, it was consecrated in the name of the assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Her image has not survived. What was this church can only assume based on eyewitness descriptions. «Its width according to the figures given in the explication of Orenburg 1751 was 4 sazhens, length 10 sazhen, which translated to modern measures of length, is 8.52 meters and 21.8 m respectively» [1, d. l., 2442, p. 1216].

In 1744, was built the Church of the Holy Trinity. This church had a frame constructed of wood [2, d. 12, p. 4-5]. Length of Trinity Church without apse stood at 17.8 meters, the width is 7.8 meters.

The Church of St. Nicholas also had a skeleton structure of wood. It was a little less Trinity, as can be seen in archival drawings. Drawings of these two churches were sent by Peter Ivanovich Ryčkovym June 3, 1760 years Professor Miller, along with other plans Orenburg buildings [2, d. 12, p. 3].

In general it can be stated that the architecture of half-timbered church buildings of Orenburg was very distinctive and unusual in the southern Urals. The composition of these temples was uniformity. Their planning decisions had a four-part structure. The Bell Tower located above the entrance porch. The central volume of the churches was addressed in two tiers. The upper tier had no Windows. Porch, a refectory, and the lower tier of the central level have the same width. Large pentagonal altars temples were slightly narrower main volume. Each of them from the East was penetrated by three Windows.

Literature:

1. Russian State military-historical archive, p. 349, op. 27.

2. Russian State archive of ancient documents, f. 192, op. 1.