Sobornaya Square

We now enter Sobornaya (Cathedral) Square - the main square of the Kremlin. It was formed in the second half of the 15th century when the cathedrals presenting the main sacred places of Moscow and Russia were erected.

In olden times, coronation ceremonies as well as processions on the days of important Church feasts took place in the square. The Uspensky Cathedral (of the Assumption) (60), the main Moscow temple built during the rule of Ivan Kalita, was the center of the ceremonies. We can use it as an example of a classical Russian Orthodox church. A high five-layer iconostasis symbolizes the unity of the Churches of the Old and the New Testament in Christ. The five cupolas of the cathedral symbolize Jesus Christ surrounded by the four Apostles. Ivan the Terrible was crowned here; metropolitans and patriarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church were ordained here.

According to a legend, Stalin ordered a service to be celebrated secretly in the Assumption Cathedral in December 1941 when the Nazis had already approached Moscow; they prayed for the country to be saved from invasion.