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Where is the Rotunda located? What is a rotunda. Rotunda as an element of landscape architecture

R Otonda on Gorokhovaya - one of the most mystical places in St. Petersburg. Many legends are associated with it.
Here they accepted into the Freemasons, Rasputin and Lenka Panteleev lived here, there was a brothel and .... however, first things first)))

According to the official version, the house was built by order of the merchant Ustinov with a very "worldly" purpose. The owner wanted to have one more building on his plot, in which he could rent apartments, and at the same time not worsen living conditions in other premises overlooking the courtyard. By 1827, construction was completed.

The customer was satisfied - the new building did not darken the corners in the courtyard of an existing house. In 1861, a three-story building was attached to the unique building, but in the Soviet years the house was returned to its original appearance.

However, there is a version, which is much more popular among Petersburgers, that the building was originally intended either for a Masonic lodge, or for a satanic temple (they say differently, and as proof they cite a strange lattice pattern on which pentagrams are visible). After that, a brothel was allegedly located there, and already at the beginning of the 20th century, Grigory Rasputin lived in the house on Gorokhovaya in the very entrance of the Rotunda.

This house belonged in the late XVIII - early XIX centuries to Count Andrei Zubov, a famous freemason, and it was in it, in the basement of the rotunda, that they accepted initiates into a well-known box and allegedly even sacrificed people on a special stone-altar ... and etc. etc... and other terry horror...

Once the entrance to the Rotunda was from the embankment, but for unknown reasons it was blocked up. You can see it on the front of the house. Where there should be a door there is a blank wall, there is no window.

We played pranks there a couple of times... with masks and stuff...

During the restructuring of 1856, metal stairs were installed here, repeating the curve of the walls. At the same time, cabalistic symbols were also removed from the walls and the lattice of the stairs. On the site of the third floor, the walls are decorated with pilasters and completed with a domed ceiling. Structures of this type are called rotunda, and under the name "Rotonda" this legendary place entered the modern history of Leningrad-Petersburg.

In Soviet times, the Rotunda was a gathering place for hippies and rock and roll, and was a truly cult place for young people. Around the same time, it received the name "Center of the Universe." Naturally, the Rotunda gradually began to acquire even more myths that have adherents to this day. About them a little later...

Ladder.

Window ... there will be no lantern and pharmacy ...

All the walls are covered with desires. It is believed that those who are unhappy in love should come to the Rotunda and leave some inscription on its walls. True, they wrote wishes related not only to personal life, and gradually all the walls were covered with numerous messages. On the ceiling-dome there used to be an appeal opposite in meaning: "Forget hope, everyone who enters here ...".

But the labels still appear...

Wishes from serious to ridiculous and even naive.

The Russians love the Rotunda, which cannot be said about the locals. There were many battles for peace in the entrance, but mystic lovers won.

For the sake of the photo, I even took off my jacket))))) this is because I had a T-shirt corresponding to the place)))) the cycle of the divine in nature ...

Zenith is sacred...

There is something incomprehensible in the lower photo ... but it is THIS that is located in the very center of the lower platform of the Rotunda (they are just standing on it in the upper photo). It is here at night that they make wishes to the Prince of Darkness.

Legends of the Rotunda

There are six columns... but you can also see the shadow of the seventh column. The place is Archi-mystical. Temple of Satan. Here they accepted into Masons, they say different sects brought human sacrifices here. Lenka Panteleev and Rasputin had an apartment here, there was a brothel here))) people disappeared here ... outrages were mainly happening in the basement, now it is walled up. It is believed that here is a portal of time and transitions to other worlds are possible ... from where you can return or not return ... you can come here young and leave old ... or vice versa ...)))

There is an opinion that there are 6 mystical rotundas in St. Petersburg, which form a regular hexagon on the city plan, similar to the Israeli symbol.

I did this unscientific study around 2009 and it went viral on the internet. My blog post on Mile

Even travel sites have already picked it up.
In my opinion, it is difficult to take research seriously, but it really has a certain mystical charm))) in these places some kind of "devilry" often happens, strange events that then turn into legends.

Connoisseurs of this place and psychics claim that the Rotunda on Gorokhovaya has special physical properties - up to the possibility enter the fourth dimension. And there are not many such cases.

In Soviet times, in the 80s, one guy went into the basement, stayed there for 15 minutes and came out an old man of 70 years old. He did not tell about what happened to him, except for close relatives and doctors of the madhouse. Television then was too far from mysticism and too true to the ideals of Marxism-Leninism. I can imagine with what enthusiasm this "young man" would be shown today on TV-3 or NTV.

They say that if you come to the lower platform exactly at midnight, stand in its center (there is an incomprehensible pentagram), you can meet Satan himself, and if a desire or some need suddenly arises, even ask him for something cherished.

And these are not "fresh" myths of today. All this has been going on since tsarist times. So, for example, a certain young girl N, from the nobility, at the end of the forties of the XIX century, as she herself said, called him there on the occasion of an unhappy love, had a long conversation with him, and in the morning her lover was found dead in his bed without any signs violent death.

Already in our time, in the late 80s of the twentieth century, a student of the Faculty of Economics of the University Sushkov, despite the persuasion of his comrades who whiled away another evening in the "Rotonda", stayed there until midnight because he wanted to acquire some dollar capital. Nobody saw him again. (c) Anton Uspensky.

Very mystical properties were also attributed to the basement. Since Soviet times, it has been laid tightly. It was there, under the Rotunda, that they accepted Masons and even made sacrifices. They say the famous bandit Lenka Panteleev liked to hide there. He went into this basement and found himself in a completely different place in St. Petersburg. Allegedly, there were numerous witnesses to such transfers. So he escaped surveillance and the Cheka. But Lenka Panteleev had many doubles, so I would not attach much importance to these testimonies.
In Soviet times, they searched for his jewelry and gold coins (he did not recognize paper money). It was believed that he hid his treasures in this basement. They, of course, were searched for, but alas ... the treasures of Lenka Panteleev have not yet been found, and this is a very serious amount, even by today's standards. The Rotunda knows how to keep its secrets.

Lost here and the tenants of the apartments. Moreover, without documents, and as they say - with ends and for no apparent reason. By the way! One of the apartments in the next entrance is now for sale.

If you "correctly" sit on the rotunda cul-de-sac (a kind of landing), you can see shadow from the seventh, non-existent column(there are 6 in total and I already wrote about this above).

Another legend - who spend the night in the Rotunda and try to pray to God can go crazy. This myth was also refuted, but it is interesting that no matter how many people are convinced of the opposite, legends live and are transmitted to followers.

The place is considered to be one of cult places in the city of dark forces. The forces of evil. The center of dark forces and the temple of Satan. At one time, a popular cafe-chantan and a dance class of Martsinkevich with a very dubious reputation were opened.

If you whisper something while facing the wall, then the phrase will not only be heard by everyone present, but, having circled the entire Rotunda, will return to its owner: it will seem that someone is whispering your own words into your ear.

The Picnic group rehearsed here, Viktor Tsoi and Konstantin Kinchev visited, many of today's stars - artists and musicians - came here to talk. They say that something here asked for something at night and the now famous artist Khabensky.

Rotunda of the Soviet era was named "Center of the Universe" and overgrown with a lot of myths. The largest inscription in the Soviet era was "Abandon all hope, everyone who enters here." Photos of celebrities and the Rotunda of the Soviet period (C).

The entrance is periodically repaired, all the inscriptions are painted over. Now there are expensive apartments, but the "pilgrims" continue to go to the former place of worship. The residents have stopped fighting, asking only not to make noise and not to litter. Sometimes the abundance of people in the entrance makes them dissatisfied, but they understand that it is not possible to fight the guests.

All boxes with number 666... ​​comedians...

What is the true history of the Rotunda, it is difficult to say. However, that belief in legends, that energy of the people who came here could not but create a completely unique atmosphere in it. After all, buildings necessarily absorb the spirit of their inhabitants ...

Some components...
There are so many mystics here that it can be easily found in everything. Nothing (at first glance) unremarkable window sill on the top floor (photo from around 2008)

Everything is as usual on the windowsill - inscriptions, requests and wishes, etc. Everything is like everywhere else, but something was spilled on it, a brown stain ... most likely beer, Pepsi or Coca-Cola.
If you look closely, you can see that the spill has strangely acquired some kind of "artistic" shape. There you can see something with a beard and horns ... and like a reverse image - a pig.

I circled this place below with red ovals. Mysticism, however ... the Rotunda really lives)))

People here are not without humor))) and cats are calm and arrogant.

This picture under the arch leading to the Rotunda, alas, has already been painted over by public utilities ... next to it is a door laid with bricks. Where she went I don't know. Now it has already been plastered and painted over, so there is an ordinary wall there.

Nearby (right in the neighboring courtyard), there is a monument to Olga Bergolts.

At the entrance to the courtyard there is an original cafe with a skeleton in the window)))

Now you can sit in a cafe ...)))

Not only the appearance, but also the spirit of St. Petersburg was formed in the 18th century, known for its luxurious balls and continuous wars, high art and palace intrigues, the spread of enlightenment and the darkest superstitions. The aura of mysticism inherent in this glamorous age permeated the palaces and mansions, parks and canals of the city on the Neva.

This atmosphere still leaves its mark on the life of St. Petersburg today, forcing people to talk about it as a magical, magical city. There are many strange places where amazing events take place and otherworldly entities appear in the Northern capital. But the most mystical place is not a palace or an ancient cemetery, but an ordinary, at first glance, house. More precisely, what is in the house is the Rotunda.


Mansion on Gorokhovaya

Finding the Rotunda is not easy, although the address of this strange structure is known. It is located in a house on Gorokhovaya Street, 57 with a facade overlooking the Fontanka embankment (house number 81). The mansion, built in the classical style of the end of the 18th century, was repeatedly reconstructed, but the facade with portico columns and stucco remained the same.

The building is an architectural monument and appears under the name "House of Yakovlev-Evmentiev". The merchant Savva Yakovlev is considered the developer, but who was the first owner of the mansion is not known for certain - Alexander Evmentiev became its owner much later in 1860. Under him, the house was partially rebuilt, and at the same time, perhaps, the Rotunda appeared. Evmentiev is far from the last inhabitant of the mansion on the Fontanka. It is known that at the end of the 19th century, the house either owned or simply lived in it, Andrei Zubov, a count and a famous freemason. According to legend, it was in this building that the ceremony of initiation into Masons was held.


architectural oddities

The Rotunda itself is not a separate building. There is also a similar building on Gorokhovaya Street - in the courtyard of the merchant Usov's mansion, it is often confused with the famous Rotunda-staircase. But he has a completely different story and other oddities. The most mystical place in St. Petersburg is located inside the building, and consists of six tall columns ending in a dome. Two metal spiral staircases rise around the columns. One of them reaches the third floor, and the landing, decorated with pilasters, goes around the Rotunda in a circle.

The second staircase - the left one - does not lead anywhere and ends with a small platform at the level of the second floor, where there are no apartments at all. They say that in the XIX century the walls of the Rotunda were painted with Masonic signs, but during one of the repairs, the drawings disappeared. On the floor in the center of the site between the columns there is a manhole cover, which also does not lead anywhere - the passage, which apparently still existed in the past, is filled with concrete.

The Rotunda has unusual acoustics. On the one hand, a booming, oppressive silence, from which goosebumps run down the back. On the other hand, literally every, even quietly spoken word is heard. And the sound always comes from the back, as if running around the Rotunda in a circle and causing the feeling of an invisible person whispering in your ear. Outside the mansion, all this incomprehensible, although not devoid of mystical charm, construction is invisible, even the dome is covered by an attic. Who and why needed to build such a strange and completely non-functional structure?


Myths and legends of the Rotunda

Perhaps in the XVIII-XIX centuries, the Rotunda was indeed a meeting place for Masons or secret rituals - various esoteric and spiritualistic communities were then in vogue. However, their participants were not in the habit of talking about their activities, and house number 57 on Gorokhovaya Street, although notorious, was not famous and outstanding.

The situation changed in the 70s - 80s of the XX century, when the Rotunda became a hangout place for various informal youth groups. It was then that old legends were remembered and new myths were born, and this was greatly facilitated by the imagination of exalted youth, often warmed up by alcohol, and even drugs. Incredible and often conflicting rumors are currently circulating about the mystical properties of the Rotunda. It is considered a place from where you can get into another world or be in the fourth dimension. Someone is sure that an inconspicuous door on the first floor leads there, but now, however, it is tightly walled up. Others claim that the entrance to another world opens on the stairs. If you walk along it with your eyes closed, then you will never rise to the top - time seems to stop. And from a small area of ​​the left staircase, you can see the shadow of the seventh column, which does not exist in our world. Satan himself sometimes descends into our world along these metal steps, and it is not for nothing that the other name of the Rotunda is the Devil's Ladder. You can even meet with the lord of the underworld and ask him to fulfill a wish. To do this, you need to climb the stairs at night to the very top. Only people who know the peculiarities of the Rotunda do not advise doing this, since you can simply not return to our world.

On the dome of the Rotunda, someone even wrote a warning with the words from Dante's "Divine Comedy": "Abandon hope, everyone who enters here." But the fulfillment of a desire, especially if it is connected with matters of the heart, can be achieved easier - just write it on the wall of the Rotunda. And until recently, its walls, like a fancy carpet, were covered with various inscriptions and drawings - the result of the creativity of young people. Now these inscriptions are almost gone. The Rotunda was renovated, a combination lock was installed on the door, and it became not easy to get there. But those who still managed to get into the unusual entrance can feel the whole mystical atmosphere of this place and, perhaps, believe in the most amazing legends of the Rotunda.


What is Rotunda - gazebo of the last century

Since ancient times, the arbor among representatives of all peoples of the world has been associated with silence, solitude and peace. However, historians are convinced that the ancestor of the ivy-covered guest house was the majestic Rotunda.

For each of us, perhaps not the main, but certainly the most pleasant and happiest moments of country life are connected with the openwork decoration of a park or garden.

Ajar from all sides to a light breeze, and the evening fog creeping from what has been done, the gazebo warmed by the warm rays of the July sun allows you to forget about all the hardships and completely dissolve in the silence of nature.

Everyone knows that morning tea in the gazebo smells especially delicious of rose and bergamot, and outdoor food disappears at lightning speed. Funny songs with a guitar in the company of friends will be able to return to the distant past again. And how many words were said in honor of the summer house entwined with ivy, by lyricists!

What is Rotunda

To date, the most common materials for construction are stone, wood, plastic. However, artificially synthesized blanks, designed to become a decoration of the garden, no longer look like the monumental columns of the real progenitor of the guest house - the majestic rotunda.

The former, sacred meaning of the gazebo was to hide from prying eyes the first passionate kisses and hot declarations of love. The Rotunda has long been considered a favorite vacation spot for the upper class. What did the gazebo of our great-grandmothers look like?


A small building of architecture, most often with a dome in the form of a roof, decorated with columns and flowers, this is the answer to the question - what is the Rotunda. An integral attribute of the noble estate of the 18th century. A few decades later, influenced by the fashion for a country lifestyle, the rotundas were replaced by openwork designs that show off the dresses and outfits of guests in all their glory.

In the 20th century, simple canopies completely replaced the majestic architectural structures of the past. To date, the construction of gazebos for summer cottages practically does not limit the imagination of a landscape designer. So the rotunda again received the right to exist in modern park ensembles.


The gazebo today is an indispensable element of any suburban or personal plot. The role of small architectural forms should not be underestimated even by the owners of a small garden - the guest house, located according to all the canons of landscape design, will very soon be turned into a secluded corner by bushy plants, where the owners and household members will not be disturbed by the curious glances of passers-by and random guests.

Source - https://website/chto-takoe-rotonda.html

In ancient Russian architecture

In the Moscow state of the pre-Petrine period

  • The fact that Italian architects invited to Rus' also built rotundas became clear after the existing cathedral of the Vysokopetrovsky Monastery (architect Aleviz Novy) was dated to the beginning of the 16th century.
  • The Cathedral of the Resurrection New Jerusalem Monastery, representing the cathedral as a semi-rotunda, was built by order of Patriarch Nikon in imitation of the Jerusalem Church of the Holy Sepulcher.

Petrovsky period

In post-Petrine architecture

  • In St. Petersburg, in the form of a rotunda, for example, Trinity Church was built.
  • Nekrasov's pavilion over the steep bank of the Volga in Yaroslavl (1840s) served as a model for a number of similar structures in Yaroslavl and other Upper Volga cities (for example, Ostrovsky's pavilion in Kostroma, 1956)
  • Shukhov's steel rotunda with hanging ceiling-shells is known from the architecture of the 19th century.
  • In Moscow, the ground pavilions of some metro stations (University, VDNKh, Rizhskaya, Alekseevskaya, Park Kultury, etc.) have the shape of a rotunda.
  • Also in the city of Voronezh there is a monument to the Rotunda - the remains of the vestibule of the children's regional hospital bombed during the Great Patriotic War, on the street. Burdenko.
  • In Perm, one of the "symbols of the city" is the rotunda in the city garden (1824, architect Ivan Sviyazev, Sibirskaya st., 41)
  • In Novomoskovsk, one of the attractions is the rotunda on Komsomolskaya street.
  • In Tyumen there is the only temple-rotunda in Siberia - All Saints Church.
  • In the city of Borovsk, Kaluga Region, a rotunda-arbor has been installed on the central city square. This rotunda was erected on the site of the destroyed temple.
  • In Volgograd, the rotunda is located on the central embankment of the city.
  • In Saratov, the rotunda is located on the city's embankment.
  • In Torzhok, the rotunda is located in the city center on the embankment.
  • In Orenburg, the rotunda is located in Lenin Park on Sovetskaya Street.
  • In Uralsk, the rotunda is located in the Nekrasovsky Garden (former Stolypinsky Boulevard).
  • In Kirov, in the architecture of the Alexander Garden ensemble, there are coastal wooden rotundas (architect A.E. Timofeev, 1835).
  • In Blagoveshchensk, on the new embankment of the Amur River, a rotunda with a glass roof was built, built in 2013.
  • In Petrozavodsk, the rotunda, built in 1995 on the axis of Levashovsky Boulevard at its exit to the shore of Lake Onega, has become a kind of compositional point on the embankment. Architect N. N. Ovchinnikov. According to legend, in this place, in the 18th century, there was a source from which Empress Catherine I took water for washing, visiting our region with Peter I. "meets" the embankment, on the shores of Lake Onega, there is a small wooden gazebo with a gable roof. The gazebo, one of the usual places of recreation for Petrozavodsk residents, remained in the city until the 1920s, and later it was destroyed.

In other areas

  • In typography, rotunda is a type of gothic type.
  • In geometry, a pentagonal rotunda is a polyhedral solid that is half of an icosidodecahedron.
  • Rotunda in the Middle Ages was called dances in which they walk in a circle (see round dance).
  • Rotunda is also called a special kind of women's cape-cloak.

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Notes

Literature

  • Klimenko Yu. G. // Actual problems of theory and history of art: Sat. scientific articles. Issue. 5. / Ed. S. V. Maltseva, E. Yu. Stanyukovich-Denisova, A. V. Zakharova. - St. Petersburg: NP-Print, 2015. S. 530-539. - ISSN 2312-2129

An excerpt characterizing the Rotunda

Despite Dunyasha's and the nurse's dissuades, Princess Mary went out onto the porch. Dron, Dunyasha, the nurse, and Mikhail Ivanovich followed her. “They probably think that I am offering them bread so that they remain in their places, and I myself will leave, leaving them to the mercy of the French,” thought Princess Mary. - I will promise them a month in an apartment near Moscow; I am sure that Andre would have done even more in my place, ”she thought, approaching the crowd in the pasture near the barn at dusk.
The crowd, crowding together, began to stir, and hats were quickly taken off. Princess Mary, lowering her eyes and tangling her feet in her dress, went close to them. So many varied old and young eyes were fixed on her and there were so many different faces that Princess Mary did not see a single face and, feeling the need to suddenly talk to everyone, did not know what to do. But again, the realization that she was the representative of her father and brother gave her strength, and she boldly began her speech.
“I am very glad that you have come,” Princess Marya began, without raising her eyes and feeling how quickly and strongly her heart was beating. “Dronushka told me that the war ruined you. This is our common grief, and I will spare nothing to help you. I am going myself, because it is already dangerous here and the enemy is close ... because ... I give you everything, my friends, and I ask you to take everything, all our bread, so that you do not have a need. And if you were told that I am giving you bread so that you stay here, then this is not true. On the contrary, I ask you to leave with all your property to our suburban area, and there I take upon myself and promise you that you will not be in need. You will be given houses and bread. The princess stopped. Only sighs could be heard in the crowd.
“I am not doing this on my own,” the princess continued, “I am doing this in the name of my late father, who was a good master to you, and for my brother and his son.
She stopped again. No one interrupted her silence.
- Woe is our common, and we will divide everything in half. Everything that is mine is yours,” she said, looking around at the faces that stood before her.
All eyes looked at her with the same expression, the meaning of which she could not understand. Whether it was curiosity, devotion, gratitude, or fear and distrust, the expression on all faces was the same.
“Many are pleased with your grace, only we don’t have to take the master’s bread,” said a voice from behind.
- Yes, why? - said the princess.
No one answered, and Princess Mary, looking around the crowd, noticed that now all the eyes she met immediately dropped.
- Why don't you want to? she asked again.
Nobody answered.
Princess Marya felt heavy from this silence; she tried to catch someone's gaze.
- Why don't you speak? - the princess turned to the old old man, who, leaning on a stick, stood in front of her. Tell me if you think you need anything else. I'll do anything," she said, catching his eye. But he, as if angry at this, lowered his head completely and said:
- Why agree, we do not need bread.
- Well, should we quit everything? Do not agree. Disagree... There is no our consent. We pity you, but there is no our consent. Go on your own, alone…” was heard in the crowd from different directions. And again the same expression appeared on all the faces of this crowd, and now it was probably no longer an expression of curiosity and gratitude, but an expression of embittered determination.
“Yes, you didn’t understand, right,” said Princess Marya with a sad smile. Why don't you want to go? I promise to accommodate you, feed you. And here the enemy will ruin you ...
But her voice was drowned out by the voices of the crowd.
- There is no our consent, let them ruin! We do not take your bread, there is no our consent!
Princess Mary tried again to catch someone's gaze from the crowd, but not a single glance was directed at her; her eyes obviously avoided her. She felt strange and uncomfortable.
“Look, she taught me cleverly, follow her to the fortress!” Ruin the houses and into bondage and go. How! I'll give you bread! voices were heard in the crowd.
Princess Mary, lowering her head, left the circle and went into the house. Having repeated the order to Dron that there should be horses for departure tomorrow, she went to her room and was left alone with her thoughts.

For a long time that night, Princess Marya sat by the open window in her room, listening to the sounds of peasants talking from the village, but she did not think about them. She felt that no matter how much she thought about them, she could not understand them. She kept thinking about one thing - about her grief, which now, after the break made by worries about the present, has already become past for her. She could now remember, she could cry and she could pray. As the sun went down, the wind died down. The night was calm and cool. At twelve o'clock the voices began to subside, a rooster crowed, the full moon began to emerge from behind the linden trees, a fresh, white dew mist rose, and silence reigned over the village and over the house.
One after another, she imagined pictures of the close past - illness and the last moments of her father. And with sad joy she now dwelled on these images, driving away from herself with horror only one last idea of ​​​​his death, which - she felt - she was unable to contemplate even in her imagination at this quiet and mysterious hour of the night. And these pictures appeared to her with such clarity and in such detail that they seemed to her either reality, or the past, or the future.
Then she vividly imagined the moment when he had a stroke and he was being dragged from the garden in the Bald Mountains by the arms and he was muttering something in an impotent tongue, twitching his gray eyebrows and looking restlessly and timidly at her.
“He wanted to tell me even then what he told me on the day of his death,” she thought. “He always thought what he said to me.” And now she remembered with all the details that night in the Bald Mountains on the eve of the blow that happened to him, when Princess Mary, anticipating trouble, stayed with him against his will. She did not sleep and went downstairs on tiptoe at night and, going to the door to the flower room, where her father spent the night that night, she listened to his voice. He was saying something to Tikhon in an exhausted, tired voice. He seemed to want to talk. "Why didn't he call me? Why didn't he allow me to be here in Tikhon's place? thought then and now Princess Marya. - He will never tell anyone now all that was in his soul. This moment will never return for him and for me when he would say everything that he wanted to express, and I, and not Tikhon, would listen and understand him. Why didn't I come into the room then? she thought. “Perhaps he would have told me then what he said on the day of his death. Even then, in a conversation with Tikhon, he asked twice about me. He wanted to see me, and I was standing there, outside the door. He was sad, it was hard to talk with Tikhon, who did not understand him. I remember how he spoke to him about Liza, as if alive - he forgot that she was dead, and Tikhon reminded him that she was no longer there, and he shouted: "Fool." It was hard for him. I heard from behind the door how, groaning, he lay down on the bed and shouted loudly: “My God! Why didn’t I go up then? What would he do to me? What would I lose? Or maybe then he would have consoled himself, he would have said this word to me. And Princess Marya uttered aloud that affectionate word that he had spoken to her on the day of his death. “Dude she nka! - Princess Marya repeated this word and sobbed tears that relieved her soul. She saw his face in front of her now. And not the face she had known since she could remember, and which she had always seen from afar; and that face - timid and weak, which on the last day, bending down to his mouth in order to hear what he was saying, for the first time examined closely with all its wrinkles and details.
"Darling," she repeated.
What was he thinking when he said that word? What does he think now? - suddenly a question came to her, and in response to this she saw him in front of her with the expression on his face that he had in the coffin on his face tied with a white handkerchief. And the horror that seized her when she touched him and became convinced that it was not only not him, but something mysterious and repulsive, seized her even now. She wanted to think about something else, she wanted to pray, and there was nothing she could do. She gazed with large open eyes at the moonlight and the shadows, every second she expected to see his dead face, and she felt that the silence that stood over the house and in the house chained her.

In literary works of a romantic nature, the rotunda is often the meeting place for the beloved. What building is this? And is it a building at all? In the writings of the beginning and middle of the 19th century, heroines are dressed in a rotunda. This word seems to have several meanings. Indeed, in the description of the architecture of churches, we meet the term "rotunda". What is it? We will try to find out in this article. Below we will consider not only the etymology of the word, which was embodied in park arbors and women's coats, but also give interesting facts about the rotunda located in St. Petersburg. What myths are fanned by this type of building?

Rotunda - what is it?

The origin of this word is Latin. Rotundus in translation simply means "round". And before rotunda became an architectural term for Italian architects, it already existed in ancient buildings. Ancient Greek monopters and tholos are built in the form of circles. Some pagan temples in the Roman Empire are also rotundas. An example is the Pantheon. Later, buildings based on a circle began to be used in Christian sacred architecture. These are mainly baptisteries, which used to be buildings separate from churches, and some churches. It turns out that the rotunda is cylindrical in shape, crowned with a round dome. But it is not so. We can meet rotundas without walls at all. Instead, the circle is created by columns evenly spaced from each other. And there are rotundas without a roof at all. So, in Greek buildings, only a portico served as a roof.

Rotundas in church architecture

When building temples, the Christian Church took as a model ancient mausoleums, which were round in their layout. The first temples for believers were a place of remembrance and veneration of the holy martyrs. Perhaps that is why the shape of the pantheons was taken for the planning of churches. Italian architects actively used the rotunda in their work. This influenced sacred architecture not only in Southern Europe, but also in Kievan Rus. We find rotunda temples of the XI-XII centuries in Galich, Lvov, Vladimir-Volynsky, Przemysl. The foundations of round churches in Uzhgorod, Nizhankovichi, Chernikhovtsy, Stolpye date back to the thirteenth century. The earliest rotunda church in the northern part of Kievan Rus was discovered in Smolensk. This is the temple of the German Mother of God, which was built in the second half of the 12th century by order of foreign merchants. But this architectural form quickly took root in Russian architecture. Even in the pre-Petrine era, when it was fashionable to invite Italian masters to build churches, rotundas appeared in Moscow monasteries. Centuries later, they could be found everywhere.

Rotundas in secular architecture

Buildings in the form of an ideal circle in the Roman era were often erected as mausoleums, pantheons. Therefore, the secular architecture of the times of classicism, wishing to inherit antique samples, began to use rotundas. These were mausoleums glorifying fallen heroes. As a rule, the walls of such buildings were decorated with columns, and a rounded dome served as a roof. With the advent of the era of romanticism, "pantheons" began to be built in parks. These small structures have become an integral part of landscape design. The rotunda in the park did not always inherit the pantheon. She might not have walls. Many parks decorate rotundas in the form of columns standing in a circle, connected by a low dome. But there are also buildings that resemble romantic chapels.

Rotunda in St. Petersburg

The house on the corner of the Fontanka embankment and Gorokhovaya street hides a rather mystical object. Looking at a gloomy building typical of St. Petersburg, it is impossible to guess that a rotunda is hidden in it. How did this rounded one end up in a rectangular house? No one can accurately answer this question. The house was built in the 18th century, but subsequently rebuilt several times. Probably, the rotunda remained from the original design. Now it seems to be hidden in the "case" of the new house: the dome rests against the attic, the windows overlook the courtyard. Because of its secrecy, the rotunda in St. Petersburg is covered with the darkest legends. It is believed that it is the center of the universe, a kind of axis of being, and here at midnight you can meet Satan. In the 80-90s of the last century, the rotunda became a place of visit not only for various kinds of esotericists, but also for informal youth. V. Tsoi and Kinchev have been here. Recently, the beautiful rotunda has been so defaced with vandal graffiti that the residents of the house have introduced an entrance fee - as much as 70 rubles. For this money they restore

Other meanings of the word "rotunda"

In architecture, the term means a cylindrical structure, regardless of what function it performs: a church, a pavilion, or an arbor. Rotunda is also the name of women's outerwear in the form of a spacious cape. She was in fashion in the XVIII-XIX centuries. In the Middle Ages, a round dance was called a rotunda. There is also a term of the same name in typography. It means a type of Gothic script.