Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Krylos

The Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, located on the territory of the Ancient Halych National Reserve in Krylos, is both a functioning church and a museum. Regular services are held here, right next to the foundations of the Assumption Cathedral. Built in the 16th century, the church retains elements of the old cathedral: materials and architectural details of its predecessor were used during construction. Immediately after its opening, it was called the "new cathedral." And now, more than four centuries later, the church is both an architectural and historical monument visited by tourists and a sacred place for believers.

The construction of the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary was completed in 1586. It was built from the stone blocks of the old cathedral that was destroyed at that time. During the construction, some elements of the planning structure of the previous church were also recreated. At the same time, defensive fortifications, brick walls with corner towers, and an entrance gate were built around the church. Also, ancient reliefs were discovered on the walls of the Assumption Church, the most interesting of which is a dragon spewing flames.

In the second half of the 17th century, the Krylos Cathedral Church suffered significant damage from Tatar and Turkish attacks. At the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries, it was rebuilt by Bishop Joseph Shumliansky. Soon the church's dome was seriously damaged again (possibly due to an earthquake).

During the First World War, the upper part of the church collapsed during an artillery shelling. All the church belongings burned down, and only the miraculous icon of the Virgin Hodegetria remained intact. In 1974-1975, the church was restored and an exhibition of the local museum of local lore was placed there.

After the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church came out of the underground, the church was transferred to it. During the 2001 restoration, the foundations of the pillars on which the building was supported were excavated. Archaeologists discovered numerous fragments of the wall structures of the 12th-century Assumption Cathedral, elements of the temple's stone decor, and details of fresco painting, which significantly supplemented the ideas of modern researchers about the appearance and interior decoration of the old Assumption Cathedral.

The founder of the Assumption Church in Krylos was a Galician nobleman, a descendant of the boyar family, Marko Shumlianskyi. It was he who approached the famous masters of the Italian school who were working in Lviv at the time and invited them to the former princely capital. That is why it is easy to notice Renaissance elements in the architectural composition of the building.

The tombstone from Mark Shumlansky's burial place has been preserved, and it can now be seen near the main entrance, in the narthex of the church in the northern part. This white stone slab was found in the early 18th century by the then Bishop Joseph Shumliansky, a descendant of a famous family. There is another interesting monument from the time of the construction of the Assumption Church: above the choirs in the church, a stone with a coat of arms in the form of an arrowhead with the letters "A" and "C" on the sides has been preserved. These are the initials of Andrii Svarychovskyi, another of the church's founders.

Architecture and interior

The western portal of the church, flanked by two pilasters and crowned with a pediment, is of great artistic value. On the inner field of the pediment is a stone-carved composition "The Assumption of the Virgin". The northern portal is decorated with the coat of arms of Bishop Joseph Shumliansky.

The Assumption Church is decorated with an iconostasis made by Anton Manastyrskyi, a prominent master of Ukrainian painting of the early 20th century. An original monument of 12th-century Old Halychyna stone plastics is an image of a winged serpent, a griffin, carved in the north wall of the narthex.

TheAssumption Church of Krylos houses a unique icon that attracts thousands of pilgrims from all over Ukraine - the Galician (Krylos) Miraculous Icon of the Mother of God. This is one of the oldest Ukrainian miraculous images.

According to legend, in 1157, after the consecration of the cathedral in princely Halych, Yaroslav Osmomysl presented the church with an icon of the Blessed Virgin Mary that he had brought from Constantinople. She became the patron saint of the Galician princes and all of Galicia. In the 13th century, Prince Lev moved the icon to Lviv, where it performed many miracles.

According to another version, the Virgin of the Wings was in Halych until the 17th century, and after the Turks burned the church during one of their raids, the icon was found in the forest near the village of Sokil. From there, it was moved to the Basilian Monastery of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. Since then, the icon has had another name - the Mother of God of Sokil.

Today, the icon of the princely era is open to the public and is placed in the altar part of the church. In gratitude for the answered prayers and healing, in the 18th century, local believers raised funds and made a silver salary for the icon. At the same time, the tradition of pilgrimage to the miraculous Krylos icon was born.

At one time, the Galician Metropolitans Sylvester Sembratovych and Andrei Sheptytsky made pilgrimages to Kryloska Mountain. For a long time, the miraculous icon did not leave its consecrated place in the altar of the Assumption Cathedral.

In the early 1960s, when the church housed a museum of local lore, the Kryloky icon was thrown out of the altar. But, fortunately, it was preserved in the church, in the choir, among the fragments of church things and junk. In the early 1980s, residents of Krylos found the icon and placed it back in the altar. In 2006, the image was restored, and on August 28 of that year, the head of the UGCC, His Beatitude Lubomyr Husar, held a solemn ceremony of its coronation, as a sign of gratitude to the icon of the Mother of God for keeping all of Galicia in the faith.

Pilgrims visit the icon of the Mother of God of Krylos at least three times a year:

• July 7 - on the Feast of the Nativity of John the Baptist;
• August 28 - on the feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary;
• September 27 - on the day of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross.

You can get to the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Krylos by car or bus. By car, take the H09 highway from Halych or Ivano-Frankivsk. From the regional center, buses Ivano-Frankivsk - Halych, Ivano-Frankivsk - Rohatyn (Burshtyn), Ivano-Frankivsk - Lviv (to the Krylos stop) run along this route. From Halych to Krylos (the distance between them is 7 kilometers) you can take one of the buses that stop near the People's House in the city center. The bus stop in Krylos is located near the main road (lower Krylos). You have to walk to Krylos Hill, where all the sights are concentrated.

Openinghours: the church is open from 8:00 to 18:00 daily. An excursion to the church can be booked at the Museum of the History of Ancient Halych (Mytoropolychi Chambers) from 9:00 to 18:00 daily.