SHRINE OF PRINCE MICHAEL OF CHERNIGOV

The Russian Church ranked Michael of Chernigov among the saints for sacrificing his life for Christian religion. Prince went to the Golden Horde to get a permit for appanage, but refused when asked to execute a rite disgraceful for a Christian: to bow to Tatar idols and go through fire (two laid fires). On the order of Batu Khan the prince was fiercely tortured and beheaded killed on 20 September 1246.

In 1570s, on the will of Tsar Ivan IV the Terrible the sainted remains of the prince were transferred from Chernigov to Moscow and put in a specially made copper reliquary. The Cathedral in Memory of Chernigov Miracle-Workers was built in the Ivanovskaya Square in commemoration of this event. In 1770, on the order of Empress Catherine II, the relics of Prince St Michael of Chernigov and his boyar Theodore were transferred from the abolished cathedral to the Archangel Cathedral.

The wooden shrine exhibited now by the northern wall of the cathedral was installed, according to the inscription on cartouche, through the efforts of boyar and Prince Yakov Nikitich Odoevsky in 1688. The princely stock of Odoevsky descended from independent princes of Chernigov: the first Prince of the Odoevsky family, Roman Semyonovich, was a grandson of the St Prince Michael of Chernigov. The copper reliquary with the holy relics remained in this wooden shrine till 1774, when on the order of Empress Catherine II a new oak shrine was made. A skillful master Peter Robert decorated it with magnificent silver plates (regretfully, stolen by the Napoleonic Army in 1812). The shrine with the holy relics was placed by the south-western pillar of the Archangel Cathedral. In 1817 the oak shrine was plated by silver and gilt bronze.

Now the reliquary is placed in the central part of the altar.