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Тайна и разум. Михайловский замок – оплот уходящей эпохи
The Mikhailovsky Castle in St. Petersburg was created by eminent architects such as François Violie, Vasily Bazhenov, Vincenzo Brenna as well as their crowned customer - Emperor Paul I. Undoubtedly, it is the bearer of a complex symbolic program, probably partly concealed.
There is an attempt in this paper to "read" the architecture itself in the aspects not covered by any preserved or created written documents. The exterior appearance of the building is considered as five manifestos "expressed" by compositional solutions of the facades and the plan.
The author concludes that Pavel Petrovich saw not only a practical but also a mystical meaning in a hasty construction. The erection of the castle-palace should magically promote the change in all the structure of life in the country, lead to the expulsion of negligence and chaos, and to the adjustment of the instruments of power.
The hypothesis is suggested that the castle plan was conceived as a secret likeness to Tree of Sefirot: and the fact that the ceremonial apartments of the monarch were located to the east of the altar of the church of Archangel Michael may perhaps confirm the already expressed idea that the emperor (as the Russian Rosicrucians suggested to him) saw himself as a "holy king" and monarch-high priest - both secular and spiritual lord at the same time.
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