1.
Grand Duke of Vladimir
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The Grand Duke of Vladimir was a prince during the Kievan Rus and after its collapse. He ruled territory approximately bounded by the Volga, Oka and Northern Dvina rivers and its capital was Vladimir during 1157-1238. Vladimir city was founded by a Kievan prince Vladimir Monomakh in 1108 and was destroyed by a Mongol invasion in 1238, the second important city was Suzdal, also destroyed by Mongols. The Grand Duke Yuri Dolgorukii, the son of Vladimir Monomakh. Vladimir-Suzdal began the consolidation of Russian lands, completed by Muscovy. Vladimir was founded in the 12th century, the principality was overrun by the Mongols under Batu Khan in 1242. He and his successors asserted suzerainty over it until 1328, during this period, Vladimir became the chief town of the Russian settlements in the basin of the Oka and it clashed with the new principality of Moscow, to which it finally succumbed in 1328. It began to decay in the 14th century, traditionally, Vladimir-Suzdal is perceived as a cradle of the Great Russian language and nationality and gradually evolved into the Grand Duchy of Moscow. Since 1332 the title of the Grand Princes of Vladimir passed to the Grand Dukes of Moscow
2.
Vasily Vereshchagin
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Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin transcribed in English as Basil Verestchagin was one of the most famous Russian war artists and one of the first Russian artists to be widely recognized abroad. The graphic nature of his realist scenes led many of them to never be printed or exhibited, Vereshchagin was born at Cherepovets, Novgorod Governorate, Russia in 1842 as the middle of three brothers. His father was a landowner of noble birth, when he was eight years old he was sent to Tsarskoe Selo to enter the Alexander Cadet Corps, and three years later he entered the Sea Cadet Corps at St Petersburg, making his first voyage in 1858. He served on the frigate Kamchatka, which sailed to Denmark, France, Vereshchagin graduated first in the list at the naval school, but left the service immediately to begin the study of drawing in earnest. He won a two years later, in 1863, from the St Petersburg Academy for his Ulysses Slaying the Suitors. In 1864 he proceeded to Paris, where he studied under Jean-Léon Gérôme, in the Paris Salon of 1866 he exhibited a drawing of Dukhobors chanting their Psalms. In the next year he was invited to accompany General Konstantin Kaufmans expedition to Turkestan and he was granted the rank of ensign. His heroism at the siege of Samarkand from June 2–8,1868 resulted an award of the Cross of St George. He was a traveler, returning to St. Petersburg in late 1868, to Paris in 1869, back to St. Petersburg later in the year. In 1871, he established an atelier in Munich, and made an exhibition of his works at the Crystal Palace in London in 1873. He made another exhibition of his works in St, in late 1874, he departed for an extensive tour of the Himalayas, India and Tibet, spending over two years in travel. He returned to Paris in late 1876, with the start of the Russo-Turkish War, Vereshchagin left Paris and returned to active service with the Imperial Russian Army. At the conclusion of the war, he acted as secretary to General Skobelev at San Stefano, after the war, Vereshchagin settled at Munich, where he produced his war pictures so rapidly that he was freely accused of employing assistants. Vereshchagin painted several scenes of imperial rule in British India and his epic portrayal of The State Procession of the Prince of Wales into Jaipur in 1876 is claimed to be the third largest painting in the world. In 1882–1883, he traveled to India. He aroused much controversy by his series of three pictures of a Roman execution, of sepoys blown from the guns in India, and his picture Suppression of the Indian Revolt by the English depicted executions carried out by tying victims to the barrels of guns. Vereshchagins detractors argued that executions had only occurred in the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Because of its style, the painting appeared to present itself as an impartial record of a real event
3.
Nobility
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The privileges associated with nobility may constitute substantial advantages over or relative to non-nobles, or may be largely honorary, and vary from country to country and era to era. There is often a variety of ranks within the noble class. g, san Marino and the Vatican City in Europe. Hereditary titles often distinguish nobles from non-nobles, although in many nations most of the nobility have been un-titled, some countries have had non-hereditary nobility, such as the Empire of Brazil. The term derives from Latin nobilitas, the noun of the adjective nobilis. In modern usage, nobility is applied to the highest social class in pre-modern societies and it rapidly came to be seen as a hereditary caste, sometimes associated with a right to bear a hereditary title and, for example in pre-revolutionary France, enjoying fiscal and other privileges. Nobility is a historical, social and often legal notion, differing from high socio-economic status in that the latter is based on income. Being wealthy or influential cannot, ipso facto, make one noble, various republics, including former Iron Curtain countries, Greece, Mexico, and Austria have expressly abolished the conferral and use of titles of nobility for their citizens. Not all of the benefits of nobility derived from noble status per se, usually privileges were granted or recognised by the monarch in association with possession of a specific title, office or estate. Most nobles wealth derived from one or more estates, large or small and it also included infrastructure such as castle, well and mill to which local peasants were allowed some access, although often at a price. Nobles were expected to live nobly, that is, from the proceeds of these possessions, work involving manual labour or subordination to those of lower rank was either forbidden or frowned upon socially. In some countries, the lord could impose restrictions on such a commoners movements. Nobles exclusively enjoyed the privilege of hunting, in France, nobles were exempt from paying the taille, the major direct tax. In some parts of Europe the right of war long remained the privilege of every noble. During the early Renaissance, duelling established the status of a respectable gentleman, Nobility came to be associated with social rather than legal privilege, expressed in a general expectation of deference from those of lower rank. By the 21st century even that deference had become increasingly minimised, in France, a seigneurie might include one or more manors surrounded by land and villages subject to a nobles prerogatives and disposition. Seigneuries could be bought, sold or mortgaged, if erected by the crown into, e. g. a barony or countship, it became legally entailed for a specific family, which could use it as their title. Yet most French nobles were untitled, in other parts of Europe, sovereign rulers arrogated to themselves the exclusive prerogative to act as fons honorum within their realms. Nobility might be inherited or conferred by a fons honorum
4.
Rurik dynasty
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The Rurik dynasty or Rurikids was a dynasty founded by the Varangian prince Rurik, who established himself in Novgorod around the year AD862. They ruled until 1610 and the Time of Troubles, following which they were succeeded by the Romanovs and they are one of Europes oldest royal houses, with numerous existing cadet branches. The Rurikid dynasty was founded in 862 by Rurik, a Varangian prince, come and reign as princes and have authority over us. Three brothers came with their kin and all the Rus in response to this invitation, Rurik set up rule in Novgorod, giving more provincial towns to his brothers. The Rurikid Dynasty DNA Project of FamilyTreeDNA commercial genetic genealogy company reports that Y-DNA testing of the descendants of Rurikids suggests their non-Slavic origin, Rurik and his brothers founded a state that later historians called Kievan Rus′. By the middle of the century, Kievan Rus′ had dissolved into independent principalities. The dynasty followed agnatic seniority and the izgoi principle, in addition, a line of Polotsk princes assimilated themselves with the princes of Lithuania. In the 10th century the Council of Liubech made some amendments to a succession rule, vsevolods line eventually became better known as the Monomakhovychi and was the predominant one. The line of Svyatoslav later became known as Olegovychi and often claim to the lands of Chernihiv. The Izyaslavychi who ruled Turov and Volhynia were eventually replaced by a Monomakhovychi branch, the Rurikid dynasty… attempted to impose on their highly diverse polity the integrative concept of russkaia zemlia and the unifying notion of a Rus′ people. But Kievan Rus′ was never really a unified polity and it was a loosely bound, ill-defined, and heterogeneous conglomeration of lands and cities inhabited by tribes and populous groups whose loyalties were primarily territorial. This caused the Rurik dynasty to effectively dissolve into several sub-dynasties ruling smaller states in the 10th and 11th centuries and these were the Olgoviches of Severia who ruled in Chernigov, Yuryeviches who controlled Vladimir-Suzdal, and Romanoviches in Galicia-Volhynia. The Olgoviches descended from Oleg I of Chernigov, a son of Sviatoslav II of Kiev and they continued to rule until the early 14th century when they were torn apart by the emerging Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Grand Duchy of Moscow. Vsevolod I of Kiev was the father of Vladimir II Monomakh, two of Vladimir IIs sons were Mstislav I of Kiev and Yuri Dolgorukiy. The Romanoviches were the line of Roman the Great, descended from Mstislav I of Kiev through his son Iziaslav II of Kiev and his grandson Mstislav II of Kiev, father of Roman the Great. The older Monomakhovychi line that ruled Principality of Volhynia, they were crowned kings of Galicia and Volhynia. Romanovychi displaced the line of Izyaslavychi from Turov and Volhynia as well as Rostyslavychi from Galicia. The last were two brothers of Romanovychi, Andrew and Lev II, who ruled jointly and were trying to repel Mongol incursions
5.
Russian Orthodox Church
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The Russian Orthodox Church, alternatively legally known as the Moscow Patriarchate, is one of the autocephalous Eastern Orthodox churches, in full communion with other Eastern Orthodox patriarchates. The Primate of the ROC is the Patriarch of Moscow and all Rus and it also exercises ecclesiastical jurisdiction over the autonomous Church of Japan and the Orthodox Christians resident in the Peoples Republic of China. The ROC branches in Belarus, Estonia, Latvia, Moldova and Ukraine since the 1990s enjoy various degrees of self-government, in Ukraine, ROC has tensions with schismatic groups supported by the current government, while it enjoys the position of numerically dominant religious organisation. The ROC should also not be confused with the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, headquartered in New York, New York, the two Churches reconciled on May 17,2007, the ROCOR is now a self-governing part of the Russian Orthodox Church. According to one of the legends, Andrew reached the location of Kiev. The spot where he erected a cross is now marked by St. Andrews Cathedral. By the end of the first millennium AD, eastern Slavic lands started to come under the influence of the Eastern Roman Empire. There is evidence that the first Christian bishop was sent to Novgorod from Constantinople either by Patriarch Photius or Patriarch Ignatios, by the mid-10th century, there was already a Christian community among Kievan nobility, under the leadership of Byzantine Greek priests, although paganism remained the dominant religion. Princess Olga of Kiev was the first ruler of Kievan Rus′ to convert to Christianity and her grandson, Vladimir of Kiev, made Rus officially a Christian state. The Kievan church was a metropolitanate of the Patriarchate of Constantinople and the Ecumenical patriarch appointed the metropolitan, who usually was a Greek. The Metropolitans residence was located in Kiev itself, the capital of the medieval Rus state. Following the tribulations of the Mongol invasion, the Russian Church was pivotal in the survival, despite the politically motivated murders of Mikhail of Chernigov and Mikhail of Tver, the Mongols were generally tolerant and even granted tax exemption to the Church. Such holy figures as Sergius of Radonezh and Metropolitan Alexis helped the country to withstand years of Tatar oppression, the Trinity monastery founded by Sergius of Radonezh became the setting for the flourishing of spiritual art, exemplified by the work of Andrey Rublev, among others. The followers of Sergius founded four hundred monasteries, thus extending the geographical extent of the Grand Duchy of Moscow. However, the Moscow Prince Vasili II rejected the act of the Council of Florence brought to Moscow by Isidore in March 1441, Isidore was in the same year removed from his position as an apostate and expelled from Moscow. The Russian metropolitanate remained effectively vacant for the few years due largely to the dominance of Uniates in Constantinople then. In December 1448, Jonas, a Russian bishop, was installed by the Council of Russian bishops in Moscow as Metropolitan of Kiev and All Russia without the consent from Constantinople. Subsequently, there developed a theory in Moscow that saw Moscow as the Third Rome, the successor to Constantinople
6.
Alexander Nevsky
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Alexander Yaroslavich Nevsky served as Prince of Novgorod, Grand Prince of Kiev and Grand Prince of Vladimir during some of the most difficult times in Kievan Rus history. He was canonized as a saint of the Russian Orthodox Church by Metropolite Macarius in 1547, as it was told by the prophet Isaiah, Thus sayeth the Lord, I appoint the princes because they are sacred and I direct them. He was taller than others and his voice reached the people as a trumpet, and his face was like the face of Joseph and his power was a part of the power of Samson and God gave him the wisdom of Solomon. This Prince Alexander, he used to defeat but was never defeated, born in Pereslavl-Zalessky, Alexander was the second son of Prince Yaroslav Vsevolodovich and Rostislava Mstislavna, daughter of Kievan Rus Prince Mstislav Mstislavich the Bold. Alexander seemed to have no chance of claiming the throne of Vladimir, in 1236, however, he was summoned by the Novgorodians to become knyaz of Novgorod and, as their military leader, to defend their northwest lands from Swedish and German invaders. According to the Novgorod Chronicle written in the 14th cent, the Neva battle of 1240 saved Novgorod from a full-scale invasion from the West. Because of this battle, 19-year-old Alexander was given the sobriquet Nevsky and he would soon have to leave Novgorod because of this conflict. This supposed battle is not mentioned in any Swedish or other source, the supposed Swedish commander was called Spiridon which is an Orthodox, not Scandinavian name. Furthermore, Sweden was on the brink of war with Norway ever since the Norwegians infamous Värmland expedition in 1225, relations improved only after the Treaty of Lödöse in 1249, which was forged by the newly empowered Birger Jarl. Before the treaty, Norway remained an ally of the folkungs, giving them refuge and providing men, in this situation, it seems unlikely that Sweden could have been able to organize a major expedition against Novgorod. After Pskov had been invaded by the Germans and Estonians, the Novgorod authorities sent for Alexander, in spring of 1241 he returned from his exile, gathered an army, and drove out the invaders. Alexander and his men faced the Livonian heavy cavalry led by the bishop of Dorpat Hermann, Nevsky faced the enemy on the ice of the Lake Peipus and defeated the German knights and Estonian infantry during the Battle of the Ice on 5 April 1242. Alexander’s victory was a significant event in the history of the Russia, foot soldiers of Novgorod had surrounded and defeated an army of knights, mounted on horseback and clad in thick armour. Tactical military considerations aside, Alexanders victory was an important milestone in the development of Muscovite Russia, after the Livonian invasion, Nevsky continued to strengthen Russia’s Northwest. He sent his envoys to Norway and, as a result, Alexander led his army to Finland and successfully routed the Swedes, who had made another attempt to block the Baltic Sea from the Russians in 1256. Nevsky proved to be a cautious and far-sighted politician, historians seem to be unsure about Alexander’s behavior when it came to his relations with Mongols. He may have thought that Catholicism presented a more tangible threat to Russian national identity than paying a tribute to the Khan, Alexander tried to strengthen his authority at the expense of the boyars and at the same time suppress any anti-Mongol uprisings in the country. According to one interpretation, Alexander’s intentions were to protect scattered principalities of what would become Muscovy from repeated invasions by the Mongol army
7.
Golden Horde
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The Golden Horde was a Mongol and later Turkicized khanate established in the 13th century and originating as the northwestern sector of the Mongol Empire. With the fragmentation of the Mongol Empire after 1259 it became a functionally separate khanate and it is also known as the Kipchak Khanate or as the Ulus of Jochi. After the death of Batu Khan in 1255, his dynasty flourished for a century, until 1359. The Hordes military power peaked during the reign of Uzbeg, who adopted Islam, the territory of the Golden Horde at its peak included most of Eastern Europe from the Urals to the Danube River, and extended east deep into Siberia. In the south, the Golden Hordes lands bordered on the Black Sea, the Caucasus Mountains, the khanate experienced violent internal political disorder beginning in 1359, before it briefly reunited under Tokhtamysh. However, soon after the 1396 invasion of Timur, the founder of the Timurid Empire, at the start of the 15th century the Horde began to fall apart. By 1466 it was being referred to simply as the Great Horde, within its territories there emerged numerous predominantly Turkic-speaking khanates. These internal struggles allowed the northern state of Muscovy to rid itself of the Tatar Yoke at the Great stand on the Ugra river in 1480. The Crimean Khanate and the Kazakh Khanate, the last remnants of the Golden Horde, in any event, it was not until the 16th century that Russian chroniclers begin explicitly using the term Golden Horde to refer to this particular successor khanate of the Mongol Empire. The first known use of the term, in 1565, in the Russian chronicle History of Kazan, applied it to the Ulus of Batu and its left wing was referred to as the Blue Horde in Russian chronicles and as the White Horde in Timurid sources. Western scholars have tended to follow the Timurid sources nomenclature and call the left wing the White Horde, the khanate apparently used the term White Horde to refer to its right wing, which was situated in Batus home base in Sarai and controlled the ulus. However, the designations Golden Horde, Blue Horde, and White Horde have not been encountered in the sources of the Mongol period. At his death in 1227, Genghis Khan divided the Mongol Empire amongst his four sons as appanages, Jochi was the eldest, but he died six months before Genghis. In 1235, Batu with the great general Subedei began an invasion westwards, first conquering the Bashkirs, from there he conquered some of the southern steppes of present-day Ukraine in 1237, forcing many of the local Cumans to retreat westward. The military campaign against the Kypchaks and Cumans had started under Jochi, by 1239 a large portion of Cumans were driven out of the Crimea peninsula, and it became one of the appanages of the Mongol Empire. The remnants of the Crimean Cumans survived in the Crimean mountains, moving north, Batu began the Mongol invasion of Rus and for three years subjugated the principalities of former Kievan Rus, whilst his cousins Möngke, Kadan, and Güyük moved southwards into Alania. Using the migration of the Cumans as their casus belli, the Mongols continued west, raiding Poland and Hungary and culminating in the battles of Legnica, in 1241, however, Ögedei Khan died in the Mongolia homeland. Batu turned back from his siege of Vienna to take part in disputing the succession, the Mongol armies would never again travel so far west
8.
Khan (title)
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Khan is originally a title for a sovereign or a military ruler, widely used by Turkic and later medieval nomadic Mongolian tribes living to the north of China. Khan also occurs as a title in the Xianbei confederation for their chief between 283 and 289, the Rourans were the first people who used the titles khagan and khan for their emperors. Subsequently the Ashina adopted the title and brought it to the rest of Asia, in the middle of the sixth century the Iranians knew of a Kagan – King of the Turks. Khan now has many equivalent meanings such as commander, leader, as of 2015 khans exist in South Asia, Middle East, Central Asia, Eastern Europe and Turkey. The female alternatives are Khatun, Khatoon and Khanum and these titles or names are sometimes written as Han, Kan, Hakan, Hanum, or Hatun and as xan, xanım. Khagan is rendered as Khan of Khans and it was the title of Chinese Emperor Emperor Taizong of Tang, and also the title of Genghis Khan and of the persons selected to rule the Mongol Empire. For instance Möngke Khan and Ogedei Khan would be Khagans but not Chagatai Khan, some managed to establish principalities of some importance for a while, as their military might repeatedly proved a serious threat to such empires as China and kingdoms in Central Asia. One of the earliest notable examples of such principalities in Europe was Danube Bulgaria, Khan was the official title of the ruler until 864 AD, when Kniaz Boris adopted the Eastern Orthodox faith. The title Khan became unprecedently prominent when the Mongol Temüjin created the Mongol empire, the greatest land empire the world has ever seen and his title was khagan, or Khan of Khans, but has often been abbreviated to Khan or described as Great Khan. The great leader was regarded as a khan in the middle east, ming Dynasty Chinese Emperors also used the term Xan to denote brave warriors and rulers. The title Khan was used to designate the greatest rulers of the Jurchens, while most Afghan principalities were styled emirate, there was a khanate of ethnic Uzbeks in Badakhshan since 1697. For example, in present Armenia and nearby territories to the left and right, diverse khanates existed in Dagestan, Azerbaijan, including Baku, Ganja, Jawad, Quba, Salyan, Shakki and Shirvan=Shamakha, Talysh, Nakhichevan and Karabakh. The most important of these states were, Khanate of Kazan, sibir Khanate Astrakhan Khanate Crimean Khanate. The ruling descendants of the branch of Genghis Khans dynasty are referred to as the Great Khans. The title Khan of Khans was among numerous titles used by the Sultans of the Ottoman empire as well as the rulers of the Golden Horde and its descendant states. The title Khan was also used in the Seljuk Turk dynasties of the near-east to designate a head of multiple tribes, clans or nations, jurchen and Manchu rulers also used the title Khan, for example, Nurhaci was called Genggiyen Han. Rulers of the Göktürks, Avars and Khazars used the higher title Kaghan, see the main article for more details. Khan-i-Khanan was a given to the commander-in-chief of the army of the Mughals
9.
Diocese of Novgorod
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The Novgorod and Staraya Russa Diocese is one of the oldest offices in the Russian Orthodox Church. The office of bishop of Novgorod was created around the time of the Christianization of Rus, the first bishop, Ioakim Korsunianin, built the first Cathedral of Holy Wisdom with thirteen tops around the time of his arrival in Novgorod. That cathedral burned in 1045, and the current, stone, cathedral and it was consecrated by Bishop Luka Zhidiata on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross, September 14,1052. The office remained a bishopric until it 1165 when Metropolitan Kirill raised Ilya to the archiepiscopal dignity, formally, though the status of the Novgorodian church remained unchanged and was still part of the Province of Kiev. Around 1400, the archbishops began referring to themselves as Archbishop of Novgorod the Great, in 1156, Bishop Arkadii was elected by the veche because the metropolitan throne in Kiev was vacant at that time. Over the next centuries, a process of local election either by the veche, by the local clergy. It was last used in the election of Archbishop Sergei in 1483, while some Russian chronicles refer to all Novgorodian prelates as archbishops, the office was not formally raised to the archiepiscopal status until 1165. There is evidence, however, that suggests that Nifont held the archiepiscopal title personally even before that, an antimins from the St. Nicholas Cathedral on the Market bears an inscription referring to Nifont as archbishop. It then continued to grow in power into the fifteenth century. After the Muscovite conquest in 1478, the office fell somewhat into decline and his successor, Serapion was removed from office after only three years and the see sat vacant for seventeen years. Like the rest of Russia, the archiepiscopal office suffered hardship during the reign of Ivan the Terrible and the subsequent Time of Troubles. Novgorod seems to have suffered more than most, as the Oprichnina massacred a number of the citizenry in the city in 1570 and looted the Cathedral of Holy Wisdom and other places in the city. At around the time of the massacre, Tsar Ivan the Terrible removed Archbishop Pimen from office, Pimen died in 1572 under uncertain circumstances in the Monastery of St. Nicholas in Tula. His successor, Archbishop Leonid, was beheaded in Moscow on Cathedral Square in the Kremlin on the orders of the Tsar in October 1575, leonids successor, Aleksandr, was elevated to the metropolitan rank in 1589, becoming the Metropolitan of Novgorod the Great and Velikie Luki. The office remained a metropolitanate until 1720 when it was reduced to an archiepiscopate. It was elevated to the level again in 1762. It was separated from St. Petersburg in 1892, the new city of St. Archbishop Dmitry, served as Catherine the Greats spiritual advisor for the first few years of her reign and crowned her Empress in 1762. The Novgorodian Eparchy was combined again with Leningrad after the re-legalization of the church in 1943 and it was briefly separated in the 1950s and combined with Leningrad, again, in the 1960s
10.
Incorruptibility
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Incorruptibility is a Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox belief that divine intervention allows some human bodies to avoid the normal process of decomposition after death as a sign of their holiness. Bodies that undergo little or no decomposition, or delayed decomposition, are referred to as incorrupt or incorruptible. Incorruptibility is thought to even in the presence of factors which normally hasten decomposition, as in the cases of saints Catherine of Genoa, Julie Billiart. In Roman Catholicism, if a body is judged as incorruptible after death, canon law allows inspection of the body so that relics can be taken and sent to Rome. The relics must be sealed with wax and the body must be replaced after inspection and these ritual inspections are performed very rarely and can only be performed by a bishop respecting canon law. A pontifical commission can authorize inspection of the relics and demand a written report, after solemn inspection of the relics, it can be decided that the body is presented in an open relicary and displayed for veneration. Catholic law allows saints to be buried under the altar, so Mass can be celebrated above the corpse, the relics of Saint Bernadette were inspected multiple times, and reports by the church tribunal confirmed that the body was preserved. The opening of the reliquary was attended by multiple canons, the mayor and the bishop in 1919, not every saint, however, is expected to have an incorruptible corpse. Although incorruptibility is recognized as supernatural, it is no longer counted as a miracle in the recognition of a saint, embalmed bodies were not recognized as incorruptibles. Incorruptibility is seen as distinct from the preservation of a body. Incorruptible bodies are said to have the odour of sanctity, exuding a sweet or floral. To the Eastern Orthodox Church, incorruptibility continues to be an important element for the process of glorification, an important distinction is made between natural mummification and what is believed to be supernatural incorruptibility. There are a number of eastern Orthodox saints whose bodies have been found to be incorrupt and are in much veneration among the faithful. Finally, the relics were sent to Petrograds Military Medical Academy. There they remained for nearly eighty years, a second uncovering of St Alexanders relics took place in December 1997, before their return to the Svir Monastery. In 1927, the cathedral itself was demolished, incorruptibles include, During marble excavations on the Appian Way in Spring 1485, workers found three marble coffins. In one, twelve feet underground, was the corpse of a woman, said to have looked as if it had been buried that day. The corpse attracted 20,000 plus crowds of spectators in the first few days, many of whom believed it to be of Tullia, daughter of Cicero, whose epitaph was on one of the tombs
