The Roadside Chapel in Pinsk

There is the picturesque town of Pinsk, a historical and cultural center of Polesye in the south of Belarus. Pinsk is distinctive for the diversity of ancient architectural monuments including the Roadside Chapel situated at the town entrance, in Penkovaya Street. The Pinsk chapel was constructed in the XVII century, and originally it presented a three-tier building in Baroque, at the top of which there was a big nest with storks.

According to the legend, the Roadside Chapel was constructed in honor of “Pinsk Apostle” Andrey Boboli. The story tells that one catholic priest was subjected to torture by Ukrainian Cossacks during the Russian-Polish War. The martyr’s body had been buried in the Pinsk cemetery for over fifty years until the Great Northern War came to the Belarusian land. At that time, one of Pinsk monks saw in his dream a man who named himself as Andrey Boboli. The martyr asked him to bring his body from the cemetery to the church; when his grave was found and opened, everyone were impressed – the martyr’s body had remained incorrupt. The request of the deceased priest was fulfilled; when a plague epidemic running wild around the entire Belarus affected the inhabitants of Pinsk, the locals began to honor and pray to the catholic priest Andrey Boboli that had saved the inhabitants of Pinsk from a terrible death.

The Roadside Chapel had been attracting the inhabitants of Pinsk and visitors for dozens of years by a multitier stork’s nest. However, the stork’s habitation disappeared alongside with a Cross of the chapel in 2013.

Don’t hurry to quit this historical town! You must visit a monumental building of the Pinsk Jesuit College forming a part of the monastery complex that was blown up in 1953.

 The visitors of the town can go for excursion around the orthodox sanctities of Pinsk. There is the five-domed Leshchinsky Holy Dormition Monastery on the bank of the Pina River. It was constructed in the times of the Christianization of Russia. The biggest collection of icons is kept in the Cathedral of St. Varvara. There you can watch a rare showpiece – the icon “the Hodegetria of Jerusalem”. The real adornment of the glorious town Pinsk is the Cathedral of St. Feodor situated in the building estate “Luga”. One of the most picturesque and lively sites of Pinsk is the embankment of the Pina River that is famous for its fogs. The locals and visitors of the town like to spend their time there.

The Belarusian town Pinsk is a “Gem of Polesye” that connects antiquity and modernity, picturesque nature and great works of folk architecture. We advise you to focus on the general excursion program “Pinsk – a town of ten centuries” in order to watch all attractions of the town.

Sources: http://vedi.by/chto-posmotret/grodnenskaya-oblast/oshmyanskij-rajon/249-golshany-derevnyahttp://heritagepinsk.blogspot.com/p/blog-page_58.html