Church of the Holy Trinity in Ischelno (Shchuchyn district) is known not only for its exquisite architecture and rich interior design, but also for the fact that there is the only sundial on its territory of Belarus. It is worth seeing at least to synchronize your watch...

The Swedes and a new church

The church was founded in the town at 30 April 1515 by Andrei Dovoynoy. It was a wooden church, for the construction of which Dovoyna donated a portion of his inheritance.

During the Northern War, the Swedes visited Ischelno and, according to surviving documents, broke the churchyard bells. The building itself suffered greatly, and it had to be rebuilt.

New brick church appeared in 1761 (according to other sources – in 1758, its construction began in 1755) through the efforts of the Grodno cornet Iosif Vala. Stone temple was built in the same place where earlier stood a wooden one. Moreover, a new church was roughly the same size and had the same system of altars, as the former one. The stone church has survived to the present days.

Five facts from the history of the church

The parish opened a school for the children of the local nobility in 1780, but soon it was closed because the local nobles were not eager to send their offspring there. A hospital and a shelter for the poor operated there at the end of the 18th century. A new school at the church was opened only in the middle of the 19th century.

In 1801-1834, a senior priest of the temple was Alex Knikovsky. For the reason that in his preaching’s, he mentioned the Napoleonic Wars, the authorities sent him as a soldier to Moscow.

The church was robbed in 1821. Unknown robber took away all the silver things, and even tin icing frames.

During the uprising in 1863, a well-known priest Adam Falkovsky served in the church. At the time, he announced the Manifest of People's Government to the congregation. Falkovsky was shot in Lida, 25 June 1863.

Before World War I, the Holy Trinity parish included nearly 4, 5 thousand of Catholics in Ischelno.

The features of the architecture

Single nave, two-towered stone church with a five-sided apse is constructed in the late Baroque style. Compositional dominant is the main facade. The square towers protrude from the main volume, and have helmet completion.

The side facades are completed with a cornice, and there are rows of arched windows on top. Inside, there are three altars and a pulpit in Rococo style. The main altar is two-tiered and is decorated with stucco. The side altars are crowned with sculptures.

Ancient kist o'whistles is preserved in the church, created by Vatslav Bernadsky. There is a belfry-tower of the 19th century and a sundial in the yard.

 

Sundial in the church yard in Ischelno village

A unique device to determine the time by the sun is located on the south side of the churchyard. Horizontal sundial was performed by a master Maletsky in the 18th century in Vilnius. At that time, a mechanical watch had already existed, but the time they showed was with large errors.

The sundial still acts in Ischelno, but a triangular arrow, a shadow from which casts on copper dial (engraving), has already been broken. Her upper corner points to the North Star. The dial is built into the stone pedestal with the height of one meter and is made according to strict requirements of a particular geographic latitude (in the case of Ischelno – 54*41"2').

Naturally, one can to know the exact solar time by such clock only in the daytime. It is interesting that in the 18th century, such sundials were made only for the big European capitals – Warsaw, Vilna, Paris, etc. This means a lot…