Mother of God Petrovskaya

The image is derived from the miraculous icon of The Mother of God Petrovskaya, painted by Metropolitan Peter, hegumen of the Ratsky Monastery. The icon represents major features of this iconographic type: the Mother of God is shown almost half-length, her right hand with an open palm covers the Infant Christ’s chest; Christ is shown blessing with his right hand emerging from under the right hand of the Mother of God, and a folded scroll in his left. The icon has also a number of specific features characteristic of this iconographic type: the Mother of God and Christ are depicted cheek-to-cheek, she is embracing Christ with her left hand.

The icon is cased in a silver gilded chiseled oklad ornamented with precious stones and pearls. The background, fields and crowns with korunas are covered with a grassy background and skatny (perfectly round) pearl in settings or on pins. The ubrus (cloth) is stringed with pearls, set with precious stones in settings and pearl pendants running along the bottom edge. On the margins are round and oval decorative plaques with images, made using metal blackening technique, of Sts. Nicholas the Wonderworker and Basil, the bishop of Kherson, the Venerable John the Ladderer, Onuphrius the Great, Sergius of Radonezh, Paphnuce of Borovsk, the martyrs Catherine, Anastasia and Juliana. These saints were particularly venerated by Ivan the Terrible’s family; some of them were patronal saints of the royal family: the martyr Anastasia of Tsarina Anastasia Romanovna, the Venerable John the Ladderer of her son Tsarevich Ivan Ivanovich, the martyr Juliana of Princess Juliana Dmitrievna Paletskaya, the wife of Ivan the Terrible’s brother Prince Yury , and bishop Basil of Kherson of her son Prince Basil..

Registration number 5424 ИХО. © The Sergiev Posad State History and Art Museum

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