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Plovdiv

St Marina Orthodox church

Hotels in Plovdiv

St Marina Orthodox church - in center of Plovdiv

St.Marina church is the known as the main metropolitan church in Plovdiv city. Not incidentally, it ranks among the must-see landmarks in Bulgaria’s second largest city.
St. Marina church is an impressive Renaissance three-nave pseudo-basilica with a pillar arcade. Having been built by stone material, it stuns the visitor with its striking design.
It is said that the holy temple was originally built in the middle of the 5th century as a token of honour to Apostle Paul. Unfortunate fate has met the sacred place and it was completely destroyed at the end of 6th century. One the followers of Apostle Paul, has laid the foundations of the Plovdiv Eparchy and Plovdiv Orthodox bishopric. It is believed that the church was built in the bottom of the Taksim tepe in 1853 on the ruins of the previously devastated church. Over the years the church dedicated to St.Martyr Marina has constantly become to a number of destructions after which it was reconstructed again.

Famous masters in wood-carving have created with exceptional skills a new 21-m-long wooden iconostasis. This precious element inside the temple depicts Biblical scenes, people with pigeons, crowns and scaring monsters. The exquisitely painted icons of Jesus Christ and Virgin Mary, a great deed of the prominent Stanislav Dospevski, were situated on either sides of the iconostasis.
After another fierce invasion in 1851, St.Marina church was entirely destroyed. Since the Ottoman government has lifted some restrictions with respect to the construction of Orthodox churches, the erection of a new, more representative and well-laid temple has become a reality.
The construction process was led and carried out by talented craftsmen of the Brazigovo Building School. The construction of St.Marina church took about three years and eventually in 1856 the temple was officially inaugurated by Plovdiv bishop.

The architecture of the nowadays church St.Marina is remarkable not only because of the 18 stone column, forming a round-arched narthex, but also the impressive Biblical scenes which were painted below it. The icons were pained by the famous iconographers such as Zahari Zograf, Stanislav Dospevski and Nikola Odrinchanin.
The dome of St.Marina church was covered with wall-paintings in 1866 by A.Gyudzhenov and Stoyan Andonov.
There is an impressive 5-storey, 17m tall belfry which rises above the entrance in the churchyard and one will not see it anywhere else in Bulgaria.
Divine service is conducted in the church every day accompanied by the brilliant singing of the church choir.