Luzhany. The Oldest Church in Bukovyna

How many wonderful villages and small towns we have, ones you want to visit and learn more about.

Luzhany, Kitsman district. Chernivtsi region

The settlement of Luzhany in the Chernivtsi region lies beside the highway that connects the Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk and Chernivtsi regions.

Luzhany. A restaurant with a patriotic name

Luzhany. A shop

A Bukovynian cottage

Luzhany. A typical Bukovynian dwelling house

A house in Bukovyna

The locality is known for the oldest church in Bukovyna.

Luzhany. The Holy Ascension Church. 15th c.

The date of the building of the Holy Ascension church — 1453 — is based on the data of a charter attesting to the purchase of the village by the boyar Fedir Vitold.

Frescoes discovered beneath layers of whitewash, depicting Saints Sergius, Theodore and, possibly, Demetrius, pushed this date back to the 13th-14th century.

Originally all the walls of the church were painted, and part of the unique frescoes has been possible to clean, which gives one the chance to appreciate the work of the ancient masters and the material they used.

Very rarely can one see the scene of "The Poor Man on the Dung Heap", where the biblical kings David and Solomon play musical instruments for the poor servant of God.

From the outside the church resembles a dwelling house, one you want to enter as if it were your own home.

There is no dome, and only three cupolas confirm that the building is a shrine.

Earlier they and the roof were covered with shingles, but now they have been clad in sheet metal.

The side walls are reinforced with buttresses.

In the churchyard stone crosses gleam white.

The wooden extension to the church and the two-tier bell tower were built in the 19th century.

To preserve this architectural monument of national significance, the parishioners built a new church.

 The Holy Ascension Church. 2014.

The building of the Church of the Ascension of the Lord went on for 18 years; it was consecrated in 2014.

The Holy Ascension Church. 2014.

It is known that in the old church, on the road from Zhovkva to Suceava, the relics of St. John of Suceava, especially revered in Bukovyna, once rested, very long ago.

 The Holy Ascension Church. The chapel

The Holy Ascension Church. The chapel

In honour of the great martyr another Orthodox church is consecrated. It can be seen if you walk along a quiet Luzhany street and cross the Sovytsia river, a tributary of the Prut.

Luzhany. Gagarin St

The bridge over the Sovytsia river

Beside the mother wooden shrine of the 18th century a new church has been erected.

 The Church of St. John of Suceava

The wooden Church of St. John of Suceava. 18th c.

On this same Central Street stands the Roman Catholic Church of St. John of Dukla.

The Church of St. John of Dukla. 1914.

The first wooden church burned down, but the monument to the saint of the Roman Catholic Church, set up in 1847, survived.

The Church of St. John of Dukla. 1914. Monument to St. John. 1847.

In the 15th century Jan carried out preaching in Galicia, was a theologian and a priest, had the gift of prophecy, and is considered the defender of Lviv.

The Church of St. John of Dukla. 1914. Monument to St. John. 1847.

The new Roman Catholic church, built in 1914, was turned under Bolshevik rule into a warehouse for salt, which greatly damaged the building. In the years of Ukraine's independence the shrine was returned to the believers.

Unfortunately, all the churches were closed, as was the roadside chapel on the Stryi — Ivano-Frankivsk — Chernivtsi route.

Luzhany. The chapel

In this small settlement, with a population of about 5 thousand people, there is its own arboretum, 2.3 hectares in area, founded in the 19th century.

And although the residents call this green corner simply the park, it holds the status of a monument of landscape-gardening art.

And I, too, was glad to rest in the 30-degree heat in the shade of the plane trees, catalpas and other exotics.

 The arboretum of the 19th c.

You can come to Luzhany by the suburban train that runs between Kolomyia, Vyzhnytsia and Chernivtsi. The railway here was laid in 1866, and the station was opened in 1902.

The railway station. 1902.

 A well on the grounds of the railway station

If you drive to Chernivtsi along the H-10 (P-04) highway, it is impossible to whizz past Luzhany,

Bus stop on the Stryi — Ivano-Frankivsk — Chernivtsi route

and some of the landmarks can be seen even from the little window.

The Holy Ascension Church