<p>Khreshchatyk<br />

street in 1875. A three-floor building of the Yevropeisky<br />

hotel, built in place of the burnt city theatre in 1851, can be seen<br />

on the right. This hotel was one of the most fashionable ones in the<br />

second half of the nineteenth century and in the early twentieth<br />

century. The square was named Yevropeiska after the hotel; in 1869,<br />

however, it was renamed as Tsarska. Near the hotel one can see cabs<br />

waiting for passengers. The hotel administration ensured the<br />

transportation of guests from the hotel to the train station and the<br />

other way around. In the foreground, the fence, the gate, and a part<br />

of the Merchant Assembly garden can be seen.</p><p>On the left one can see<br />

the so-called Iron Chapel, built in honour of the rescue of tzar<br />

Alexander II from a bullet fired by a revolutionary in 1866. The<br />

style of this small chapel imitates the typical Moscow brick<br />

architecture of the seventeenth century, which was then considered<br />

original, free from Byzantine or European influences. Its<br />

characteristic features are two rows of the so-called kokoshniks<br />

(corbel archs) over the cornice, an onion cupola with a cross and the<br />

shape of the kokoshnik roof supported by carved columns on the dormer<br />

windows. </p><p>At some distance, the Khreshchatytska street ensemble can be<br />

seen, which was formed in about 1875 and consisted mostly of one- and<br />

two-floor housing; the carriageway was rather wide and free.</p><br />

<p><br />

The high<br />

quality (for that time) photo creates a mood of a dull winter day.<br />

The high exposure suggests an additional effect of a snowstorm as the<br />

silhouettes of a tree near the chapel and cabs on the carriageway are<br />

fuzzy. However, the grass in the foreground indicates that the photo<br />

was taken in a relatively warm season; the “winter” effect is due<br />

to the lightening of the photo.</p><p>Olga Martyniuk</p>