Tserkva Rizdva Presvyatoyi Bohorodytsi

Very old wooden church

The 16th-century wooden church is built in the Hutsul style. Perfectly preserved. It has a local flavor.

This is an incredibly charged place! The only thought is that in front of you is the Sanctuary, which for more than 400 years makes the heart beat faster. It is gratifying that the residents managed to keep the temple in very good condition.

Great church, in a good location.

The main treasure of Vorokhta is not even from Vorokhta: this ideal in proportions, extremely harmonious wooden church was brought here in 1780 from Yablunytsia (now Nadvirna district). Its name is the same as that of a newer and super-shiny neighbor on a nearby hill: the church is dedicated to the Nativity of the Virgin. (I remember two interesting churches with the same dedication in Bukovynian Toporivtsi). When the Church of the Nativity of the Virgin was built, historians do not know: there are two versions, about the XVIII century. - and about the very archaic as of this part of the Carpathians in 1615. In any case, the composition of the shrine has not changed for several centuries - and this is also a real gift of fate. The church in Vorokhta is miniature, four-carved, in plan (although the side arms of the church are small, only half their width), typical of the Hutsul. Typical is typical, but better than their sisters from Tatarov or Kolomyia: they are gnarled, short, drawn to the ground, and this stately, slender, kicks up to the sun. And the place, the place that was chosen for the temple: on top of a hill in the northern part of the village, on the way to Verkhovyna. Whence all Vorokhta as on a palm: and the Prut, and a track, and a viaduct, and villas ... Well and the stone base too promotes harmony. The octagonal cellar, which is narrower in volume, rises above the central frame. The walls are sloping inward - researchers say, a sure sign of antiquity. Mandatory attic on brackets, this wooden umbrella for parishioners, runs around the shrine. Getting inside the church is a great habit that not everyone will catch by the tail. I was unlucky, so I did not see the remains of paintings on the walls of the eastern part, dating from the XIX century. The condition of the building is quite satisfactory: I know that even after 1979, when the church was restored by Lviv specialists B.Ya. Kindzelsky, G.P. Kruk and I.R. Mohytych, the church was repaired. The eye in the church rests: it is not in blaze, not in ondulin, not in siding: it is really wooden. It used to be a Carpathian norm, now it is a rarity. There used to be a cemetery around the church, no doubt. Now there is little left of it, and crosses and graves are surrounded by the newer Church of the Nativity of the Virgin, which sparkles with a gold plate and lets the sun bunnies from the tops to the iron attics. The famous researcher of architecture G. Logvin wrote that the entrance to the old cemetery was flanked by two giant stones (menhirs), which have long marked the sacred places. I don't know, maybe so, but somehow my menhirs don't fit in with the Carpathians. The newer church has recently changed its tin top: it was white and blue in a cell, it became infamous gold (I don't want to say anything, but in the pre-election period the analogies between white and blue and yellow-hot camps are obvious). A large wooden temple was built in 1925-1929. Attention, tourists: we are looking for such a necessary toilet when traveling only near the NEWER church: it is not near the older one. However, there is a rather modest museum in the bell tower of the elder.