The Resurrection Church is a masonry temple of the late 17th century in Sedniv, the family church and burial vault of the Cossack Lyzohub family. Until 1880, it was named the Church of the Nativity of the Theotokos.
A Temple Funded by a Colonel
The church was built by Chernihiv Colonel Yakiv Lyzohub, and according to archival documents, it was erected in 1690. The colonel himself left an inscription on the Gospel, which he handed over "to the temple built at my expense." Local residents also worked on the construction: old-timers recounted how, as a little girl, their grandmother carried bricks to the workers and received a shellyah for it. The bell tower nearby was added in 1856 at the expense of landowner I. Lyzohub.
What Makes It Special
The plan of the temple is cruciform, with nine chambers and a single dome. The arms of the cross are lower, and even lower chambers stand between them, so the central dome on a high two-tier octagonal drum rises above everything. The facades are decorated with stepped niches of various shapes, cornices, and lancet windows with typical Chernihiv window frames. The portals of the side annexes have two tiers with niches for painting.
Once, the temple housed copies of paintings by Raphael, Marotti, and Dolci, and local icons of the Savior and the Nativity of the Theotokos were painted by Andriy Lyzohub — a close friend of Taras Shevchenko, who visited Sedniv.
The Lyzohub Crypt
In 1924, more than 40 mummified bodies, mostly members of the Lyzohub family, were found in the crypts of the temple. The find interested scientists of the All-Ukrainian Academy of Sciences. In 1935, the church was closed and turned into a warehouse. Restoration began in the 1980s, and in 1990 the temple was returned to the community. At the same time, the ashes of one of the Lyzohubs were returned from the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, and today the coffin rests in the vault.
How to Get There
The church stands in the center of Sedniv, next to the Lyzohub estate and the park over the Snov River, 25 km from Chernihiv. Nearby is the wooden St. George's Church. More about the settlement can be found in the article "Sedniv."
