The Mother of God of Hodigitria

Icon of the Mother of God Hodegetria of Chernihiv–Gethsemane, 1881. The image of Hodegetria is one of the most frequently depicted images of the Mother of God with the Child – see S.12677MŁ. The presented icon belongs to the variant of the Chernihiv Hodegetria (Chernihiv-Gethsemane) and bears on its reverse a dedication in Russian, addressed to the purchaser and, at the same time, its first owner. The inscription translated into English reads: “This holy icon was acquired during my pilgrimage to the Sergeyev Lavra to bow to the Miraculous image of the Holy Mother of God of Chernihiv in the underground temple on 6 June 1881.” The small image, purchased by a reverent pilgrim, was made in 1881 or shortly before, painted according to an older original. Sergeyev Posad, called Zagorsk in Soviet times, is a Russian city 70 km from Moscow famous for the Troitsky–Sergeyev Lavra, also known as the Trinity Lavra, initiated in the 14th century, and for Sergiy Radonezhsky, one of the most important monks in Ruthenia. In 1844, not far from the monastery, some monks settled in caves, called Gethsemane after the place where the Mother of God fell asleep. Along with this hermitage, the underground Orthodox church of St Michael the Archangel was founded in 1851 with the icon of the Ilyin–Chernihiv Mother of God, made in the 18th century and presented to the monastery by Alexandra Filipova in 1852 and transferred there from the Troitsky–Sergeyev Lavra. On 1 September 1869, the miracle of healing Tekla Andrianova from paralysis occurred by the image of the Mother of God of Chernihiv in the Gethsemane hermitage, followed by other healings which contributed to the growth of the cult of this image, accompanied by the popularisation of the image in numerous copies made for pilgrims. The origins of the image of the Mother of God Hodegetria of Chernihiv are much older, dating back to the 11th century and connected with the figure of the monk Anthony of Pechersk, which is described under S.12928MŁ. Teresa Bagińska-Żurawska https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9243-3967