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- Tourist Objects
- Bulgaria
- Zemen town
- Church of St. John the Evangelist
The Church of St. John the Evangelist was built around the XI-XII centuries and is one of the few preserved monuments of Bulgarian medieval architecture. In the construction of the church used light rock materials. The dome rests on a cylindrical drum decorated with blind arches. The windows are extremely small. Above the front door is the image of John the Evangelist with the open gospel. Inside there is a massive stone altar, the floor is tiled with marble and colored stone mosaics.
The walls of the church were painted with great skill and elegance. It remains a mystery to modern scientists what paints were used by the artist, because they have been preserved for seven centuries. Unique are the images of Despotos Dejan and Doi with their families. During medieval scholasticism, living people were depicted extremely rarely. It was, in a way, revolutionary for that time. In addition, these images are a valuable source of knowledge about the clothes and jewelry of the boyars of the early XIV century. The most impressive is the image of Doi, a young woman dressed in a red tunic with long lace sleeves, with a white veil and a crown on her head. No less interesting is the mural "Forging Nails for Crucifixion". Such a plot is not found anywhere else in the famous art monuments of this era.
