Where Pushkin and Goncharova were married in the unfinished Church of the Great Ascension

Alexander Pushkin and Natalia Goncharova were married on 18 February 1831 in the parish of the Church of the Greater Ascension at Nikitsky Gate. The new church was still under construction at the time, but its refectory, with two side chapels, had been in use since 1816; the official description places the wedding ceremony in this part of the church. One heritage protection document places the ceremony in the ‘narthex’, while another refers more cautiously to the consecrated part of the building. These descriptions do not establish the exact spot where the bride and groom stood.

The archival record: date and parish

The Moscow archive identifies the Ascension Church on Tsaritsynskaya Street as the church where Pushkin and Goncharova were married and dates the entry to 18 February 1831. In the state register of unique documents the exact archival reference is given: fond 2124, inventory 1, file 1722, folio 120. This provides verifiable evidence for the date and the name of the parish.

The archive’s register briefly describes the entry but does not identify the part of the building where the ceremony took place. The mere fact that the marriage was registered does not establish the location of the altar, the route of the wedding procession or where the participants stood inside the church. Answering these questions requires a different kind of document: a plan showing which parts of the building were in use on the relevant date, or an eyewitness account describing the space in sufficient detail.

The premarital inquiry record and participants in the ceremony

The marriage inquiry record dated the same day, 18 February, names those who formalised the marriage, but likewise does not specify the room where the wedding ceremony took place. In the published transcription of the document Archpriest Iosif Mikhailov is named, along with the clergy of the Ascension Church on Tsaritsyna Street. Here, the connection with the parish is explicit in the wording of the document itself, rather than appearing only in a later biographical account.

The marriage inquiry checked for potential impediments to the marriage: religious affiliation, the absence of prohibited degrees of kinship, freely given consent, parental permission, age and confirmation that neither had been married before. The record bore the signatures of the couple and their guarantors. Among the signatories, the text names Lev Pushkin and Pyotr Vyazemsky on the groom’s side, and Nikolai Goncharov and Pavel Azanchevsky on the bride’s. These details shed light on the preparations for the sacrament, but do not establish where people stood in the church.

The editors who published the document in 1935 noted that the original premarital inquiry record was held in a register of the Nikitsky ecclesiastical district, in the collection of the Institute of Russian Literature. This document records the verification of the conditions for marriage and the signatures, while the parish register entry records the marriage itself. Their agreement on the date and parish strengthens confidence that the central event took place. It does not provide a third piece of information, concerning the location, that neither text contains.

The premarital inquiry record is particularly valuable to this investigation: its wording, ‘on Tsaritsyna Street’, shows how the church was identified in documents from 1831 itself. Heritage protection documents and the current address, ‘36 Bolshaya Nikitskaya Street’, belong to different periods of description. Reading them as identical designations without accounting for the historical change in the street name can easily obscure the link between the record and the building. Comparing the wording of archival records is more reliable than relying on the church’s later nickname.

Pushkin himself, in a letter to his wife written from Moscow in September 1832, recalled their wedding on Nikitskaya Street in the parish of the Ascension. B. L. Modzalevsky quotes this text in his notes to the scholarly edition of the poet’s correspondence. Pushkin’s mention of the parish is valuable as a participant’s own testimony, but it specifies neither the old nor the new building, nor the refectory or the narthex. Even an eyewitness had no obligation to describe the church’s interior layout when writing about something else.

As early as 19 February 1831, the poet’s Moscow acquaintance Alexander Bulgakov informed his brother that the marriage had taken place ‘at the Old Ascension’. This phrase cannot be dismissed simply because later accounts of the building’s history point to the refectory of the new building, which was then in use for worship. Yet the letter does not state that Bulgakov witnessed the ceremony from inside the church, nor does it describe the space. To verify the name, we need evidence of how these words were used in 1831 and information about the relocation of services; the adjective ‘Old’ alone does not amount to a floor plan of the old church.

Two churches by the Nikitsky Gate in 1831

The Church of the Greater Ascension at Nikitskiye Gates was built beside an earlier Church of the Ascension, constructed under Natalya Kirillovna Naryshkina in 1685–1689. The 2024 heritage assessment of the Church of the Greater Ascension explicitly distinguishes between these buildings: both the old and the new churches are marked on a plan of the area from 1800. The old building was still standing in February 1831.

The church’s official page states briefly that the old church was dismantled ‘by 1831’; a 2024 report dates its dismantling to late 1831, while the historian Sergei Romanyuk dates it to 1832. The 1831 Moscow guidebook he quotes describes two neighbouring buildings: the old church was still standing at the time. From 1816, services were held in the consecrated refectory of the new church. After the old church was dismantled, its bricks were used to complete the new building. The fact that the old church was still standing therefore does not prove that the ceremony took place there.

The names add to the confusion. The 2024 report notes that older documents referred to the church as ‘on Tsaritsynskaya Street’, ‘v Storozhakh’, ‘by the fine bell tower’, and also as Old Ascension and Great Ascension. The name Bulgakov used in his letter therefore warrants attention: it may have referred to the earlier church. Yet the phrase ‘at Old Ascension’ does not describe its interior, and the same expert assessment states that services in the old building ceased in 1816. The place name in a contemporary account needs to be considered alongside the history of the transfer of services: on its own, it does not prove that the ceremony took place in the earlier church.

How can you distinguish the Greater Church of the Ascension from the Lesser Church and the old church?

There are three buildings in this area, not two, that can become confused in retellings. Near the Nikitsky Gates, the old Naryshkin church stood alongside the new one, construction of which began in 1798. A separate church near Voznesensky Lane later became known as the Lesser Ascension. Its heritage protection document identifies the building as the present-day No. 18 and explains that the diminutive name became established after a larger church was built near the gates.

The historical account of the Lesser Ascension dates the first building on this site to 1584 and the stone church to 1634. It was remodelled several times in the 18th century, with side chapels added and its upper structure altered. This is the separate history of a different parish and a different building. The archival record of Pushkin and Goncharova’s marriage refers to the Ascension Church on Tsaritsynskaya Street near the Nikitsky Gates; the similar dedication does not justify identifying it as the Lesser Ascension.

Even after identifying the site, the two buildings belonging to the same parish still need to be distinguished. In 1831, the old church was still standing, while the new church already had a refectory in use for services. A document written after the old building was demolished may use ‘church’ to encompass the parish’s entire remembered history. To establish where the ceremony took place, one must ask in each case whether the source refers to the parish, the physical building or a specific part of its interior.

The addresses help, but they do not remove the need to ask this question. The 2024 heritage assessment of the Church of the Great Ascension concerns what is now 36 Bolshaya Nikitskaya Street, Building 1; the 2018 document in which the word ‘narthex’ appears was prepared for the site by the Church of St Theodore the Studite at 29 Bolshaya Nikitskaya Street, Building 2. The latter document recounts the wedding in an accompanying historical note; it does not examine the foundations of the room where Pushkin and Goncharova stood.

Which part of the new building was already being used for services?

By the wedding day, the refectory section of the new church was in use, with two side chapels dedicated to the Meeting of the Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God and St Nicholas the Wonderworker. According to the 2024 report, its foundations were laid in 1798; by 1805, construction work had been completed and interior finishing had begun. It was consecrated in 1816; from then on, parish services were held there.

The rest of the building followed a different construction timeline. Before the war of 1812, only the foundations, plinth and some of the columns of the main building had been completed. Measured drawings from 1825 recorded its unfinished state; a survey in 1829 confirmed that the foundations were suitable for work to continue. Thus, the word ‘unfinished’ refers to the complex as a whole and does not mean that services could not be held in the part already consecrated.

In 1830, Osip Bove inspected the church under construction and, according to the report, retained the basis of Fyodor Shestakov’s design, adding four-column porticoes to the north and south façades. The drawings were approved in late 1830, while final approval followed only in late 1831. These dates mean we cannot picture the church at the February wedding exactly as it would look once construction was complete.

Construction from Potemkin to Bové

The new building was planned for an adjoining plot, as remodelling the existing church would not achieve the desired scale. According to the historical account in the 2024 report, Prince Grigory Potemkin first inspected the Naryshkin church with Vasily Bazhenov. Its foundations were judged insufficiently strong for a large building, so the prince set aside part of his own grounds for the new project. This explains how the old church and the neighbouring construction site could have existed side by side, rather than one replacing the other within a single building season.

After Potemkin’s death in 1791, his heirs allocated funds for the church and commissioned Matvey Kazakov to design it. The construction contract was signed on 10 March 1798. Work began with the refectory and its two side chapels, rather than with the completion of the central part of the church. This sequence allowed services to be held before the entire building was finished.

By 1805, the refectory had been completed and work on its interior decoration had begun, while by 1812 only the foundations, plinth and some columns of the main body of the church had been built. The war brought construction to a halt; a scholarly ecclesiastical publication about the church adds that the unfinished building suffered fire damage. For Pushkin’s contemporaries, therefore, the ‘new church’ could mean both a functioning place of worship and an unfinished architectural structure. This apparent contradiction was not unusual for a building project spanning many years.

The later resumption of construction cannot be attributed to a single architect either. Alexander Shestakov carried out a measured survey in 1825, and a commission that included the architect Shestakov examined the condition of the foundations in 1829. A 2024 report names Fyodor Shestakov as the author of the subsequent design, whereas Sergei Romanyuk attributes it to Alexander. Bové’s report, published by Romanyuk, gives only the surname, without a first name, so the document itself does not resolve the disagreement. In 1830, Bové determined that a church modelled on St Petersburg’s Transfiguration Cathedral could not be built on the existing foundations without demolishing the part already constructed. The parishioners chose to retain the building. The porticoes were an addition to Shestakov’s design, but they do not prove that the entire church was ready by the time of the wedding.

The sequence of approvals is particularly important in determining where the wedding took place: the drawings incorporating Bové’s additions were approved in late 1830, while final approval of the design followed in late 1831. The marriage ceremony took place between these milestones, on 18 February. The architectural drawing records what the builders intended; it does not confirm that all the doors, staircases and porticoes shown were already in use by parishioners. Distinguishing the design from what had actually been built is essential to any attempt to pinpoint the location.

What exactly does the 2018 report say about the ‘narthex’?

The 2018 expert assessment states in its historical overview that the wedding took place ‘in the narthex of the new church’, as the main part of the building had not yet been completed. The historian links the choice of church to the parish in which the Goncharov family home stood and to the insistence of the church clergy. The assessment concerns a plot beside the neighbouring Church of St Theodore the Studite and a stormwater drainage proposal; reconstructing the wedding ceremony was not its purpose.

The 2018 report helps us understand how the historian described the wedding venue, but does not in itself constitute a plan of the 1831 ceremony. It neither pinpoints a location within the building nor shows exactly which area its author referred to as the narthex. It is therefore appropriate to present this as the wording used in the record, leaving room for clarification based on more direct evidence.

Particular care is needed when applying the term to the church as it stands today. In its description of the protected architectural features, the 2024 record lists the side narthexes with porticoes and the refectory with two side chapels as distinct elements of the building as it has evolved. The word ‘narthex’ alone in the 2018 report does not establish that the author meant one of these specific side structures. Equating the terms without a plan from the period means replacing the question with a ready-made answer.

The different meanings of ‘narthex’

In church tradition, the narthex usually means the space at the entrance to a church. An explanation of church layout on an Orthodox Christian website describes it as the western part of the church and notes that the word ‘refectory’ could also be applied to this space. This broad interpretation explains why the terms are treated as similar in popular accounts. But a general definition cannot automatically establish which specific part of the Church of the Great Ascension the author of the 2018 record meant.

The architectural terminology of the 2024 record is much more specific: its description of the protected structure separately identifies the side narthexes with four-column porticoes and the refectory with two side chapels and entrance galleries. Here, the terms distinguish between parts of the building as it has evolved. The 2018 document uses the singular without reference to such a list. There is therefore no evidence to support simply equating the term used in the 2018 record with the specific structure on either the north or south side.

A scholarly church publication adds another historical detail: the initial section of an unfinished gallery, originally intended to connect to the bell tower, was fashioned into a narthex. This offers a useful clue as to how an additional structure bearing that name may have emerged during construction. But the publication provides no dated plan showing where the wedding participants stood. On its own, it does not prove that the ceremony took place in that initial section of the gallery.

How does the cautious wording of the 2024 report change the conclusion?

The 2024 expert assessment of the Church of the Great Ascension itself confirms the wedding date and that the new building was unfinished. However, it describes the location within the building differently: “as historians surmise” the ceremony took place in the part that had already been completed and consecrated. The status of this conclusion is explicitly stated here: a hypothesis based on the condition of the church, rather than an indisputable record of where the participants stood.

The adjacent lines of the report give this interpretation a firm basis in the building’s history: by 1831, services were being held in the refectory, which had been consecrated in 1816. Nevertheless, the statement that “the refectory was in use” does not in itself establish that the wedding ceremony took place strictly within its main room, rather than in an adjoining space. The distinction between the area used for worship and the precise spot where the ceremony took place may seem slight in words, but it is crucial to historical reconstruction.

The two reports therefore need not be regarded as either wholly consistent or mutually exclusive. They address the questions at different levels of detail. The 2018 document names the section as the “narthex”; the 2024 document sets broader limits — the completed and consecrated part — while leaving the precise location within it open. The verified chronology supports these limits but does not resolve the terminological uncertainty.

Can the refectory be considered the established location of the wedding ceremony?

The refectory is the most confidently identified location in terms of which part of the church was in use. The official page of the Financial and Economic Administration of the Moscow Patriarchate explicitly states that Pushkin and Goncharova were married in the refectory on 18 February 1831. The same page sets out the sequence: construction began in 1798, restoration followed the fire of 1812, and this part was completed by 1816.

However, the official page recounts the past from a modern perspective; it does not reproduce an 1831 document in which the priest himself or a wedding participant identified the room. The 2024 report, which also draws on the building’s construction history, describes the location in the consecrated part as a hypothesis put forward by historians. Natalya Bolotina names the western side chapel, but the relevant passage in her book cites no document linking the ceremony specifically to it. The explicit statement on the church’s page should therefore be presented to the reader alongside the reasoning and qualification given in the heritage assessment, rather than passed off as the exact wording of the parish register entry.

In practical terms, the distinction is this: the refectory was already functioning as a church while the main body of the building was still under construction. The construction records point to this particular area. However, neither the church institution’s webpage nor either of the two documents establishes which of the two side chapels the ceremony took place near, whether the ‘narthex’ mentioned in the 2018 document referred to the entrance area of the refectory then in use, or where the boundary of the space as it existed in 1831 lay on the present-day floor. This wording is sufficient to identify the area of the building, but not to provide greater detail.

How does the evidence from 1831 relate to the later expert assessments?

The archival entry and the premarital enquiry record were created in connection with the marriage itself; the heritage protection documents were drawn up almost two centuries later for entirely different purposes. Later studies bring together information about the construction and help establish which part of the church was already in use. However, a record of the event and a reconstruction of the space carry different evidential weight, so their conclusions cannot be used interchangeably.

The report dated 22 August 2018 was prepared by historian Alexey Ponomarenko to assess measures to protect archaeological heritage during the installation of stormwater drainage near the Church of St Theodore the Studite. The assessment’s main focus is — the impact of excavation work on the neighbouring plot, its archaeological deposits and any archaeological features that may be present. The reference to the wedding appears within a general historical overview of the neighbourhood. Its accuracy should be assessed in light of its role in the document.

The report dated 2 April 2024 concerns conservation work on the Church of the Greater Ascension itself at 36 Bolshaya Nikitskaya Street. Its historical overview takes the reader in detail from the old church through the stages of construction of the new one, mentioning the measured surveys of 1825, the inspection of the foundations in 1829 and the design decisions of 1830. When the authors reach the wedding, they still choose the cautious wording ‘as historians surmise’. This qualification marks the limits of what is known, even with extensive construction records.

A historian may conclude that the wedding took place in the already consecrated part of the new church, since the old church was no longer used for services and the main body of the new building was not yet ready. However, an additional source is needed to move from a probable area to a specific room. The two reports provide neither an account of the ceremony accompanied by a plan nor testimony identifying a side chapel or entrance whose location can be verified. To state that it took place ‘in precisely this or that narthex’ would go beyond the available evidence.

Checking for accuracy also means refusing to infer absence from a document’s silence. The parish register entry, as described in the archival catalogue, does not identify the room; the premarital enquiry record deals with other matters. Other evidence from 1831 may have survived, but the documents examined here do not provide the precise location sought. Acknowledging this limit is more modest than declaring categorically that the information has been lost for ever, and more historically sound.

What do the dates 1840, 1845 and 1848 signify?

The later dates refer to stages in the completion of the building as a whole, rather than the start of services in the refectory. The 2024 report dates the church’s consecration to 19 September 1840, while Natalya Bolotina gives 19 September 1848. The first document also states that heating was installed throughout the building in 1848. The 2018 report briefly dates the completion of construction to 1845. This discrepancy does not negate the separate consecration of the refectory in 1816.

Nor should the date range ‘1798–1848’ in the current heritage listing be read as the construction date of every stone, or as an indication that all rooms were in the same condition at every point during that period. It covers the history of the building’s development. For the question of February 1831, the sequence matters more: the refectory already existed and was in use for services, the main church was still being completed, and the building acquired its final architectural form later.

What changed in the church after Pushkin’s wedding that February?

After the wedding, the old Naryshkin church was dismantled: the 2024 report dates this to late 1831, while Sergei Romanyuk gives 1832. Some of its bricks were used in the new building, while the tent-roofed bell tower was retained. Sources also give different dates for the tower’s demolition: the 2024 report gives 1937, while the historian places it in the final months of 1935. According to the 2024 report, the old church stood on the site of the present-day public garden. The square’s appearance today therefore leaves no clear visual trace of where the two neighbouring churches stood on the wedding day.

The central part of the building was completed after the wedding. The report mentions a plan of the surrounding area drawn up by the architect A. I. Starov in 1837, work based on designs by Mikhail Bykovsky, conflicting dates for the church’s consecration, and the installation of heating throughout the building in 1848. None of these later features can be presented without qualification as the setting for the 1831 ceremony. When illustrating that day, it is particularly misleading to pass off the completed mid-19th-century interior as an accurate depiction of the setting at the time of the wedding.

The architectural vocabulary underwent an even more abrupt break in the 20th century. According to a 2024 report, the iconostasis and most of the interior decoration were destroyed after the church closed in 1931. The building was adapted for other uses: a garage entrance was cut through the apse, intermediate floors and new windows were added, and the side porticoes were also damaged. In the 1940s, the church was handed over for laboratory experiments that damaged the floor and the structure. These alterations explain why the interior today cannot be regarded as an untouched record of Pushkin’s era.

The restoration of the building’s appearance as a church also has its own timeline. Restoration studies began in 1988; the main work was completed by 1990, with further refurbishment of the façades in later years. In 2002–2004, architect Oleg Zhurin built on the western side a new bell tower, 61 metres high based on Shestakov’s unrealised design concept. It was consecrated on 20 May 2004. The bell tower gives the architectural ensemble a sense of completeness, but it did not exist in Pushkin’s lifetime, nor did it stand in this form in the mid-19th century.

In 2002–2009 and again in 2012, the façades and refectory were restored, and the walls and vaults were reinforced. In 2017–2018, work focused on the paintings in the side chapels, the main sanctuary, the area beneath the dome and the refectory. As a result, even the architectural forms that broadly survive are seen today through the lens of restoration decisions. They can help us understand the church’s layout, but without specialist research, we cannot assume that every visible element was present on 18 February 1831.

The difference is particularly clear in a photograph of the façade. The portico, bell tower, decorative finishes and surrounding garden square date from different periods. No present-day photograph shows which passageways were open on the wedding day, where scaffolding stood or what the temporary entrance looked like. Architectural history allows us to frame these questions, but without a dated account, it does not justify filling in the answers.

Can the location of the wedding ceremony be identified on the church’s present-day floor plan?

The present-day plan helps distinguish the refectory, side chapels and side vestibules, but does not automatically pinpoint the location of the 1831 ceremony. The heritage assessment describes a building that took shape between 1798 and 1848 and takes subsequent restoration work into account. To identify the site of the ceremony with confidence, this plan must be matched to the building’s layout specifically on 18 February 1831 and to a source that identifies the spot within the space then in use.

Nor can a later painting replace such evidence. The A. S. Pushkin State Museum has dedicated a room to the event in the poet’s memorial flat on Arbat Street, with Dmitry Belyukin’s painting ‘Pushkin’s Wedding’ as its centrepiece. This work of art helps us imagine the wedding ceremony, but does not provide a documentary record of where people stood in the church.

The Arbat house and the limits of museum reconstruction

Pushkin’s memorial flat on Arbat Street helps trace the history of his home after the wedding, but does not establish where inside the Church of the Great Ascension the ceremony took place. The house’s address is confirmed by a rental record dated 23 January 1831, which the archive included in the same list of unique documents as the marriage record. The museum provides further details: the poet rented the second floor of Nikanor Khitrovo’s house, and by 10 February was already asking for letters to be sent to him on Arbat Street. Here, researchers have documentary evidence linking the rental agreement to the actual use of the address.

The museum also helps reconstruct the days surrounding Pushkin and Goncharova’s wedding: on 17 February, the poet gathered friends at his Arbat flat; on the 18th, dinner was held there after the wedding ceremony; and on the 27th, the newlyweds hosted their first ball as a married couple. These dates do not reveal the layout of the Church of the Great Ascension, but show why the Arbat house and the church are connected without inventing a scene of a walk between them. One location is supported by the rental agreement and the museum’s account of the couple’s time there, the other by church records and construction documents.

The exhibition in the flat reopened after restoration on 6 June 2024. Its ‘Wedding’ room is devoted to the marriage of Pushkin and Goncharova, with Dmitry Belyukin’s painting at its centre. On the second floor, the museum has recreated the interiors of the couple’s rooms; according to the museum, surviving plans of the house from 1806 and 1836 were used in restoring the building. This is a reconstruction of a historical setting. The same principle should guide any discussion of the church: a painting and a recreated interior bring the past to life, but cannot replace a record of where the bride and groom stood during the wedding ceremony.

The comparison with the Arbat house provides a useful benchmark for future efforts to establish where in the church the ceremony took place. For the flat, the museum cites the rental agreement, plans from 1806 and 1836, and Pavel Vyazemsky’s recollection of the flat. As for the precise location of the wedding ceremony, the sources examined include the marriage record and a general construction chronology, but no equally direct link between the ceremony and a particular room. If a new plan or description emerges, it will need to be assessed by its date and provenance, rather than by how plausibly it fills in the familiar picture.

A careful answer requires just three levels of precision. The date and parish are confirmed by an archival record. The section in use can be identified from the construction history of the refectory and the cessation of services in the old church. The documents examined do not establish the precise location of the ceremony: the term ‘narthex’ in one document cannot be assigned to a specific room on the present-day floor plan without further evidence.

This distinction is also worth bearing in mind on the ‘Alexander Sergeyevich's Moscow’ tour: the route links the Church of the Great Ascension with the Pushkin Memorial Apartment on Arbat. The museum confirms that a wedding dinner was held at the house on Arbat after the wedding ceremony; these two places, whose connection is well documented, offer a clear account of the day without inventing an exact location inside the unfinished church.

Sources

1. State Register of Unique Documents of the Moscow Archival Fund
2. State Historical and Cultural Expert Assessment Report on the Church of the Great Ascension, 2024
3. State Historical and Cultural Expert Assessment Report on the Site near Nikitskiye Gates, 2018
4. State A. S. Pushkin Museum: Memorial Apartment on the Arbat
5. Premarital Enquiry Record for A. S. Pushkin and N. N. Goncharova, published text of the document
6. Historical and Cultural Expert Assessment Report on the Church of the Lesser Ascension on Bolshaya Nikitskaya Street
7. The Church and Its Layout: Church Terminology Explained
8. Church of the Ascension of the Lord beyond Nikitskiye Gates — Orthodox Encyclopaedia Church Research Centre
9. Financial and Economic Administration of the Moscow Patriarchate: Church of the Great Ascension near Nikitskiye Gates
10. B. L. Modzalevsky. Notes on Pushkin’s Letters of 1831–1833 (Fundamental Digital Library)
11. S. K. Romanyuk. ‘By Nikitskiye Gates’, Construction and Architecture of Moscow magazine, No. 10, 1986
12. N. Yu. Bolotina. ‘Potemkin’, 2014
13. ‘Alexander Sergeyevich’s Moscow’ tour — itinerary