The Tatars burned the village of Lucky together with the inhabitants. Greek Monastery of Laki (map, photo). Inconvenient questions for officials
A person who first enters the cozy Lak Valley is amazed at its silence. This silence is somehow special, there is no such silence anywhere else in the Crimea. The chalk mountains scorched by the sun stand silently. Wind does not shake trees. You can't hear the buzzing of the bees. Only a lone hare will run across the field strewn with huge red poppies. Nature is silent. But it is worth listening more closely to these mountains and trees, peering into the scarlet blood of poppies - and they will begin to speak. They will tell a terrible story that has been kept for 60 years...
From time immemorial, the descendants of glorious listrigons lived here. In the vicinity of the village, the remains of the church of St. Trinity, erected at the beginning of the 15th century. And not far from it are the ruins of an even more ancient temple with the remains of a cemetery. On one of the tombstones there is an inscription dating back to 1362. The blood of proud Theodorites flowed in the veins of the locals. That real indigenous Crimean people, who was respected far beyond the peninsula.
It has always had its own little world. The villagers were not particularly interested in the events that took place further than Mount St. Elijah towering over Laki. People grew excellent tobacco, grapes, raised cattle, raised children. Strangers were not particularly allowed in, although they were always welcomed cordially. The whole village was made up of several dynasties that lived here from time immemorial. The melodic Greek surnames Spai, Leli, Arvanidi come from these places. So the Lak land would have given birth to new hard-working Crimeans, if on one dank winter morning in 1942, a car with Germans had not stopped at the house of the chairman of the Neo Zoya collective farm, Vladimir Lelya. From that moment on, another life began in Laki.
The Germans, in their indignant rage, decided to wipe Lucky from the face of the earth. All houses, warehouses, a farm, a club were destroyed and burned. Punishers could not destroy to the ground only the church. Beautiful church of St. The Evangelist Luke, which the villagers restored in 1904 on the site of the old one, still stands today. Nowhere in the Crimea is there a temple like this. It is individual not only for its architecture. He is individual in his spirit. The stay of dozens of human restless souls is clearly felt here. It seems that all of them - those who burned in hellish fire, who were not betrayed by the custom of their ancestors to their native land, gathered within these walls. The temple stands on a hillock, surrounded by a dense wall of weeds - nettles, sorrel. In front of the entrance on the ground are stone blocks from the destroyed dome of the bell tower. The altar was completely destroyed, but the frescoes were preserved. In some places, the gloomy faces of saints, angels, a lion, an eagle and an ox are clearly visible. Above the frescoes are ugly inscriptions of modern vandals. Without them, to our regret and shame, we cannot imagine more than one Crimean monument of antiquity ...
60 years have passed since the Lak tragedy, but the wound is still bleeding. Decades have not been able to erase from the memory of people the terrible details of the destruction of an entire village, on the site of which is now a plowed field. Not even foundations remained, wells were buried, only a dilapidated church and a modest monument remind us that here, in the village of Laki, the Greeks lived from ancient times. They worked, had fun, fell in love, until trouble came to their homes ...
On March 23, 1942, the village of Laki was captured by the Nazis and destroyed. Why was this village burned down? Why were the Nazis so merciless towards its inhabitants? Historian Panteleimon Kesmedzhi in the book "Greeks of Crimea" cites the words of the commander of the Bakhchisaray partisan detachment Mikhail Andreevich Makedonsky, later the commander of the Southern Unit of the Crimean partisan detachments. He says that his detachment owed its existence to the inhabitants of Lika, who provided assistance to the partisans with food, clothing, and in cold weather arranged for quarters. There were many other villages around, but at least a few traitors lived in each of them, and in Laki everyone supported the pre-war government, the Village Council worked, a red flag defiantly fluttered on the building of the krtrry.
Yuri Mikhailovich SPAI, nephew of Nikolai Konstantinovich Spai, a scout of the Karasubazar partisan detachment, who carried out special assignments from the central headquarters, witnessed the destruction of the recalcitrant village. Nikolai Spai was betrayed by a traitor and hanged by the Nazis. One of the streets in Belogorsk is named after him. Yuri Mikhailovich Spai is already over seventy. Then, in 1942, he was a thirteen-year-old boy.
“When the Nazis defeated the partisan detachment, those who remained alive came to our village. On March 23, 1942, the village was surrounded by Germans and volunteers - Crimean Tatars from the punitive battalion, - says Yuri Spai. - All residents were gathered in front of the Village Council, searched. Apparently, the Germans received a denunciation, because, despite the fact that they did not find anything suspicious, more than thirty men were immediately driven aside. Among them were my uncle and two brothers. I, then still a naive teenager, came up and asked: “Uncle Mitya, why are you here?” And he answered me in Greek, so that the Tatars would not understand, “Yura, go away, otherwise they will kill you too. They are taking us to be shot.” You can't forget this…”
The village was set on fire, dogs barked loudly, people panicked. All the "dirty" work was done by the Tatars. Yury Mikhailovich's aunt was tied to a bed, and her eight-month-old child was thrown into the fire like a rag. The woman screamed until the burning roof collapsed on her. The fire destroyed all 87 households. Those who survived, including Yuri Spai, accompanied by Crimean Tatar volunteers, were sent through Bakhchisarai to Oktyabrskoye.
Seventeen lives were taken by the war in the Spai family, Yura's father died, his mother went to the partisan detachment. After the liberation of Crimea, Yura and his mother received housing in Bakhchisarai. It would seem that life began to improve. But fate gave these people only a month of respite. Years of 1944 the Greeks were expelled to the Crimea.
The Greek people honor the memory of those who died 60 years ago. Every year, on March 23, Greeks come from all over the once vast country, pay tribute to the memory of the dead, lay flowers. “What did you feel?” - I ask Yuri Mikhailovich a not entirely tactful question. He simply answers: "I cried." And today it’s a shame for an elderly person that “he dug up everything, not even leaving the foundations - witnesses of the tragedy. They probably did this so that no one else would ask where the people had gone.” There is not enough money to erect a worthy monument to the Orthodox Greeks. The "Muslim" Reskomnats, - says Yuri Mikhailovich, - finds funds only for the needs of the Crimean Tatars. And all of us, illegally evicted in the distant forty-four, need to get together. And the Crimean Tatars must admit their guilt and repent before the Greek people.” But instead ... in a modest monument, erected on voluntary donations, there are three bullet holes gaping. The inhabitants of the surrounding villages, lowering their voices to a whisper, say: “The Tatars shot through!”
Kermenchik (Vysokoye village) - Crimean wilderness?
A long ascent along a desert road, blinding limestone slopes and the scorching sun discourage any desire to go further. It seems that the endless, heat-breathing asphalt will never end. But suddenly the rise ends and the road joyfully rushes down. At the foot of the forested hills, in a cozy hollow, the houses of a mountain village are scattered. This is the High, the goal of our path.
Center for Medieval Orthodoxy
There are places in Crimea where everything breathes antiquity and mystery. The village of Vysokoye in the Bakhchisaray district (formerly Kermenchik) is one of those. People have lived here for a long time. The village itself got its name from the small fortress of Kermen-Kale, the ruins of which can still be found on the nearest mountain. A seven-meter section of the wall, five meters high, is all that has been preserved from the medieval fortification. Once it protected the inhabitants from enemies, once battles were in full swing here and blood was shed. But most of the time people devoted to peaceful life. Orthodox Greeks have long lived in the village - subjects of the Principality of Theodoro. The settlement stood apart from the crowded ways and lived its own life. There were many such villages in the Middle Ages and, it would seem, there is no need to pay so much attention to Kermenchik. But it turns out there is a reason.
Imagine what this area looked like 6-7 centuries ago. In the middle of the crowded village rose the beautiful church of Theodore Tiron, in which the ancient image of this saint was kept. And around the settlement, wherever you look: on the tops of the mountains, at the foot of the hills, near the springs, you can see the domes of the temples. This is an amazing fact: there were 14 (!) Orthodox churches in an area of no more than four kilometers. The names of eleven of them are known: St. Trinity, the Assumption of the Virgin, Saints Cosmas and Damian, Theodore Stratilates, Euphemia, John the Baptist, Maximus, Elijah, Luke, two in the name of Theodore Tiron. What a powerful bell ringing was carried around the neighborhood during the great holidays! The most revered was the Church of Saints Cosmas and Damian, from under the altar of which a miraculous spring gushed. This source is considered sacred by the local population even now. They call it Ai-Kuzma and they say that there is the best water in the area.
Why has this place been honored with such a concentration of Orthodox churches? After all, nothing like this is known anywhere else in the Crimea. What is this - the center of medieval Orthodoxy in the southwestern Crimea? Maybe here, away from the eyes of the Crimean khans, on the days of great holidays all the surrounding Orthodox people flocked? Or was it a semblance of the Crimean Athos created by the command of the Mangup prince? It looks like these questions will remain unanswered. And neither the ancient Greek graves, nor the ruins of the once shining temples, nor the water of the holy spring will reveal their secret.
Moscow in Crimea?
In the immediate vicinity of the village there is a tract, which not so long ago bore the name "Moscow"! This name has existed here for a long time and was forgotten, most likely after the eviction of the local population from here in 1944. Where did this native Russian word come from here, in the Crimean wilderness?
The well-known Crimean scholar A. Berthier-Delagard tried to answer this question in his work “Kermenchik (Crimean Wilderness)”, which was published in 1899. For centuries, the southern expanses of Russian land groaned from Tatar raids. Several million Slavs passed along the Crimean roads to their death. The dust of these roads mixed with Russian blood, tears and sweat. The grinning faces of the Tatar horsemen haughtily looked at the grief of the people, who were worse than cattle for them. “Katorga of the Mediterranean Sea moved with the muscles of a Russian slave, harems were filled with the body of Russian slaves. The entire Crimean yurt had almost no, or knew no other means of subsistence, like a Russian tribute, a Russian full, a robbery of Russia; it was his field, on which the horde, without sowing, gathered a living harvest. Sincere sympathy for the grief of the Russian people is filled with the words of Berthier-Delagard, whose grandfather was a Frenchman, and his grandmother was Polish. Indeed, it does not matter what nationality you are, it is important whether you understand the misfortune of another person.
“There were cases of ransom, release, flight from the countless full of Russians; all this huddled and hid in Christian villages of the same faith, crowded into special areas named after their native homeland. This is where the name of the tract “Moscow” came from, and this is what it reminds of in the forgotten Kermenchik.” It is difficult not to agree with the opinion of an authoritative Crimean scholar. Christians of the same faith in Crimea always helped each other: Russians helped Greeks, Greeks helped Russians. And of course, several Russian slaves who escaped from captivity could live in the Greek village. The Crimean land is beautiful and friendly, but the motherland is the motherland. It was impossible for people who found themselves in a foreign land to return to Muscovy. Therefore, they themselves created a corner of their land here, which every day reminded them of Russia.
Now the localization of the Moscow tract in the vicinity of Vysokoe has been forgotten. But it is not so difficult to establish where it was. It is only necessary to dig in the archive and find the boundary plans of the area, where all the old toponyms are mapped. This will be a grateful work for local historians, which will be appreciated by the entire Russian population of Crimea.
Scary word - deportation
The peaceful life of the Greek population of the village ended in 1778, when the entire Orthodox population of Taurida was evicted from the peninsula. This was the first deportation of Crimeans, more tragic and cruel than the deportation of 1944. Then 31,385 Greeks, Armenians, Georgians and Vlachs were forcibly taken out of the Crimea. People walked across the entire Crimea to the shores of the Sea of Azov, to where the city of Melitopol is now. They came to the desert waterless steppe, where there were no dwellings. Hundreds died along the way. In the first winter alone, 12,000 died.
About 500 Greeks were evicted from Kermenchik. But not everyone left the land of their ancestors, their home. Many hid in the mountains, holed up in caves. More than one hundred Greeks hastily converted to Islam. Islam became their protection from eviction from their native places, but in their hearts these people remained Orthodox. They also revered Orthodox holidays and holy places for Christians, kept icons in their homes. A unique Christian-Muslim culture began to form here, which became the basis of good neighborly life in this part of Crimea.
At the beginning of the 19th century, the empty Greek villages were settled by Arnaut Greeks, who helped Russia in the war against Turkey. Here is a paradox: it was necessary to evict some Greeks in order to bring others in a few years! But, unfortunately, not one government can do without such mistakes. Newcomer Greeks settled in the lower part of the village of Kermenchik, and in the upper part lived Muslim Greeks - descendants of the local Orthodox population.
Newcomer Greeks rebuilt the old church of St. Theodore Tiron to the Church of St. Trinity. The temple was finally destroyed in the late 50s, now there is a collapse of stones, and a few ancient Greek tombstones. Several fountains were built, of which only one has been preserved. The descendants of the local Greeks, avoiding prying eyes, after prayers to Allah, went to bow to the ruins of old Christian churches. The most revered was the temple of the Virgin on the outskirts of the village. Here, in the ruined altar, lay a throne and a slab with crosses. Trees grew nearby, hung with shreds of cloth. It was believed that if a person fell ill, he should pick a leaf from a tree, kiss it, put it on the throne, tear off a piece of his clothes and tie it on a branch - then the disease would pass. They believed in the healing power of the sacred water of the Ai-Kuzma spring, over which was the church of Sts. Cosmas and Damian.
This is how they lived in Kermenchik in the first half of the 20th century, until the Soviet ideology gradually destroyed the remnants of the past. Finally, the unique traditions ended on May 18, 1944, when the entire population was taken out of here. Most of the inhabitants were Greeks and Tatars, descendants of Muslim Greeks; Actually, there were not so many Muslim Tatars here. Settlers who did not know either the history or the traditions of the village arrived in the deserted village. Kermenchik was renamed Vysokoye.
today
Like other Crimean villages, Vysokoe is going through hard times. There is no work, young people flee to the city, there is no transport connection with the village. People live on farms and work in their gardens. There used to be a school, a first-aid post, and even a club. Now there is nothing. No more than 200 people live in the village. Half of the houses are sold for summer cottages. Wonderful views, fresh air, rates, a river with a waterfall attract summer residents here not only from the Crimean cities, but also from Moscow and Kiev. Fortunately, a house in the village can be bought quite inexpensively.
Approximately half of the local residents are Crimean Tatars who came from Uzbekistan. Only one family of those who lived here before the war returned. Grandmother Anife Mandrazhi was a thirteen-year-old girl when her family was taken out of the Crimea. She was lucky - she returned to her own home, to those walls among which she grew up. There are few such buildings left in Crimea - a typical two-story Tatar house with a flat roof, an earthen floor, and an earthen closet. Grandmother Anife still remembers how her ancestors lived, what the surrounding mountains were called, fountains, where the ruins of the once glorious temples and mosques are located. It is a pity that young people do not want to remember this. Modern Crimean Tatars clearly last for two types. The first type is those who returned to the homeland of their ancestors to live according to their precepts of good neighborliness, peace, love for people and nature. The second type is those who just arrived. The first, unfortunately, is less.
Elderly Anife looks after the local shrine - Azis. So in the Crimea is called a holy place for Muslims, where a true believer is buried. According to my grandmother, sick people were brought here to heal, several people were allegedly buried here. ... Two vertical sticks with a crossbar, to which multi-colored ribbons are tied. Irises, tulips, peonies are planted around. Old cherry tree. There are traces of masonry. It is clear that there was some kind of structure, and clearly oriented along the east-west line. On the east side, the collapse of the masonry is rounded, like an altar. So it is, this is the foundation of the once most important local Christian shrine - the Church of the Assumption of the Virgin. Here's how: it turns out that the local Tatars still revere the places of former Christian shrines! Of course, they themselves do not remember this, but the intuitive, historical memory of the people does not disappear.
Here is another factor in the good neighborly coexistence of several peoples: mutual respect for each other's religious objects. The Tatars look after the shrines of the Greeks, the Greeks respect the Muslim cemeteries, the Russians respect the culture of both the Greeks and the Tatars. If everyone adheres to this simple rule, then any talk about a complex interethnic and confessional situation will soon be forgotten forever on our peninsula. I would like to hope that this will be the case.
Bibliography
For the preparation of this work, materials from the site http://www.bestreferat.ru were used.
Valery BORISOV
March 23 marks the 74th anniversary of the destruction by the fascist punishers and their minions - "Khivi" from the village of Koush of the Greek partisan villages of Laki in the Bakhchisarai region. This punitive action was carried out in 1942 and will always remain in the memory of generations both as the cruelest act of genocide and as an indelible stain of shame lying on the executioners who carried it out.
The first settlement, from which one of the most inhuman forms of genocide in Crimea began to be implemented - the burning of settlements with civilians, was a workers' settlementChairin the Bakhchisarai region, destroyedFebruary 4, 1942.The second was the village of Laki. In the village of Chair and the village of Laki, the punishers honed the practice of the subsequent destruction of dozens of settlements in Crimea with its inhabitants.
Capture and destruction
The history of the death of the village of Laki is described in sufficient detail. Let's remember her once again on this memorable day...
But why was this particular village burned down? Why were the Nazis so merciless towards its inhabitants?
Historian Panteleimon Kesmedzhi in the book "Greeks of Crimea" quotes the words of the commander of the Bakhchisaray partisan detachment Mikhail Andreevich Makedonsky, later - the commander of the Southern connection of the partisan detachments of the Crimea. He says that his detachment owed its existence to the inhabitants of Laki, who provided assistance to the partisans with food, clothing, and in cold weather arranged for quarters. There were many other villages around, but at least a few traitors lived in each of them - and in Laki everyone supported the pre-war government, the village council worked, on the building of which the red flag defiantly fluttered.
Yuri witnessed the destruction of the recalcitrant village Mihailovich Spai, nephew of Nikolai Konstantinovich Spai, the legendary intelligence officer of the Karasubazar partisan detachment ... Then, in 1942, he was a thirteen-year-old boy ...
“On March 23, 1942, the village was surrounded by the Germans and Crimean Tatar volunteers from the punitive battalion,” says Yuri Spai. - All residents were gathered in front of the village council, searched. Apparently, the Germans received a denunciation ... More than thirty men were immediately driven aside. Among them were my uncle and two brothers. I, then still a naive teenager, came up and asked: "Uncle Mitya, why are you here?" And he answered me in Greek, so that the Tatars would not understand, “Yura, go away, otherwise they will kill you too. They are taking us to be shot.” You can't forget this..."
The village was set on fire, dogs barked loudly, people panicked. All the menial work was done by the Tatars. Yury Mikhailovich's aunt was tied to a bed, and her eight-month-old child was thrown into the fire like a rag. The woman screamed until the burning roof collapsed on her. The fire destroyed all 87 households. Those who survived, including Yuri Spai, accompanied by Crimean Tatar volunteers, were sent through Bakhchisaray ... ”to the village of Biyuk-Onlara (now the village of Oktyabrskoye).
“So it will be with anyone who acts against the Germans”
Thanks to the declassified archives of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs, it was possible to find out one previously unknown page in the history of the destruction of this village. From the protocol of interrogation of the senior translator of the Sevastopol branch of the "SD" Obidova-Khalilova dated October 14, 1947, it was established that "in the summer of 1943 Mayer (head of the German security service in Sevastopol, SS Sturmscharführer. - auth.) was called to Simferopol with a team of Tatar volunteers. Upon his return (...) Mayer told me that on the orders of the Obersturmbannfuehrer of the TsAPP (...) the commander of the police and security services of the Crimea (...) and with his direct participation, Mayer, for assisting the partisans, they shot all the inhabitants of the village of Laki, Bakhchisarai district, and the village was burned to the ground .
Tatar volunteers Mammadov Ayder Seyid Ali and Mammadov Belal told me about this in more detail. They said that in addition to them, more units of the “SS” were pulled into the village of Laki, whose soldiers snatched small children from women and threw them into burning huts.
Before the eyes of the elderly, the soldiers of the SS units shot their sons and daughters (thus, giving such testimony, the Tatars-punishers saved their own skins, blaming their accomplices for the crimes - auth.). After the extermination of the entire population and the burning of the village, the Germans nailed shields around with the inscription in German and Russian: (...) "So it will be with anyone who acts against the Germans."(Investigation file No. 234 on charges of German war criminals: 1. Enikke Erwin ... and others in the amount of 12 people in a crime under Part 1 of the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of April 19, 1943. USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs. Sevastopol. October - November 1947. Before the reunification of Crimea with Russia - Archive of the Main Directorate of the SBU of Ukraine in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, file 2262, volume 1, sheet 21).
Let the memory of the past not disturb you?
But what about the perpetuation of the memory of the tragedy of the partisan village of Laki and the partisan village of Chair in the Bakhchisarai region? The district officials do not honor the memory of these "Khatyns". Not only have they been forgotten, it seems that the authorities are deliberately hushing them up! So, the Bakhchisarai District Council and the district administration, the organizers of the round table held on December 11, 2015 in the Bakhchisarai district administration, in its title - “72nd anniversary of the tragedy of the villages of the Bakhchisarai district, burned by the Nazis during the Second World War ...” chronologically excluded the destruction of the settlements of Chair (February 4, 1942 ) and Lucky (March 23, 1942), shifting the start of Hitler's punitive actions a year later.
That's right - the 73rd anniversary! And the editors of the regional newspaper “Glory to Labor” repeated this mistake in two publications and categorically refused to correct it in response to a comment from historians - just like the Bakhchisarai District Council (!)
This year, the commemorative days of the death of these settlements were not celebrated at the district level, no official events were organized. No information about the existence of such memorable days of the partisan settlements of Chair and the village of Laki was published in the ideological mouthpiece of the district - the newspaper "Glory to Labor" and other mass media of the district - was published.
It turns out that for the officials of Bakhchisarai there is no place in history for the partisan "Khatyns" destroyed by the Nazis?
This conclusion is also consistent with the fact that on the memorable day of the burning of the village of Chair - February 4 - an exhibition dedicated to the destruction during the Great Patriotic War ... of the village of Sinapnoye (former Ulu-Sala), which took place December 22, 1943. Who benefits from such a defiant opposition of two tragedies with silence on the dramatic history of the village of Chair?
Inconvenient questions for officials
By the Decree of the Supreme Council of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea dated May 18, 2011 No. 369-6/11, the territory of the former Greek village of Laki in the Bakhchisarai region was declared a cultural and historical monument of local importance "Village of Laki" and specific instructions were given for its implementation to the Council of Ministers of Crimea, the Bakhchisaray regional state administration with their deadlines.
Five years have passed. Question to the first officials of the Republic of Crimea and the Bakhchisarai region: how is this resolution being implemented? BUT no way! No one of the paragraphs of the specified resolution is not fulfilled.
Is the creation of the cultural and historical monument "Village Laki" included in the draft scheme of the territorial development of the Republic of Crimea? - According to the documents that are posted on the Internet, No!
Is the cultural and historical monument "Village Laki" included in the draft scheme for the territorial development of the Bakhchisarai region of the Republic of Crimea and in the developed Strategy for the socio-economic development of the Bakhchisarai region for the period up to 2030? - No!
And one more fact. In the Bakhchisarai region, for the first time in the Russian Federation (at the district level), the first edition of the Military Historical Calendar of the Bakhchisarai region was developed, which until recently was published in parts in the Slava Trudu newspaper. And now, for inexplicable reasons, this publication has ceased ...
This is how the State Program “Patriotic Education of Citizens of the Russian Federation for 2016-2020” is being implemented in the Bakhchisaray District, approved by Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation of December 30, 2015 No. 1493.
Monument to the dead inhabitants of the partisan village of Laki
For all honest people and patriots of Russia
The tragic death of the partisan village of Laki March 23, 1942- not only a symbol of eternal sorrow and sadness for the victims, but also a symbol of valor, courage, heroism, unbroken spiritual strength, pride in our heroic ancestors, the people's hard-won victory over fascism. And no bureaucratic opposition of officials will erase the memory of our great history.
Honorary citizen of the city of Bakhchisarai
Mountain Crimea is rich in amazing places. One of them, in interfluve of Kacha and Belbek, in the era of the Principality of Theodoro, it could well have had the mysterious name "land of chapels". This valley is located in the mountains, at an altitude of half a kilometer above sea level. It is surrounded on all sides by hills overgrown with forests. To find a way to it, you can take the Syuyren fortress as a starting point: the village of Kuibyshevo lies down the slope. From this village, the path goes up, along a winding path to the north, and you will never miss the final goal: the ascent will end abruptly, and you will freeze with delight at the sight of the panorama that opens below.
Once upon a time in the Middle Ages there was a settlement with the fortress of Kermenchik, now it is the village of Vysokoye (the highest mountainous Crimean village). The fortress itself stands 200 meters higher, and is located 500 meters from the village. On the south side of the fortress there was a donjon tower, and the total length of the defensive wall was about 250 meters. Until now, there have been no serious excavations here; this is a standard refuge castle of that time.
So, there is nothing unique in this fortress. What is it about this that surprises and amazes so much? The fact is that on a very modest territory, including the immediate vicinity of Kermenchik and the village of Laki (it is now gone), there are 14 chapels and churches. Now these are just the remains of former temples, once scattered throughout the valley.
Even the names of some churches are known: unfortunately, there are only nine of them. Eight of them are the Church of the Holy Trinity (it was the main one in Kermenchik), the Assumption of the Virgin, Cosmas and Damian, John the Baptist; the churches of St. Euphemia, Theodore Tyron, Maximus and Theodore Stratilat are also known. All of them are small, and now only ruins remain of them, but where else in our country can you find something like this?
The ninth church with the name is Church of Saint Luke(fortunately, it survived after the destruction of the village of Laki and its inhabitants in 1942 by the Nazis). It is the most complete of all, because it was erected in 1904 (before it, a wooden church of the sixteenth century stood on this site). The main entrance to the temple is the western one. Directly above the entrance on the portal is the inscription "ETOΣ 1904" (year 1904). If you raise your eyes higher, you can see a phrase of several words carved in a semicircle - "NAOΣ TOY AGIOY KAI EYAGGELIΣ TOY LOYKA", which means "Church of the Holy and Evangelist Luke" in Greek.
Inside the temple in Soviet times, the painted plaster was peeled off. However, some images can be distinguished: the frescoes of the evangelists Matthew, Mark, John and Luke have been partially preserved. They are depicted symbolically, respectively, as an angel (a messenger to the world of the Son of God), a lion (a symbol of the power and royal dignity of Jesus), an eagle (height and Divine mysteries of the teachings of the evangelists) and a calf (sacrificial redemptive service). Now the area adjacent to the church is awe-inspiring with its silence. There is only one small skete where hermit monks live and pray.
If you wish, you can admire the wonderful view of the Lakinskaya basin and its surroundings, including a huge rock mass, to the north-west of the former village of Laki. This panorama opens from Mount St. Elijah and from its slopes.
How to get there
If you decide to go to Lucky by public transport, it is most convenient to start your journey from the city of Bakhchisarai. In Bakhchisarai there is a bus stop to the village of Sinapnoye. You need to get off the bus behind the village of Bashtanovka, where you will see a turn from the main road to the right. At this place there is a sign "Lucky 8 km". Get out here and move further in the direction of the sign (by the way, the next settlement after Bashtanovka is the village of Mashino, 8 kilometers away, closest to the valley).
You will have to go uphill all the time to the village of Laki. The paved road, along which you will start the path, at the end rests on a military unit: you do not need to go there. You need to turn left from it almost immediately after the bridge, so you will come out onto a dirt road. Go further along it, and after ten kilometers you will see the pass. Take a look at the map: the place where the village of Laki used to be is located on the saddle of the pass. Looking to the left, you will see the mountain of St. Elijah with the ruins of the chapel of the Holy Trinity, and to the right, Mount Tatar-Yalta. If there is a desire to swim, then there are several lakes behind the pass.
By car, if the weather is dry, you can get on the dirt road. To do this, you need to turn off the highway Bakhchisaray - Sinapnoe between Bashtanovka and Mashino. Also, only from the other side, you can get from the village of Vysokoye.
ABOUT PLACES OF POWER
Places of power are special territories scattered throughout the planet. They are distinguished by their bright features and strong impact on a person. Most often, places of power that are of natural origin stand out expressively against the general background. These may include single mountains or a whole massif, which can be distinguished from another mass by a number of features (Kilimanjaro, Belukha, Kailash), water sources, lakes, waterfalls. Ancient civilizations attributed great sacred significance to such places. Special buildings were erected, which increased the positive impact on the environment and the person in particular. These are pagodas, and pyramids, and dolmens, and stone circles and much more.
The village of Laki was located between the villages of the Bakhchisarai district Vysokoye and Verkhoreche. It was founded by the Greeks who lived in the Crimea during the early Middle Ages, then it was called Laka. A prosperous small village of 60 households was located on the picturesque slopes of the Crimean mountains.
On one of the hills, the church of St. Luke was built. The locals believed that the very name of their village comes from the name of St. Luke.
Later in 1904, local residents rebuilt the old temple. Now from the Church of St. Luke, only the bell tower to the belfry has survived, a number of rooms in the church, the dome has been partially preserved.
Above the entrance to the temple, preserved Greek inscriptions are visible; the date of construction of the temple is “1904”, a little higher - “Temple (in honor) of Saint and Evangelist Luke”. Even higher there is another inscription - these are the words of Christ in modern Greek: "Come (to me), all who are laboring and burdened, and I will give rest (to you)." Behind the temple there used to be an old church cemetery.
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The village of Laki was located between the villages of the Bakhchisarai district Vysokoye and Verkhoreche. It was founded by the Greeks who lived in the Crimea during the early Middle Ages, then it was called Laka. A prosperous small village of 60 households was located on the picturesque slopes of the Crimean mountains. On one of the hills, the church of St. Luke was built. The locals believed that the very name of their village comes from the name of St. Luke. Later in 1904, local residents rebuilt the old temple. Now from the Church of St. Luke, only the bell tower to the belfry has survived, a number of rooms in the church, the dome has been partially preserved. Above the entrance to the temple, preserved Greek inscriptions are visible; the date of construction of the temple is “1904”, a little higher - “Temple (in honor) of Saint and Evangelist Luke”. Even higher there is another inscription - these are the words of Christ in modern Greek: "Come (to me), all who are laboring and burdened, and I will give rest (to you)." Behind the temple there used to be an old church cemetery. Save ChangesAnd, at the very moment when I had already begun to scold myself for the impulse, I finally saw the monastery. But instead of the picturesque ruins, I found a restored temple. But from the first minutes it became clear that it was not in vain. It was so good there. There are some places of power on the planet, this is apparently one of them. I felt complete peace in my soul. But in addition to peace, the silence in the Lak Valley is amazing. Some special silence, it seems that nature itself is silent here. As if nature remembers the tragedy that occurred at this place 60 years ago.
Road to the monastery
Once there was a wonderful Greek village here (according to the Soviet census of 1926, 240 Greeks (out of 260 inhabitants) lived in the village of Laki, in which the descendants of proud Theodorites lived. The whole village was made up of several dynasties that lived here from time immemorial. The melodic Greek surnames Spai, Leli, Arvanidi come from these places.People grew tobacco, grapes, raised cattle, raised children and were not interested in what was happening outside their village.They had their own little world, they did not let strangers in, although they were warmly welcomed. Until the war and the tragedy came, which was called the Crimean Khatyn.By some mystical coincidence, it happened exactly a year before the burning of Khatyn - to the day - on March 23, 1942.
For the support of the partisans, the village was destroyed by the Nazis. The fire destroyed all 87 households. The Nazis tried to completely wipe out this village from the face of the earth, but they could not destroy the church to the ground. Why was this village burned down? Residents of Lak from the first day of the occupation of the Crimea actively helped the partisans. There were many other villages around, but at least a few traitors lived in each of them, and there were no traitors in Laki. For this disobedience, the Greeks were put on fire.
Here was the village of Laki
In 2005, a male Orthodox monastery was opened here.
Monastery of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke in the disappeared village of Laki
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Monastery of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke
Monastery of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke
Refectory of the monastery
Monastery of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke
Monastery of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke
These places have been inhabited since ancient times. In the area of the village of Laki, traces of two small settlements of the 6th-8th centuries were found. Until recently, there were the remains of the church of St. Trinity - a small cross-domed church of the 13th century, and not far from it - the ruins of an even more ancient temple with the remains of a cemetery. On one of the tombstones there is an inscription dating back to 1362.
It is believed that the name Laki comes from the name of St. Luke, but in Greece there are many villages and towns with this name, therefore, it is more likely that the etymology is Greek. The name "Laki", or "Laka", is translated from Greek and means "pool".
The Lost Village of Lucky
Monastery of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke
Church of St. Luke wasn't always like this. She changed her appearance three times. In the church built in 1904 on the site of an old wooden church of the 16th century, instead of birds, there were gloomy faces of saints, angels, a lion, an eagle and an ox. The evangelist Matthew was depicted as an angel, the evangelist Mark was symbolized as a lion, and the evangelists Luke and John were symbolized by images of an eagle and a calf.
Laksky temple is the only temple in the name of St. Luke in the Crimea, which is surprising, because the holy apostle and evangelist Luke was revered and respected by all Christians, not only by the Greeks, although they are more so because he was also a Greek.
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Church of Saint Luke
Monastery of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke
Monastery of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke
Monastery of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke
The Church of St. Luke was recently restored at the expense of the Greek community, and an obelisk was erected to the innocent victims. They say that a place was specially left on the granite slab of the obelisk in order to replenish the list of victims of a distant tragedy as they are installed by the search engines.
Obelisk to the victims of the tragedy
The Lost Village of Lucky
The Lost Village of Lucky
The Lost Village of Lucky
I really regretted that I had thrown my backpack in the bushes, I didn’t want to leave here. But it was necessary, so I grabbed a bottle of water, which the priest provided me for the road, and nevertheless, an hour later, I moved back.
Monastery of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke
The most convenient way to get there is from Bakhchisaray. In Bakhchisarai, take a bus going to the village of Sinapnoye. Before reaching the village of Mashino (behind the village of Bashtanovka) there will be a turn from the main road to the right and a small sign. Get off the bus and follow this sign (not far from Bashtanovka is Kachi-Kalyon, I talked about it, as well as Kyz-Kermen, you can combine it).
The village of Laki is about 10 km away. The road will always go uphill. At first it will be an asphalt road, then from it almost immediately after the bridge, turn left (if you go further along the asphalt road, you will run into a military unit and you will have to return). The village of Laki and the monastery are located on the saddle of the pass. Behind the pass there are lakes where you can swim.
It is best, of course, to go by car, because walking uphill is not a short path.