What exhibits the "Bird Museum" keeps under the roof of an ancient temple: What jackdaws have been stealing from people for 100 years

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

The unique collection of old papers discovered by scientists in Zvenigorod amazes not only with its diversity and antiquity. The fact is that collectors for hundreds of years have been birds that steal material from people to insulate their nests. Thanks to the "feathered historians", scientists got their hands on a wide variety of exhibits - from coupons for food in the 1930s to scraps of documents from the 17th century.

The Assumption Cathedral in Zvenigorod is a monument of early Moscow architecture, built at the turn of the 14th and 15th centuries. Inside the cathedral, unique paintings have been preserved; they are believed to be authored by Andrei Rublev and Daniil Cherny. The ancient temple, fortunately, was not badly damaged during the Soviet era. It was closed only for a short period of time - from the end of the 30s, and after the war it was reopened. In 2018, a large-scale restoration was finally begun, which has long been required not only for the priceless paintings, but also for the building itself. In such cases, all nooks and possible secret places are examined - from the basement to the roof. Here the scientists were in for an unprecedented surprise.

Having opened the tin roof, the repairmen discovered a layer of earth mixed with bird droppings and some papers. Jackdaws have been living under the roof for hundreds of years. It was they who brought in numerous scraps to insulate the nests. If it was just about repairs, such rubbish would undoubtedly be thrown away, but during restoration any deposits are a “cultural layer” that requires careful research. Having disassembled this unusual "archive", scientists found a lot of interesting things: fragments of church books, candy wrappers, newspaper articles, scraps of letters, calendar sheets, music scores, tickets for transport and museums and other artifacts. The earliest date back to the 17th century, and the latest from the 1980s.

- Dmitry Sedov, director of the Zvenigorod Historical, Architectural and Art Museum, expressed his opinion to journalists. It was here that after careful selection and restoration the unique “bird archive” came to be.

Of course, the preservation of documents is not the best. For example, from the most interesting find - the decree signed by the "clerk of the 5th table" from 1865, almost nothing remained - the ink faded and the paper was torn off. It is only clear that the document was binding “within one day”.

And here is a less valuable document - two sheets from the loan bank, although rumpled, but perfectly preserved. It follows from them that a certain Agrafena Ageeva once pawned a drape jacket for the merchant Yevseyeva, received a label in confirmation and left a receipt. It is interesting that the house of the merchants Yevseyevs still stands not far from the Assumption Cathedral - it was from there that the birds most likely stole the security. Probably on purpose to preserve it for history.

Interestingly, according to the documents, the roof of the cathedral was last repaired in 1837. The roof then had to be completely changed, but, apparently, the builders were negligent about the matter - the metal may have been changed, but the "cultural layer" under it was clearly not cleaned. It is unlikely that they were concerned about the safety of the "bird's archive", but thanks to this attitude, scientists today have found more ancient documents - the oldest date back to the 17th century.

Among the interesting finds, you can find a wide variety of "pieces of paper": packs of cigarettes and match labels, scraps of pages with prayers (after all, the papers were collected in the vicinity of the temple), playing cards, calendar sheets of the early 20th century and bread coupons from 1933, and many more candy wrappers. For example, "Cancer necks" of the late 19th century. All this together really looks like a chronicle of human lives, collected over hundreds of years by "winged historians".

By the way, this is not the first time when strange bird habits, although at first annoying people, then turn out to be very appropriate. For example, in Australia, the Dove stole poppies from the grave of an unknown soldier with a very noble purpose.