Unique crypt in Kerch threatened due to lack of funding (12/15/02)

Unique crypt in Kerch threatened due to lack of funding

by Maryna Makhnonos
Special to The Ukrainian Weekly

KYIV - A crossroads of numerous cultures and epochs, Ukraine is a source of many of humankind's ancient treasures. Unfortunately, it could soon lose some of them. One such threatened site is a unique Greek crypt of the goddess Demeter, located in the Black Sea port of Kerch. The reason: a lack of state funds.

If the government doesn't provide about 500,000 hrv ($93,800 U.S.) in the next five years for maintenance, the crypt's frescos may be destroyed forever, said Rosa Synenko, chief architect of the Kerch Historical Park.

The chief restoration expert who worked with the frescos, Olha Kushlyk, told The Ukrainian Weekly that the largest portion of money is needed in the next year: about 300,000 hrv ($56,285) to repair old structures that surround the underground crypt, which Soviet restoration workers created to provide better ventilation but which in fact harmed the crypt.

Succeeding years will not require such huge investments; only about 25,000 hrv ($4,690) will be needed annually for the training of local restorers and for control measures to stabilize the crypt's air, humidity and temperature regime, Ms. Kushlyk said.

Speaking passionately about the crypt, she emphasized that it could "survive on its own" after the restoration of its natural subterranean micro-climate, which is expected in 2010, when the restoration program should be completed.

The arched crypt, which is located in downtown Kerch, was created in the first century A.D. and was discovered in 1895 . Because it contained no mummified remains, the theory is that it was dedicated to Demeter, the Greek goddess of fertility, according to Ms. Kushlyk.

Although there are numerous Greek crypts in the city, Demeter's is especially valuable because of the many frescoes that describe the Greek myth about the cycle of life and death.

"The unique thing here is that this crypt proves that paintings already existed in the first century A.D, which contained techniques that could preserve colors until the present time," said Ms. Kushlyk, who has written 11 substantial scientific reports on the Demeter frescos.

The frescos include a large portrait of Demeter in the center: her face is dolorous, eyes are wide open and lips tightly closed. The depiction of this period, unlike other paintings from the period or others in the crypt, is anatomically correct. According to Greek mythology, Demetra had a daughter with Zeus, the leading god of Olympus. The daughter was named Persephone.

Greek mythology holds that the god of the subterranean world, Pluto (or Hades), kidnapped Persephone and told Demetra that he would release the girl if she didn't eat any fruit of the Earth for a year. Suffering from hunger, however, Persephone couldn't resist eating three seeds of the pomegranate tree. As a result, three months of the year were turned into cold and fruitless winter. On the fresco, Pluto holds Persephone in a chariot with four horses, which lack two hind legs.

The figures of the naked god Hermes, whose mission is to accompany souls into the underworld, and of the nymph Calypso, who covers the souls with a death veil, are painted on the crypt's northern wall, symbolizing death. They stand in contrast to cheerful flowers and birds ornamenting Demeter.

The crypt, which is 2 meters wide and about 3 meters long, was used by Soviet soldiers as living quarters during World War II, which left it smoke-damaged. Floods in the 1970s caused additional damage.

Ms. Kushlyk and her colleagues began restoration several years ago by removing muddy water, which had stood at knee level, with buckets. They were able to attain relatively stable conditions for the frescos' maintenance.

The government, however, consistently fails to fulfill commitments to the monument's preservation. Most of the previous work to save the frescos was sponsored by donors, said Ms. Synenko.

"We are told there is no money," said Ms. Synenko. "The government remembers us only if the monument is under threat of total destruction."

Kerch is an industrial city stretching some 50 kilometers (31 miles) along the Black Sea shore on the Crimean Peninsula, about 900 kilometers (558 miles) south of Kyiv. Initially named Pantikapeum, this prosperous trading center of the seventh to fifth centuries B.C. was founded by ancient Greek colonists who had fled civil strife in Greece.

It later became a center of the Bosporan Kingdom, which became independent of the Greek homeland and controlled all of the Kerch and Taman peninsulas as well as the eastern shore of the Sea of Azov, as far as the mouth of the Don River. Until the second century B.C. the kingdom flourished as a center of grain trade, fishing, wine-making, and small-scale artisan craftsmanship. In 63 B.C. the Bosporan Kingdom came under the control of the Roman Empire, as did the Hellenic states around the Black Sea.

Under Roman hegemony in particular, the Bosporan Kingdom became a refuge for Christians fleeing from persecution; it was a root of Christianity in Ukraine since the first century A.D.

The Christian way of life was especially popular after the sixth century, when Crimean coastal cities came under direct Byzantine control with a local administrative center in Khersonesus, now a part of modern-day Sevastopol.

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