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Lion's City 750 Anniversary

One of the most beautiful and the oldest cities in Europe, the city that belongs to the UNESCO world heritage, the city of world wide known architecture, museums, churches, theatres, universities, concert halls, the city with one of the best in Europe breweries and chocolate fabrics - Lviv - was celebrating its 750 anniversary on the 30th of September and the 1st of October, 2006


By SOFIYA FEDYNA
from Lviv, UKRAINE


On the 30th of September and the 1st of October, 2006, in Ukraine there was held a celebration that was in the middle of attention of the whole country and Europe as well. One of the most beautiful and the oldest cities in Europe, the city that belongs to the UNESCO world heritage, the city of world wide known architecture, museums, churches, theatres, universities, concert halls, the city with one of the best in Europe breweries and chocolate fabrics - Lviv - was celebrating its 750 anniversary.

Actually it is 750th anniversary from the first mention about the city in the books - year 1256. But the scientists say that Lviv might have been founded 100 years earlier. The name of Lviv takes its origin from the son of King Danylo - Lew (what means lion) - to whom this city was a present from his father. But another legend says that the Price Lew came to the territory Lviv is on, and had a fight with the cave lion that lived on the mountain that is now in the center of Lviv. The Prince won, but in a name of the defeated Lion he named the city. Nice legends, but anyway Lion is the symbol of Lviv for already 750 years.

History

From those old times Lviv always was in the middle of the events that took place in Europe. After being settled Lviv became a capital of Galytsko Volynska State and then became one of the most important political and trade centers. Lviv was one of the first to gain the so called Magdeburg right - the right of self-government to granted to the city and giving to it the possibility to decide on its own on its internal and external policy.

The starting point to get acquainted with the city is the High Castle on the mountain where the first stone Lviv castle was settled and from where the king or his representatives ruled the city. The way down - and you can see the old walls of the city with preserved Gun-powder tower, 16th century city Armoury that is now used as weapon's museum and 17th century King's armoury, and finally you find yourself in the center of an old city - Rynok (market-en.) Square - the very heart of modern Lviv - with the buildings the majority of which have been preserved from 15-16th century. Here every building has its own interesting story among which the building # 2 - here was situated the first European type post office in Eastern Europe, the Black house(building # 4) that belonged to the family of doctors and that was called black because of the special type stone that it is built of; building # 6, the so called Korniakt building, the only one that has 6 windows (according to the old law only three windows were allowed in a building on Rynok Square because of space shortage), just because the King issued a special permission for its owner Kostiantyn Korniakt to award his help for the kingdom, - later here was a residence of Polish Kings, with Italian style yard inside, where guests and the citizens of Lviv like to go for a cup of coffee; the buildings famous because of the Venice consul Antonio Massari and his distant relatives - the family of his wife who came out Scholz-Wolf; four fountains of four corners of Rynok with the statues of gods Diana, Neptune, Adonis and Amphitricha; and of course the building of City Council, full of legends and ghosts, because of many people imprisoned there in old times.

Like rays of the sun go eight streets into different sides from Rynok Square - that territory belonged to an old city and now is full of amazing places to go to: Armenian street with 14th century church on it that was closed during the soviet times and altered into the storehouse but now in use as an Orthodox church; Rus'ka street - that was the preserve for Ukrainians that lived in Lviv with one of the most beautiful orthodox churches and chapels of 14-15th century that was built for the money donated by already known for you Kostiantyn Korniakt and Moldavian landowners, Drugstore museum from the beginning of 18th century with all the medicine and equipment preserved from that times, 14th century Catholic Cathedral where people go to listen to organ music and which was one of the places in Lviv visited by the Pope John Paul II. Another street leads you to the main street of Lviv - Independence avenue where is situated the pearl of Lviv - National Opera House, the building of which belongs to the most beautiful in Europe.

Not to forget National Drama Theater, Dominican Dome, St.George cathedral, Lviv National I.Franko University - one of the oldest universities in Eastern-Central Europe - that is now situated in the building of Galician Parliament and many other.

For a long time Lviv was a part of different kingdoms and empires - Recz Pospolita, then Austro-Hungarian Empire.But anyway it always has been a unique united community, preserve for different cultures, and nice place to live in.

Celebration

The celebration was awaited for a long time, but the new mayor had only 5 months to prepare that. Lviv has approximately 1 milion of inhabitants, and approximately one million of people came to this city to celebrate together. There was no free space on the streets, cafes, museums, near the stages. Furthermore, more than 190 VIP guests have come to Lviv for celebration. Among them - three presidents: president of Poland - Lech Kaczynski, president of Lithuania - Valdis Adamkus and of course president of Ukraine - Victor Yushchenko.

The celebration itself reminded me of Edinburgh 'Fringe' festival - performances are going everywhere and all the time and unexpectedly Lviv appeared to be really small for so many performances and so many people on the streets. All around the city there were different performances starting in the morning till late at night.

- 'I have not expected such a big celebration' - said Olav Oye from Norway . 'I just had some work to do here in Ukraine , and when I have heard of Lviv anniversary I came here. So many people from abroad, from all the Ukraine - and everyone came especially for this 750th birthday!'

On the very central square, the heart of Lviv - Rynok Square, there were put three stages with different types of music being played: folk, jazz (in the yard of City Council - as you can see Lviv does not grudge anything for cultural occasions) and comedy shows. Everywhere on Rynok Square and neighboring streets were walking people in folk and 19 century garment, and street musician played the so called 'Lviv Retro' music and songs - very popular song about Lviv from 1930-s. At these days people had also the possibility to see the first Lviv Tram, which was used since the end of 19th century, and which was the first tram ever used in Ukraine.

The capital of Ukraine or Ukrainian capital

Moving on further the guests and citizens of Lviv were welcomed at: Festival of blacksmiths' art, where the smiths taking a peace of metal, heating it in a fire and then hitting it with a hammer showed to the people how out of piece of some metal is being born a piece of art; Theater festival - "Golden Lion" - its performances were held on the streets and all the willing people also had the possibility to get involved in them; Literature festival - "NaLit"; medieval culture festival; Honey festival, Folk handicraft exhibition - that made every person to stop and to spend at least half a day observing how talented are the people that are able to produce different things with their own hands: fabric dolls of straw - by the way everybody willing had a chance to try to do it by his/her own hands, glass figures, anniversary hand mint copper coins with a lion and the name of King Danylo on it that I liked the most and had to stand in a long queue to buy it as too many people wanted to do the same, Pysanky(dyed eggs that are considered to be the symbol of life, sun and are originally painted in Ukraine for Easter time) painting, beading, wood carving, embroidery, music instruments testing... Artisans came here from all the parts of Ukraine and the variety of works and art was unbelievable. This folk atmosphere was enhanced by young folk musicians - the group "KORALI" from Ivano-Frankivsk who were playing and singing Ukrainian folk songs.

The central place for celebration was the square near the Opera House, where, first in the Opera was held a meeting of presidents, and later in the evening outside was the show of Ruslana and the present from Gert Hoff - amazing light show. Also two very famous all over the world singers - Ingrid and Goran Bregovich - decided to come to Lviv during its anniversary. The Sunday, 1 October, evening was full of fireworks, music, laugh and songs but the celebration that lasted for two days had come to the end.

But as said the mayor of Lviv Andriy Sadowyy: 'Step by step Lviv becomes to be known all over the world as the European city that is really worth coming to. And I am happy that with this celebration we started a new level of development and promotion of our beloved city.'

Often people say: Kyiv is the capital of Ukraine, but Lviv is Ukrainian capital. And that is true if to add that it is cultural capital of Ukraine, as it was preserved during the centuries and now has the greatest cultural heritage in Ukraine.