Place In Central Part Research Articles

Омфалий в декоре полов церквей домонгольской Руси.

The Omphalos is a specially marked place in central part of a temple. It originates from the sacred stone at Delphi, which is considered to be the “navel of the earth”. In Christian churches, it was situated in the center of the structure under the dome. On the territory of Kiev Rus, there were only 15 monuments where omphaloi were found. All the omphaloi of Rus could be divided into two groups depending on material and technology. The first one includes facings of the Tithe church and St. Sophia Cathedral in Kiev, the Church of Our Savior, Borisoglebskiy Cathedral and the Church of Annunciation in Chernigov. These omphaloi were laid with expensive prestigious materials: stones, smalt, and slate slabs inlaid with smalt. All these facings were found in churches located in the middle basin of the Dnieper River. The second group includes facings in the churches in Halich and Grodno regions: Spasskaya church and the Church of Annunciation in Halich, the rotunda in Oleshkov and Paraskeva church in Zvenigorod, Lower church in Grodno and the Church of Boris and Gleb in Nowogrudek. The composition in all of these monuments represents concentric circles inlaid entirely with glazed ceramic tiles with large gurative compositions in the center. These two variants show the development of two different traditions. Monuments of the rst group directly link to the tradition of Byzantine mosaics. Monuments of the second group are connected to it indirectly, probably through the Polish architectural tradition.

Temperature regime of upper layer of the glacier East Grönfjordbreen (West Svalbard)

Data of thermometry performed in boreholes of the glacier East Grönfjordbreen situated in West Svalbard are presented. The measurements were made within the ice upper layer down to 20 m in spring and summer of 2012–2014. Basing on the temperature distribution in the boreholes the following heat balance elements of the active ice layer were calculated: winter storage of cold, heat losses for thawing and warming of snow and ice. It was found that the main influence on storage of cold in the upper ice layer is exerted by thickness of the snow cover and the summer ablation. Comparison between winter and summer storages of the cold allows drawing the conclusion that the most intensive cooling takes place in central part of the glacier where the snow accumulation is small and the ablation is moderate.