Underground spaces
Item set
Title
Underground spaces
Description
The term “religious underground”, so often used by both the secret police and dissident religious groups during communism, had both metaphorical and literal meanings. Clandestine and illegal religious groups sometimes opted to conduct their services and meetings or to hide their members and possessions in underground spaces. This was not a phenomenon solely of the communist era however; in the history of Christianity many groups, especially monastic communities have chosen to worship and live in subterranean spaces. In Orthodox Christianity there are many examples of sacred underground complexes, which could serve as a model for the creation of new underground spaces when circumstances required it. Many different groups used underground spaces during the course of the twentieth century and examples can be found in Ukraine, Romania, Moldova and Hungary amongst both Orthodox dissent movements and so-called sects of Protestant or Evangelical origin, such as Adventists or Jehovah's Witnesses.
Underground places of worship were often dug specifically for the purpose although existing cellars and caves were also sometimes used. These underground spaces varied in size, complexity and artistry, from small “priest-hole” type hiding places to vast underground complexes. They were dug in both rural and urban settings but were more easily realised and concealed in the countryside.
Religious gatherings conducted in subterranean spaces might demand certain changes such as the modification of the spatial and material aspects of ritual or the reduction in the number of those present a certain gatherings.
Typically, the images we find in the secret police archives were taken as crime scene photographs and as such they were concerned with showing means of concealment of entrances to underground spaces, the route of entry and actual hidden space. In some cases, the secret police also captured in photographs and film the enforced re-enactment of ritual in these spaces.
Underground places of worship were often dug specifically for the purpose although existing cellars and caves were also sometimes used. These underground spaces varied in size, complexity and artistry, from small “priest-hole” type hiding places to vast underground complexes. They were dug in both rural and urban settings but were more easily realised and concealed in the countryside.
Religious gatherings conducted in subterranean spaces might demand certain changes such as the modification of the spatial and material aspects of ritual or the reduction in the number of those present a certain gatherings.
Typically, the images we find in the secret police archives were taken as crime scene photographs and as such they were concerned with showing means of concealment of entrances to underground spaces, the route of entry and actual hidden space. In some cases, the secret police also captured in photographs and film the enforced re-enactment of ritual in these spaces.
Creator
James A. Kapaló
Publisher
This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme No . 677355
Bibliographic Citation
James A. Kapaló "Underground spaces"
Date Created
2019
Items
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The sketch of the Archangelist underground shelter from Vadul-Leca, Moldova
The image contains the sketch of the underground shelter built by Archangelist leaders, Alexandru and Grigore Culiac, and by their followers in Vadul-Leca village, Moldova. The sketch was produced by the Soviet state security service in 1945 after a police raid of the Archangelist community on the 3rd of February. The sketch contains technical details regarding the dimensions of the underground space and about the hiding techniques used by Archangelists to protect their leaders. The shelter was built four meters deep under an orchard, and its entrance was hidden by a shed. The underground spa -
Jehovah's Witnesses bunker printing press Ukraine
These images were included in a 14-volume criminal file against seven Jehovah’s Witnesses (JW) leaders from western Ukraine (former Drohobych and Stanislav region), 1955-1956. The photographs were produced during a police raid of an underground bunker printing press operated by the Witnesses in a rural location. The photographs were used as incriminating evidence of their clandestine illegal activities. The first image shows a rural private house in Smodne village under which the bunker was constructed. The place was also used as a safe house where several members of the JW organisation were -
Images of Old Calendarist underground church in Bucharest
The 4 images are taken from a secret police personal file and were used as evidence of an Old Calendarist underground monastery in Bucharest. The community was led by the Old Calendarist bishop Evloghie Oța. According to the communist state legal framework, the Old Calendarist Orthodox Church was an illegal entity. These pictures documented a sweep operation of the secret police that ended in the destruction of the underground church and the arrest of the bishop. We cannot date the pictures precisely because the community kept rebuilding the underground chapel and the secret police destroyed -
Incriminating photographs on Old Calendarist underground community Bucharest
The two photographs are part of an evidence file of an underground Old Calendarist community. They are successive images of a typewriter and the typewriter with its owner taken by the Securitate for an evidence file constructed against the underground group. The first photograph has the typewriter placed near a Kalimavkion (monastic head gear in the Orthodox Church) which visually links the object with the owner. They are placed in the dormitory on the bed and what appears to be some literature is visible next to the typewriter. The second picture presents the owner of the typewriter with the