The Church of St Paraskeva ( bg, църква "Света Параскева", ''tsarkva "Sveta Paraskeva"'') is a Bulgarian Orthodox church in

Sofia Sofia ( ; bg, София, Sofiya, ) is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria. It is situated in the Sofia Valley at the foot of the Vitosha mountain in the western parts of the country. The city is built west of the Iskar river, and ha ...

, the capital of

Bulgaria Bulgaria (; bg, България, Bǎlgariya), officially the Republic of Bulgaria,, ) is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern flank of the Balkans, and is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and North Macedon ...

. The church, dedicated to Saint Paraskeva, is located on 58

Georgi Rakovski Street Georgi Rakovski Street ( bg, Улица Георги Раковски, ), usually called with its old name Rakovska, is an important street in the capital of Bulgaria, Sofia, located in the central area of the city. It is named after the famous Bu ...

in the centre of the city. It is the third-largest church in Sofia. Plans to build a church at the site date to 1910, when

Stuttgart Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the ...

-educated Bulgarian architect Anton Tornyov (1868–1942) won a competition for the church's design. Due to the

Balkan Wars The Balkan Wars refers to a series of two conflicts that took place in the Balkan States in 1912 and 1913. In the First Balkan War, the four Balkan States of Greece, Serbia, Montenegro and Bulgaria declared war upon the Ottoman Empire and defe ...

and

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, however, the construction was postponed. In 1922, the church board of trustees announced another competition, which was again won by Tornyov. The construction of the Church of St Paraskeva was complete by 1930, but the finishing works on the

portico A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cult ...

s did not cease until 1940. St Paraskeva night

St Paraskeva has a somewhat unusual design for an Eastern Orthodox church. For example, the cella is in practice a round chamber over in diameter. The cella gradually disintegrates into the surrounding

apse In architecture, an apse (plural apses; from Latin 'arch, vault' from Ancient Greek 'arch'; sometimes written apsis, plural apsides) is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical vault or semi-dome, also known as an ''exedra''. In ...

References

Paraskeva Churches completed in 1930 Church buildings with domes {{bulgaria-church-stub

See also

References