2. St. Pauil's (Cathedral)
Собор св. Павла. Главный собор англиканской церкви (Church of England); находится в Лондоне; одна из наиболее известных достопримечательностей Лондона. Построен1! архитектором К. Реном (Christopher Wren) в 1675 - 1710 после великого лондонского пожара (Great Fire).
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Sir
Christopher Wren said
"I'm
going
to dine with some men
If
anybody calls
Say
I'm
designing St. Paul's"
Тауэр, старинная крепость на берегу р. Темзы в Лондоне.
Tower of London is only a tower in name. In fact it's the oldest fortress in Great Britain built in the 11th century to guard the river approach to London. Within its walls is written the history of Great Britain It was the royal Palace and state prison, the fortress and home of English monarchs. Even today the English say "Who holds the Tower, holds Britain".
Упражнения
Упражнение I. Текст для перевода с листа по абзацам. При переводе обращайте внимание и на внешнюю сторону речи: не изменяйте первоначальный вариант, не повторяйтесь, переводите в умеренном темпе. Прочтите лингвострановедческий словарь.
The Kremlin, Moscow's castle was the kernel from which the great city developed. The churches and palaces here have long been of the greatest historical and cultural importance.
Much of what Lermontov wrote about the Kremlin in 1833 remains true today: "What can compare to the Kremlin which, having ringed itself with crenellated walls and adorned itself with the golden domes of the cathedrals, sits on a high hill like the crown of Sovereignty on the brow of an awesome ruler? No," he concluded, "neither the Kremlin, nor its crenellated walls, nor its dark passages, nor its splendid palaces can be described. They must be seen, they must be seen. One must feel all that they say to the heart and imagination*."
And some four decades later an English professor of history Sir Horsey who came to Russia with a group of tourists, his colleagues, wrote: "I have shown over the Kremlin numerous people who have traveled all over Europe, if not over the world, and they unite in saying that it is unique.
To compare it with England, it represents Westminster Abbey, St. Paul's, the Tower of London and the contents of the Tower of London rolled into one."
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The modern Kremlin dates from the end of the 15C and the beginning of the 16C, a time of remarkable building activity which coincided with the unification of Russia under Ivan Ш (1462-1505).
The century which followed added little to the Kremlin. The great fire of 1547 was quite the worst of a series that ravaged the Kremlin and at the beginning of the 17C came the Time of Troubles. In the last stages the Poles were besieged inside the Kremlin; they surrendered the ruins of the fortress in October 1612. The remainder of the 17C was more stable, however, and the building of the Kremlin was resumed. The next great event in the history of the Kremlin was its occupation by the French in 1812. The building and palaces were looted. When he heard that the cross at the top of the Belfry was of solid gold, Napoleon had it taken down. However it proved to be of gilded iron.
The handsome Cathedral of the Assumption (converted to a stable) was stripped of 5,300 kg of silver and 259 kg of gold. Much of the silver, however, was recaptured by the Cossacks who later presented the Cathedral with a 46-branch silver and bronze Chandelier known as the Harvest. This is the central chandelier of the 12 now illuminating the interior.
When he decided to leave Moscow Napoleon ordered the Kremlin be blown up*. Fortunately on the appointed night of October a heavy downpour and the prompt arrival of Russian troops prevented many of the planned explosions, but three towers, part of the wall and much of the Arsenal were destroyed.
The French troops also plundered St. Basil's but failed to carry out Napoleon's instructions to blow it up. The Cathedral was nevertheless badly damaged and was restored only in 1817. The magnificent Novo Dievichy Monastery, or, as we should say, "the New Nunnery for Girls," built by the Great Duke Vasily, the father of Ivan IV almost perished too in 1812, as Napoleon had it undermined, and had the mines fired*. It was only saved by the heroism of the nuns, who rushed up* at the peril of their lives and extinguished the fuses.
During these years the Kremlin lost part of its defences; the Neglinaya River was buried in a conduit under the New Alexander Gardens, and the moat in Red Square was filled in.