Mikhalishki. Church of St. Michael the Archangel.

Mikhalishki has been mentioned in chronicles since 1518 as the possession of the Trotsky governor of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. For some time the estate was in the possession of the Radziwills. At the beginning of the 17th century, Mihalishki was acquired by the Brzostowskis, a noble family of magnates and politicians of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, who founded an Augustinian monastery in Mihalishki, and later, in 1653, erected a temple here in honor of St. Michael the Archangel, patron of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

The church was built in a simple style, according to the design of Christophe Pence, a Belgian by birth, famous for being the architect of the beautiful Church of Peter and Paul in Vilnius. Working together with the Italian Pietro Perti, Pence designed the interiors of the Peter and Paul Church in what was then Vilna. Externally, the ascetic building merely imitates a medieval castle. In fact, no defensive functions were provided for during construction.

The Church of the Archangel Michael is a one-nave church. Adjacent to the rectangular main volume from the northeast is a pentagonal apse with two low side sacristies. The main volume is covered with a gable roof with hips above the apse. The main facade is divided into two tiers by a simple cornice, completed by quadrangular towers with hipped hipped roofs and an attic pediment between them. The entrance is designed in the form of a low vestibule with a separate cone-shaped roof. The walls are cut through with windows with semi-circular endings and paneled niches.

The temple is distinguished by the elegance of its interior decoration, richly decorated with blue and white stucco bas-reliefs. The decoration of the temple is reminiscent of the decoration of the famous Church of Peter and Paul in Vilnius, since the architect Pence worked on the interior of the church together with the Italian artist Pietro Perti, one of the authors of the sculptural compositions of the Vilnius monument. The bas-reliefs were made in 1684-1700 by a group of foreign decorators under the direction of Pietro Perti with the participation of local master Nikolai Zhilevich, whose name was discovered in the Vilna archives.

The two-tiered main altar with twisted columns is particularly rich in decoration. In its lower tier is a valuable 18th-century icon of the temple's heavenly patron, flanked by large-scale sculptures of saints. The center of the composition of the second tier is occupied by a sculptural crucifix with figures of bishops kneeling in front of it. The entire composition of the main altar is completed with the relief “Trinity of the New Testament” and decorated with stucco floral patterns, which gives it an exquisite lace look. The carved gilded pulpit with a finial in the form of a crown is of great artistic value. The pulpit is decorated with floral and floral motifs and rests on a sculptural image of an eagle holding in its talons the heraldic cartouche of the Brzostowski family. In the crypt of the temple there were burials of this magnate family.

During the First World War, the church was severely destroyed. However, by the end of the 1920s, the building was restored. Today, the Church of St. Michael the Archangel belongs to the historical and cultural values of Belarus.