Novogrudok. The Church of Saints Boris and Gleb.

Novogrudok Borisoglebsky Cathedral is the oldest church in Novogrudok. Initially, a temple was built on this site in the first half of the XII century, the walls of which were made of limestone tuff blocks with minor inserts of plinths. A few years later, a gallery was built around the church, made of plinth in the technique of a heater "with a hidden row". This principle of construction was characteristic of the Polotsk architecture of the XII century. The temple was painted with frescoes, had a magnificent majolica floor made of polished various ceramic tiles, square, rectangular and triangular. Since 1317, this ancient temple served as the cathedral of the Lithuanian-Novogrudok Metropolia, and a monastery operated under it. In 1451, he was visited by St. Jonah, Metropolitan of Moscow and All Russia.

On the foundation of this temple, the Borisoglebsky Church was rebuilt in a new way in 1517-1519. The sponsor of the construction was Prince Konstantin Ostrogsky, Hetman of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The gallery disappeared, and the size of the church increased significantly. A 3-nave hall building with a 5-sided apse and patterned vaults in the late Gothic style was erected. The facades were separated by numerous rows of thin vertical columns-blades, which in the upper part turned into arches. The temple has become a striking example of the Belarusian Gothic architecture of the 16th century.

After the conclusion of the Brest Union (1596), the church housed the residence of the Uniate metropolitans of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. In 1620, a Catholic female Basilian monastery was founded at the temple. In 1624-1632, the temple was partially rebuilt with donations from Alexander Khreptovich: the Gothic facade was replaced by a Baroque one. A bell tower was attached to the south side of the tower, which gave the main facade and the entire composition of the temple an asymmetry. The roof was covered with green and brown polished tiles, and inside a patterned floor was made of hexagonal, square and diamond-shaped polished tiles.

In 1839, the church became Orthodox again and was rebuilt in a pseudo-Byzantine style. The high wedge-shaped roof was replaced by a four-pitched roof. A wooden drum was erected in the middle of it. The towers on the main facade and the drum received pointed tent-like completions with bow-like domes.

In 1961, the church was closed and the Grodno State Archive was placed in it.

In 1996, on the feast of the Nativity of Christ, the cathedral was returned to the Orthodox Church.

The temple is an architectural monument of a symbiotic Gothic-Renaissance style with elements of defensive architecture.