Anastasia I. Dolgova
(St.Petersburg State University, Russia)

On the Origins and Symbolism of the Iconography of “Spiritual Labyrinth”.

This research deals with the iconography “The spiritual labyrinth” presented by the works of the 17th and 18th centuries in the collections of the State Museum of Religion History and New Jerusalem’s monastery. The study sheds new light upon the sources of this iconography declaring the connections between iconography and spiritual literature. Also some pictorial sources were found out — such as the western European engraving of the same period. This clearly demonstrates a new step in the evolution of this iconography in the 17th — 18th cc.