Ruska Kapelica: Janez Smitek

Artwork to commemorate and remind

The wooden chapel, dedicated to St. Vladimir was built in 1916 by surviving Russian prisoners of war to commemorate those who died during the construction of the road across Vršič.

Some of the dead Russian prisoners who died building the road across Vršič were buried in Trenta, but most of them were buried in common graves on and below Vršič, in a pyramid-shaped stone tomb. The surviving Russian prisoners built a Russian-style memorial chapel next to it, which was acquired by the Russian Matica in 1924. Ecclesiastically and legally it belongs to the Russian Orthodox parish of Belgrade, and at the time of its construction was probably the westernmost Orthodox church in the world.