Among the first to the painting of Easter eggs were the miniaturists of Mstera, understanding their ornamentation in a purely religious sense. In 1874, ordered by Moscow's "dismissed-priests" Old Believers, the Tyulin brothers, renowned icon painters from the village of Mstera, near Vladimir, painted images on Easter eggs to greet distinguished persons. The eggs were chiseled out of wood. Each consisted of two halves gilded on the inside with mat gold and painted bright crimson on the outside. The egg was very light, extremely, and polished like a mirror. The Tyulins painted eggs of two sizes: ten the size ofa goose egg and eight the size of a duck egg. All the eggs hore on one side the same subject matter-"The Savior "s Descent into Hell"-and on the opposite side , the image of the patron saint of the person for whom the egg was meant as a present. There were three eggs with Saint Alexander of the Neva and one each with Czar Constantine, Prince Vladimir, and Metro-

The egg "Resurrection". Second half of the 19th c. Papier - mache, oil, gold, painting, lacquer. PAM, Moscow.

politanAlexis. The middle, where the egg opens, was adorned by the artists with an ornament. The images are distinguished by the exactness of minute details: ancient Russian style norms are observed: pure gold is used. The paintings on these Easter eggs were rewarded by what was much money at that time: 25 rubles for every big egg and 15 rubles for every small rarity. A well-known icon painter from Mstera, O.S.Chirikov, filled an order for a series of patterns of "painting of saints for the 12 high holidays" for the decoration of porcelain Easter eggs. The eggs created on the basis of those patterns are considered some of the best among those manufactured at the imperial Porcelain Factory. They were also the most expensive ones: to paint one such egg a painter spent 40 days, and it cost 75 rubles. The number of those eggs for every Easter holiday for the imperial family was strictly definite: the emperor and the empress each received 40-50 eggs, grand dukes each received three and grand duchesses each received two. At the various exhibitions held in Novgorod to commemorate 1000 years of Christianity in Russia, religious personalities noted that, of all the centers of tempera miniature painting on papier-mache. Mstera was the one which preserved the most the traditions of ancient Russian painting.