At the time of the First Republic, Minsk was a royal city and the capital of a province, but under the terms of the Treaty of Riga, it was incorporated into the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic and never returned to Poland. Traces of Polish presence in today's Belarusian capital can be found in the Calvary Cemetery. Many Polish tombstones have survived here, the oldest of which date back to the first quarter of the 19th century

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As a result of the massive scale of destruction that Minsk suffered over the last century, very little of the city's historical buildings have survived. Turned to ruins as a result of World War II, the Belarusian capital was practically completely rebuilt in the second half of the 20th century. The monumental architecture prevalent in today's cityscape, created in the era of socialist realism, contrasts with the few older buildings. Notable among these is the Calvary Cemetery, which is the oldest surviving necropolis in the city.

<p style="ltext-height:1 px> ;The establishment of the Calvary Cemetery in Minsk is connected with a meeting of the chapter of the Carmelites of the old Observance (visceral), held in Lida in 1745. As a result, the Minsk convent was given permission to set up a calvary on the hill known as the 'holy place', located on the road to Rakov. It is not known whether this calvary was set up at the time, but certainly by the end of the 18th century there was already a wooden church here, around which the dead were buried. The necropolis began to grow in its surroundings. In 1945 the area of the cemetery was enlarged to its present size of about 14 ha.</p>. <p style=" text-height:28pxIn the Calvary cemetery several major brick buildings dating from the 19th century have been preserved, of which the church and the cemetery gate stand out in particular.

Church of the Elevation of the Holy Cross

Historical sources mention the existence of a wooden church in the Calvary area as early as the turn of the 18th century. It is believed to have been built by the Discalced Carmelites in the mid-18th century and remained under their administration until 1800, when it passed into the hands of the Franciscans. By the 1830s, the two-towered, shingled church was already in such poor condition that it was unsuitable for religious services.

The construction of the brick church that still exists today was financed by local Poles. The neo-Gothic single-nave building with a shallow transept and four-storey tower in the façade was completed in 1839. Under the chancel and nave were the crypts in which the following are buried: Jan Krzysztof Damel (died 1840), Polish painter and graphic artist, lecturer at Vilnius University, and Bishop of Minsk Mateusz Lipski (died 1839). The plastered facades of the temple are decorated with corner lisens with cube decoration and horizontal banded cornices. The interior of the church was decorated with mural paintings of Golgotha and a painting of Christ in the Garden of Olives made by Johann Christopher Damel before 1840. Damaged by a lightning strike in 1855, the paintings were restored in the 1870s. In the same period, the shingle roofing was replaced with sheet metal.

It is likely that with the completion of the church, a parish was also erected there. The church was closed in the 1930s and turned into a workshop. At that time, its furnishings were also destroyed. The temple was not returned to the faithful until 1984

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Cemetery gate

A classicist gate in the form of a triumphal arch, erected in 1830, leads into the cemetery from Kalwaryjska Street. It is a foundation of Jerzy Kobylinski in memory of his late wife Josefa. This is indicated by the inscriptions on the gate: on the front side, 'Eternally resting', and on the side of the cemetery, 'Pamiątka męża i dzieci poświęcona Józefie Kobylińskiey / r. 1830 September buried here". The imposing brick gate is divided by three arcade openings and crowned by a prominent moulded cornice. Above the side arcades are bas-relief decorations, created from sepulchral and military elements. The arcades are closed by a wrought-iron gate and gate, probably dating from the time of the building's construction.

Contemporary cemetery

The area of Calvary Cemetery, once located on the outskirts of Minsk, has now been absorbed by the city. The immediate surroundings of the necropolis are modern high rise residential buildings, and one of Minsk's metro lines runs nearby.

The cemetery was formally closed for burials in 1967, but the practice of replacing older, abandoned graves with modern burials continues to this day. Along with the conduct of unprofessional 'maintenance' and the general poor state of preservation of the gravestones, this is one of the three main problems that exist in this cemetery.

It is worth noting that, of the cemeteries of old Minsk, only the Calvary Cemetery has survived to this day - after World War II, the Orthodox (Storozhevsky), Catholic cemeteries on Zolota Gorka, Jewish, Tatar and Lutheran cemeteries were barbarously destroyed.

late 18th century.