Google Commemorates St. Basil’s Church With Doodle

Google has commemorated the 450th anniversary of St. Basil's Cathedral, the world famous Russian Orthodox church, located in Moscow's Red Square, with a doodle on its principal search page.

The church is dedicated to the Russian saint, Basil the Blessed, the “holy fool for Christ”, who was highly eccentric and idiosyncratic.

Russian officials have opened an exhibition Tuesday after a ten-year long restoration of the church which is believed to have cost 390 million rubles (£8.7-million).

This cathedral is a shrine and a symbol of Russia, Deputy Culture Minister Andrey Busygin. It's a miracle it survived at all.

Built during 1555-1561 on orders of Ivan the Terrible, the Cathedral incurred severe damage by Napoleon during the early 19th century and also during the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution in 1917. While Communists destroyed thousands of religious structures throughout Russia, Basil's was spared only after it was converted to a museum.

Legend has it that after the church was completed; Ivan had the eyes of the architect gouged out so he could never replicate the structure.