At the time of Rublev, the Holy Trinity was the embodiment of spiritual unity, peace, harmony, mutual love and humility.

It says that the biblical Patriarch Abraham 'was sitting at the door of his tent in the heat of the day' by the Oak of Mamre and saw three men standing in front of him, who in the next chapter were revealed as angels.

In his effort to uncover the doctrine of the Trinity, Rublev abandoned most of the traditional plot elements which were typically included in the paintings of the Abraham and Sarah's Hospitality story.

At the same time, the angels are not inserted into the circle, but create it instead, thus our eyes can't stop at any of the three figures and rather dwell inside this limited space.

It hints at the crucifixion sacrifice and serves as the reminder of the Eucharist (the left and the right angels' figures make a silhouette that resembles a cup).

[6] The starting point of the divine administration is the creative Will of God, therefore Rublev places Abraham's house above the corresponding angel's head.

The blue of the Son's robe symbolizes his divinity, the brown represents earth, his humanity, and the gold suggests the kingship of God.

[17] The Holy Spirit and the Son bow their heads in submission to the Father, yet their placement on thrones at the same level symbolizes equality.

There is not much historical data on the subject, and even at the beginning of the 20th century historians did not dare to claim any facts and could only make guesses and assumptions.

[13] The icon was first mentioned in 1551 in The Book of One Hundred Chapters, the collection of Church laws and regulations made by the Stoglavy Synod.

Among other things, The Book stated the Synod's decisions that had been made about the iconography of the Holy Trinity, in particular the details that were considered canonically necessary for such icons, such as crosses and halos.

[20][21] The next known source that mentions The Trinity is The Legend of the Saint Icon Painters (Russian: Сказание о святых иконописцах) compiled at the end of 17th century—the beginning of the 18th century.

[25] The Soviet historian Vladimir Plugin had a theory that the icon had nothing to do with Nikon of Radonezh, but was brought to the Trinity Lavra by Ivan the Terrible.

He theorized that all previous scholars after the famous historian Alexander Gorsky made the wrong assumption that Ivan the Terrible only "covered with gold" the icon that had already been kept at the Trinity Lavra.

[13] However, in 1998 Boris Kloss pointed out that the so-called Troitsk Story of the Siege of Kazan, written before June 1553,[27] contains a clear reference to the fact that Ivan the Terrible only "decorated" the existing icon for the Lavra.

The first person to make the suggestion was Dmitry Rovinsky even before the cleaning, but his idea "was immediately extinguished by the note from metropolitan Philaret; and again, on the basis of the legend, the icon was attributed to Rublev.

Viktor Lazarev sums it up: "In the light of recent analysis we can definitely state that Rublev was not familiar with the works of Italian art and therefore could not borrow anything from that.

Compared to other icons such as the Theotokos of Vladimir or Our Lady of Kazan The Trinity was not particularly revered, because there was nothing special about it, it was not "miracle-working" or "myrrh streaming", and it did not become a source for a large number of copies.

The cleaning of The Trinity could theoretically reveal a perfect example of his style and help with the examination of the other icons that were attributed to him on the basis of legends or common belief.

[20] Invited by the prior of the Trinity Lavra in the spring of 1904, Vasily Guryanov took the icon out from the iconostasis, removed the riza and then cleaned it from the "renewals" and the drying oil.

There was even an obvious meddling in the inner sanctum, the "face image" area, where insufficiently cleaned remains of the author's.. lines...(which were already rather schematically reproduced by the latest renewals of the 16—19th centuries) were literally rumpled and absorbed by the rigid graphics of V. P. Guryanov and his assistants.

On 20 April 1920 the Council of People's Commissars issued a decree called About the Conversion of the Historical and Artistic Valuables of the Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius into a Museum (Russian: Об обращении в музей историко-художественных ценностей Троице-Сергиевой лавры).

In 1929 the icon arrived to the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow, while the copy made by Nikolai Baranov replaced the original in the iconostasis.

However Valentin Yanin with an assistance of Yuri Melentyev, the Minister of Culture at that time, managed to meet with the President and made him change his mind.

The matter concluded with a decree published in the Rossiyskaya Gazeta, The Trinity was declared a property of the Tretyakov Gallery forever.

In 2008, Levon Nersesyan, one of the Gallery staff members, revealed that Patriarch Alexy had requested the icon to be brought to the Lavra for the religious holiday in the summer of 2009.

[38] Most scholars agreed that the climate inside the Cathedral was unsuitable for the icon keeping, that candles, frankincense and the transportation could destroy it.

The Ministry of Culture's press service confirmed that the icon would be put on display at the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow.

The primary problem is a vertical crack passing through the surface in the front, which a rupture between the first and second ground boards at an unknown time caused.

Yury Olsufyev attempted repair by moving the icon to a special room with artificially induced high humidity of circa 70%.