The icon depicts Yaroslavl princes, brothers Vasily and Constantine, who lived in the middle of the 13th century. The life of the saints was mainly connected with the history of Yaroslavl, so the copies of their icons were not wide spread throughout Russia.

Vasily and Constantine are painted close-up in the central part of the icon - the middle section. They are standing against the background of the Yaroslavl Assumption Cathedral with its image replicated in the stamps – the picturesque miniatures. We can see the figure of the Savior in the upper part of the middle section: Christ’s clothes are done with juicy lilac and green colours with gold. The face of Jesus is painted with thin layers of paint - under this technique, liquid layers of paint were applied gently, without abrupt transitions.

The lower part of the icon depicts the figures of the Russian Princes who were canonized: Boris and Gleb, Vladimir, Alexander Nevsky and others.

The stamps feature the miracles attributed to Vasily and Constantine, as well as to their relics. The miniatures are based on the lives of the Yaroslavl princes, and also the events in Yaroslavl’s history since the 13th century. The life of Vasily and Constantine was described in the first quarter of the 14th century. The hagiography contains historical inaccuracies: one literary source states that the brothers lost their lives when Yaroslavl was besieged by Batu Khan. However, the annals mention that Vasily went cap in hand to Batu Khan at the Horde many years after the city’s siege, and later died in Vladimir. Prince Vasily is depicted as a bearded old man, although it is a known fact, that he died aged just over 20 years. No data on the younger brother Constantine has been preserved in the annals. All the deeds described in the hagiography of the 16th century and depicted on the icon, were performed by his grandfather, Prince Konstantin Vsevolodovich of Rostov.

The incorruptible remains of the Princes were found under the floor of the Yaroslavl Assumption cathedral after a destructive fire that occurred in the beginning of the 16th century. This event is depicted in one of the stamps. According to legend, miracles soon began to occur near the remains and the brothers Basil and Constantine came to be canonized. Some of the stamps feature miracles of the city dwellers’ healing – ranging from a headache to blindness, to internal illness.

The icon is likely to have been painted in the second half of the 1640s for the Dormition Cathedral and hang near the remains there. The remains were greatly damaged during the fire that occurred in the 18th century, which broke out because of an unextinguished candle.

Researchers have not come to a definitive conclusion as to whether the local or the Moscow masters created the painting. This is, presumably, the work of, at least, two artists. The center piece is painted in a decorative manner – the magnificent clothes, the richly decorated architecture - while the figures and the buildings in the stamps are created in a laconic and restrained style.