Filotheou Monastery

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The monasteries of Athos

Philotheou Monastery

The Monastery of Saint Philotheos is located approximately in the middle of the eastern coast of the Athonian peninsula, built on a brownish plateau of the north-eastern side at an altitude of approximately 330 meters above sea level, between the Monastery of Karakallos and the Seat of Mylopotamos. It is dedicated to the Annunciation of the Virgin Mary.

The monastic complex displays the usual, almost square, floor plan, with the Catholic Church in the middle and the Trapeza to its west, but integrated into the corresponding wing of the Monastery.

In the hierarchical order of the twenty monasteries of Agioreitis, the Monastery of Philotheos occupies, since 1574, the twelfth (12th) rank.

History

In the current location of the Philotheus Monastery, according to tradition, there was an Asklepiion, founded by Constantine the Great (323–337). During the 9th century a monk named Xenophon appears to have been an ascetic at the site. Gerasimos Smyrnakis (1862–1935) mentions that in this place there used to be a monastery, which was already called Filotheou from 868, without this claim being verified by the written sources. A document of the Great Lavra of the year 992 names it as the Monastery of Pteris or Philotheos.

With its current name, we still find it in two documents of the First Nikephoros in 1015 and 1016, where its abbot at the time signs as "George the monk and abbot of Philotheus" and as "George, Monk and abbot of the monastery of Mr. Philotheus" respectively, while in a document of 1017 it is identified four times with the Monastery of Pteri: "Filotheou was of Pteri".

From these documents, as well as from other related documents, it is concluded that it was founded several years before 1015 by Philotheos, a contemporary of Athanasios Athonites (d. 930–1000), perhaps even at the end of the 10th century. The old tradition that attributes its foundation to Philotheos in collaboration with the ascetics Arsenios and Dionysios basically agrees with these historical facts.

From 1051 to 1141, the Philotheou Monastery is not mentioned in any archival document. The tradition that the first major building program of the monastery complex was placed in the years of the reign of Nikiforos III Botaneiatis (1078–1081), whose donations enabled its formation into a real monastery, is attested only in later sources. It seems that it comes from the accounts of the donation of the stock of Prodromos in Thassos to the Philotheou Monastery, from the 18th century onwards, on the one hand by Ignatios Philotheitis in 1796 (cod. Phil. 89) and on the other hand by cod. Everywhere. 281 of the 19th century.

This absence of evidence suggests that the Monastery was abandoned. Its presence is demonstrated again in 1141, when a new building was integrated with the former site of the Monastery under the guidance of a certain Arsenios. Arsenios is included among the builders.

The possibility of a second period of abandonment is raised by the absence of documents for more than a century, from 1169 to the mid-1280s.

During the reign of the Paleologues Andronikos II (1282–1328), Andronikos III (1328–1341) and John V (1341–1391) the Monastery enjoyed special care, with a grant amounting to ten large talents. In addition, the possessions of the Monastery in Thassos, Serres, Kalamaria etc. were awarded.

New impetus to the Monastery was given by Theodosios (1300–1391), brother of Dionysios, founder of the monastery of the same name. Theodosios comes from Korysos in Kastoria, he studied in Constantinople, where he was ordained. He then fled to the Philotheou Monastery where in 1335 he was voted its abbot. In 1370 he was captured by pirates and sold as a slave in Bursa. After adventures he became metropolitan of Trebizond, invited by Alexios III Komnenos (1349–1390).

The Philotheu Monastery was tried to be manned by Stefanos Dusan, when in 1346 he issued a golden bull in favor of it. The result of his move was the arrival of many Bulgarian and Serbian monks to the monastery, who turned the Monastery into a peculiar one. In a document of the Synagogue in 1483, the abbot of the Monastery signed in Slavic.

After the fall of Constantinople, around 1480, the Philotheou Monastery went through a period of desolation. It was led to restoration by Dionysios (d. 1541), who took over its abbotship around 1500. Dionysios had started from Meteora and before moving to Filotheou he was a monk in the neighboring Monastery of Karakallos. The Slavic-speaking friends of the idiosyncrasy reacted to his efforts to convert the Monastery into a commune and forced him to leave his position and take refuge first in Veria, then in Jerusalem and finally in Olympus, where he founded the Monastery of the Holy Trinity. However, his offering had lasting beneficial effects. He imposed the communal way of life and began a major renovation program, which relied on donations from benefactors. At the same time, he staffed the monastery with young monks he brought from Constantinople and established the Greek language in church services.

In 1533, however, the Philotheou Monastery, in order to deal with its debts, apparently due to the Ottoman conquest, was forced to sell the Seat of Stavronikitas to Exarch Grigorios Geromeriotis for 4,000 whites, which then developed into a sovereign monastery. Furthermore, in 1541 she granted to villagers the usufruct of the land of her share in Thassos. Also, at the end of the 16th century, the prior ownership of the Monastery on Mylopotamos and Kravatos in the Monastery of Lavra was validated by the patriarchate. Its bankruptcy followed and in 1661 it was exempted for this reason from the communion to the community, together with the Monasteries of Konstamonitos and Agios Panteleimonos. In 1666 it had 50 monks.

Among the last benefactors of the Monastery are the Russian tsars Michael Theodorovitch (1642), who gave permission to fundraise every seven years, and John Maximovitch (1707), as well as the rulers of the Transdanubian hegemony John Grigorios Ghikas (1733–1735) and Konstantinos Mavrokordatos (1730 c .e.). The rebuilding of the Catholic Church, which had collapsed in 1746, is due to the last two.

In 1744, 91 grosias corresponded to the Filotheou Monastery as tribute to the Turks. In 1759 Kosmas Etolos, a former student of the Athonia School, became a brother of the Monastery.

During the census of 1808, its monks were 60, of which 42 lived inside the Monastery.

In September 1871, a fire destroyed most of the buildings, except for the Catholic Church and the Library. The Trapeza was partially saved, as well as a small part of its entrance, in which an inscription with the date ˏzmi' (=1540) was found. The reconstruction work lasted 20 years and exhausted the resources of the Monastery, without completing the work, since half of the northern wing was left unfinished. From March 1900 the Holy Community took over the guardianship of the Monastery.

Nothing easily visible survives from the Byzantine Monastery of Filotheou in our days. Only sporadically, and through the recent restoration works, some elements can be seen that could be placed in the Byzantine era.

In 1965, the Philotheou Monastery had only 22 monks. In 1973 it was manned by the retinue of the elder Ephraim, a student of Joseph of Spilaiotis in Nea Skitis, which was located in Provata, in the Cell of Agios Artemios. In October of the same year, it returned to the synovial system with the seal of the Patriarch of Constantinople Demetrius I.

Escorts of monks from the Philotheou Monastery manned the Konstamonitou (1979), Xiropotamou (1980) and Karakallos (1981) Monasteries.

Among the monks who from time to time abandoned the Philotheou Monastery are the strict ascetic Simeon, who received the nickname monochite and anipodetos, originally from Agia Magnesia, Dometios and Damianos from Agrafa, Dionysios from Fanari Karditsa, Evlogios Kourilas ( 1880–1961), from the outskirts of Kortsa, etc.

The Catholiko

The Catholic Church of Philotheu Monastery is dedicated to the Annunciation of the Virgin Mary. It was built on the foundations of an older church and architecturally belongs to the Agioreite inscribed cruciform style. In the construction (1746) and illustration (1752) of the Catholicos, the rulers of Moldavia Konstantinos Mavrokordatos and Grigorios Ghikas helped financially with 6,600 aspra. The illustration of the Catholic is the work of the brothers Konstantinos and Athanasios from Koritsa. Thirteen years later, in 1765, they also told the story of austerity. The iconostasis is from the 18th century. The bell tower is from the same period (1764).

We only know about the old Catholic that it was basilica style. In fact, in a design by Barsky, who passed through the Monastery just two years before the construction of the new church, this basilica appears domed, with side choirs and an additional dome on the pronaos. From that temple, the iconostasis was preserved, enriched with portable images of Cretan art in its portico.

The Trapeza

The Trapeza, integrated into the west wing, on the first floor, is considered one of the oldest buildings of the Monastery. It was expanded during the 16th century at the expense of the king of Kakheti (present-day Georgia) and his son Alexander. An inscription dated 1540 refers rather to the renovation of a building and not to its fresco, which according to newer studies is placed between the years 1561–1574. These are remarkable frescoes, which, however, are not preserved in good condition, due to the fire of 1871. They were created in one phase, but belong to two different painters.

Between Katholikos and Trapeza is the Fiali, which is made entirely of white marble. The frescoes of its dome date back to the end of the 18th century.

Icons

The Holy Mother of God Glykofiloussa and Panagia Gerontissa are considered to be the holy icons of the Monastery. Glykofilousa, a two-faced icon with a representation of the Crucifixion on the back, is placed on the left marble shrine of the Catholic. The tradition of the Monastery wants it to be pre-iconoclastic and to arrive in a miraculous way from Constantinople, as the owner of the patrician Victoria threw it into the sea to save it. Gerontissa is placed behind the left dance. He was also miraculously transported by Nigrita Serron.

A large 11th century brass campaign cross with depictions of healing and military saints is also kept in the Catholicos.

Library

The current collection of the Library occupies the first floor of the newly built north-west wing, which was erected according to modern standards of safekeeping and conservation (1992–1994). Its previous location was on the first floor of the monumental entrance of the Monastery, located in the eastern wing, below the chapel of the 5 martyrs.

The earliest reference to the Philotheus Monastery Library that has been identified is that of Kyriakos Agkonitis, who visited the monastery on November 22–29, 1444, and noted that he saw a copy of Eustathius' commentary on Homer ("Eustathius master of the ecclesiastical orators of the prayers of Homer of the late Thessalonica, transmitters of Homer's Iliad"). This code is no longer in the library.

We can speak of the existence of a library only after the re-foundation of the Monastery by Arsenius, i.e. after 1141. Some liturgical books of the 12th and 13th centuries that are in the library were probably bought new.

Following the history of the library we find that the collection of books from purchases or writings took place approximately every hundred years until the Ottoman conquest. The initial impetus is related to its founder Arsenius (mid-12th century), its renovation by Saint Savva (early 13th century), the establishment of a bibliographic workshop by the monks Gerasimos and Ignatius (mid-14th century), the renovation coming from the donations from the emperor Andronikos II Palaiologos (first quarter of the 14th century) and from the abbotship of Theodosios (second quarter of the 14th century), later archbishop of Trebizond, from the scriptorium and the school of the Kallipolitan monks Maximos, Gabriel and Makarios (who extends to the middle of the 16th century), connected with the renewal of the Monastery as a Greek synovium by the abbot Dionysios, later known as Dionysios in Olympus. The work of Kallipoliton was also connected with the installation of a calligrapher, Kallinikos Dionysiatis, as abbot in the Philotheus Monastery.

The unbroken history of the monastery since its founding in 1141 by Arsenius suggests that the library must also have had an unbroken run, as books were certainly part of the needs of its new founder. In fact, the scientific interests of Arsenios himself must have played a role in the formation of this early library, who is identified with Philotheitis, the writer who composed the canonical work "Synopsis of the Divine Canons" around 1150. No copy of this Synopsis is preserved in the Monastery, but two of its codices are probably related to Arsenius' sources, codex 216 (Lambros 42), from the middle of the 12th century, and codex 38 (Lambros 52), from the 11th century, since Arsenius should have collected relevant writings in his hands.

None of the manuscripts dating from the 12th and early 13th centuries can be proven to have been written in the Philotheus Monastery. However, seven or eight codices written during this period have been identified, which had either been acquired for the Monastery as new, or some of the older manuscripts had been acquired at that time at second hand.

During the Paleologian period, the Philotheite monks expanded the content of the library either by writing or by acquiring several codices from various sources. The codes acquired during this time are almost all agiological. The monks Gerasimos and Ignatius, with the help of other monks, managed to create an important thematic series. The only exception is a four-gospel written by Philotheitis, a contemporary of Gerasimos, apparently for personal use.

With the fall of the Byzantine Empire, Mount Athos experienced a difficult period. Information on copying codes is scarce and concerns the first half of the 15th century. At the same time, the West began to be interested in the collections of monasteries due to the Renaissance, with the result that manuscripts with works of classical authors were sought. In addition, due to the conflict between the Eastern and Western churches, theological texts are sought. The result of these searches was the sending of people to Mount Athos in order to supply the West with manuscripts, resulting in the "known" losses in the libraries of Agios Athos. In addition to attempting to obtain manuscripts, some of the Western envoys recorded what they encountered. Thanks to these testimonies, we know that the libraries of the Great Lavra and Vatopedi were organized and that the Pantokrator and Philotheou Monasteries seem to have had important personal collections of monks.

During the 16th century the inmates of the Monastery collected and copied mainly liturgical texts. The group of scribes from Gallipoli wrote many liturgical books for the monastery and at the same time ran a school in which illiterate priests were trained. Some of them wrote codices that are preserved in the monastery.

In the same period we also have an enrichment of books that can be characterized as sources for orthodox theology and biblical interpretation. Most were acquired through donations or purchases.

During the fire of 1871 all the books were moved to safe places and saved.

The case of the Library of Philotheus is of particular interest because of the large collection of early Minaeans, which is important for their Athonian manuscript tradition. If we refer to Lambros' list, the Philotheo Monastery is surpassed only by the Great Lavra in the number of surviving old Minaios, and they constitute a record that documents the history of the ways in which services were carried out at the Philotheo Monastery from its foundation in 1141 onwards.

Manuscript Codices

The Library of the Philotheou Monastery today includes about 400 manuscript codices, with 54 of them on parchment and two scrolls. Lambros in 1880 recorded 249, while most of the fragments he found he placed in an envelope and listed on the shelf number 81. Today, they have been returned to their respective codices and counted in the descriptions of said codices.

Additional codices are later, mostly functional, manuscripts, many apparently copied from printed editions. Several of them are still used in the services of the Monastery and may have been in the Catholicos when Lambros studied the collection. However, some older, post-Byzantine codices, which are now kept in the library, were apparently in the monks' cells or in the shares of the Monastery during Lambros's visit.

In 1660, Arsenios Sukhanov removed 32 manuscripts from the Monastery. The codex that contained historical notes on Mount Athos, studied by Ouspensky and Fallmerauer is not located in the library.

The most important of all the manuscripts is an illustrated tetraevangelium (no. 33), which is considered one of the most ancient of Mount Athos. The portrait with the evangelist Mark attributed as a philosopher is the oldest miniature representation on Mount Athos. The codex is from the 10th century, but the archaic depiction of the evangelist comes from an earlier manuscript.

Print Books

The printed books of Philotheou amount to approximately 20,000 copies, of which 500 are in Russian and Romanian.

To these has recently been added the rich library of the previous librarian Loukas Douros from Katerini, who died in January 2022 from covid-19.

The first Greek edition that Thomas Papadopoulos has located in the Libraries of Mount Athos (p. 3), dates back to 1494 and is the Anthology of various epigrams, which was printed in Florence by L.F. de Alopa.

The library of the Monastery also houses the only known copy of an Ermologion, printed in Venice on 12/09/1549, by the publishing company that consisted of Mitrophanes of Caesarea, Dimitrios Marmaretto, Vasilios Varelis and Silvestro de Odino. In this edition was printed for the first time the work of Nikolaos Malaxos On the importance of the joined fingers of the priest's hand when he blesses the Christian people.

Also noteworthy is the edition of the Pentecost, printed in Venice in 1525 by Stephano de Sabio, as well as the Triodium of 1538, printed by Geraldi also in Venice, both editions being "pono demitrio of Zeno".

The bibliographic laboratory. A bibliographic laboratory, founded in the middle of the 14th century, as well as a "school" in the middle of the 16th century, functioned in the Monastery. The workshop functioned twice despite being a small and isolated monastery.

It focused exclusively on the copying of liturgical and liturgical texts, which is why out of the 250 codices of the workshop none contain works by authors of classical and late antiquity.