Stavronikita Monastery

Stavronikita Monastery

The Holy Monastery of Stavronikita is located approximately in the middle of the eastern side of the Athonian peninsula, on a large steep rock, between the monasteries of Iviron and Pantokratoros. Its building complex and the surrounding area make up a particularly elegant and impressive whole. The building facilities are among the smallest in area of Mount Athos, as is its courtyard. The defensive tower and the aqueduct with arched piers complete the entire impressive architectural complex.

It occupies the fifteenth place in the hierarchy of the twenty monasteries of Mount Athos.

History

There are many traditions about its establishment and name. The most prevalent one wants it to be founded at the end of the 10th to the beginning of the 11th century by the monk Nikitas, while another speaks of two monks who founded it, Stavros and Nikitas. The existence of a monastery with the name of "Stravonicitas" is testified at the beginning of the 11th century in a series of four documents of the First Mount, where, among other things, a "Nikephoros monk of Stravonikitas" is signed: Nikephoros was perhaps the successor of Nikitas. Later, already in the 11th century, the name was changed for the sake of euphemism to "Stavronikitos", which appears until the middle of the 12th century, and to "Stavronikita", which finally prevailed. As monydrio it is mentioned in documents of the 12th century (1108 and 1153). It then fell into obscurity, as can be inferred from the absence of historical evidence. As a small and unwalled monastery, it could not survive on the coast due to the weakening of the Byzantine forces and, at the same time, the adverse conditions during the years of the Frankish rule, as well as the pirates who attacked the coastal monasteries in particular. Deserted by monks, in 1287 it became the property of the First. Then, for its maintenance, it was granted, now as Kelli, according to the then current practice, initially to the Koutloumousiou monastery and later to the Filotheou monastery. After all, his tower, as mentioned, was absolutely necessary as an observatory for the security of Karia and the hinterland. In a document from 1313, the signature "Theodosios the Stavronikita" is indicative of an independent monastery. However, in the Standard of Antonius (1393), Stavronikita is not included among the 25 monasteries mentioned, as at that time it was not an independent monastery.

The historical course of the Stavronikita monastery can best be followed from the 16th century onwards. In 1535, the hieromonk Grigorios, abbot of the Geromerios monastery in Filiates Thesprotia, arrived on Mount Athos, probably due to the then recent death of his brother Kallistos. He bought from the Filotheou monastery the "propalai os eripeion pepaliomomenon" Kelli for 4,000 silver coins and undertook its reconstruction as a memorial to his brother, who had probably been a monk there. Indeed, he partially rebuilt it and in 1536 secured a seal from his friend the patriarch Jeremiah I "by which he validates and confirms the agreements between the Philotheus monastery and the archarch Grigorios regarding the assignment of the seat of Stavronikitos to him". With this seal, Kelli was recognized as a patriarchal and sovereign monastery and its possessions were awarded (among other important shares in Kassandra and Lemnos). After a while, he succeeded in granting it the neighboring dissolved monastery of Fakinos, which was owned by the monastery Pantokratoros, and thus its insufficient area was expanded. Grigorios passed away around 1538, "having left the work unfinished". In the following years, its buildings, some of which were left unfinished, began to deteriorate, while a fire worsened the situation.

The representatives of the Synaxis, who were interested in the existence of a permanent observatory at the site, "desperately petitioned" the ecumenical patriarch Jeremiah I and asked him to personally take care of the monastery. He arrived on the spot and from 1540 he focused on its reconstruction. Thus, "we also built the great and wonderful temple with narthexes, and made it a beautiful and brilliant cell of the monks, we also built towers and a Trapeza and a great and strong wall around it and made it look like a castle". He also provided it with all the necessary liturgical utensils and classified it among the existing monasteries. In addition, he bought from a Turk a fee-bearing estate in Kassandra and offered it to the monastery. The patriarch, in addition to its operating regulations, also left a will that had the form of a solitary standard, in the introduction of which he mentions the efforts of Gregory and himself for its reconstruction. With the proclamation of Stavronikitas Cell as a monastery, Jeremiah I finalized the number of monasteries to twenty, and these, after the establishment of the Vakuf regime, remained the only dominant institutions of Mount Athos.

However, the Stavronikita monastery, which at the beginning of the 17th century turned into a peculiar one, remained one of the poorest on Mount Athos.

In 1607 a fire broke out which destroyed its buildings. A concerted effort was immediately undertaken for repairs and restorations. According to an inscription, in 1627–1628 renovation works were carried out in the catholicon. In 1630 permission was issued by the Turkish administration for the construction of a wall. In 1667 the chapel of the Archangels was built. During the period of the hegemony of the ruler of Wallachia, Serban Kantakousinos (1679–1688), and with his own funding, the monastery's aqueduct was built in the form of an arch known since ancient times. Various other works were carried out with the revenues of the monastery of the Holy Apostles in Bucharest, which had been granted to the monastery of Stavronikita as a share by the ruler of Wallachia Alexander Ghikas (1726–1749: four periods of hegemony). Before 1712, Pashalios, the son of the nobleman of Wallachia, became a monk at the monastery.

In 1741, according to a note in Code 387 of the Panteleimonos monastery, the monastery was "destroyed", while in 1743 it became the iconostasis of the catholicon. In 1770, according to an inscription, the Trapeza was renovated. In 1797, the former patriarch Neophytos retired to the Stavronikita monastery, for whom Gregory V sent a letter asking him to be respected and treated as he deserved.

The Stavronikita monastery, although poorer than others, managed to cover all its needs with sobriety and austerity. During the census of 1808 the monks numbered 48, of which 25 lived within the walls. However, during the years of the Greek Revolution, Stavronikita was severely tested. The monks abandoned her to save themselves. They returned around 1830 and devoted themselves to repairing the damage and building new buildings.

During the second half of the 19th century, the monastery was hit three times by fire (1864, 1874, 1879), with the last one being the worst. She was therefore forced to take out unsustainable loans, amounting in 1890 to 12,000 Ottoman pounds, which completely impoverished her. During this period, the Russian agent attempted to take possession of the monastery through the monk Nathanael, representative of the Panteleimon monastery in the Community, who also had the required amount of money in his hands. In the meantime, the monastery's 34 Huts had been taken over by Russians, except one belonging to Georgians, and of its eleven Cells, six also fell into Russian hands, with two of them housing a large number of nuns—the Virgin 25 and the Agia Triados 30. The monastery barely managed to escape Russification, since this move was thwarted with the death of Nathanael in 1890. It should also be noted that the Romanians also tried to beat Stavronikita during its time of bankruptcy, but they failed. The monastery was then placed under the guardianship of the Community until 1902. The sponsorships of the Greek government and the pilgrims, as well as the prudent administration of the predecessor Theofilos Vatopaidinos, who was appointed by the Community as trustee of the bankrupt monastery (1893), restored its finances and they fixed her.

The forced expropriation by the Greek state of its shares in favor of the refugees that took place in 1927–1928 also caused financial difficulties. Also, during the 1960s its situation was dramatic, staffed as it was with only 11 overage monks. At the beginning of this decade, the monastery was forced to sell its lucrative share in Kassandra, where the "Sani" hotel complex is today. In 1967 there were only 4 monks. In 1968 a new brotherhood, who lived in the Iberian hermitage of the Holy Forerunner, manned the monastery, which was converted into a common with the seal of the patriarch Athenagoras I and with the abbot (1968–1990) Archimandrite Vasilios Gontikakis , gaining new vigor. It was restored in 1986–1988, while in 1996–2000 the cracks that had been created in the rock by the Ierissou earthquake in 1932 were treated with large-scale strengthening operations.

In 1990, an escort of monks from Stavronikita under Archimandrite Vasilios manned and restored the monastery of Iveron to the synovial system.

Today, the abbot of the Stavronikita monastery is the archimandrite Tychon.

The catholicon of the monastery, dedicated to Saint Nicholas, was completed around 1541-1542 thanks to the patriarch Jeremiah I. It was built on the foundations of the old church, which was dedicated to the Theotokos, apparently due to the restrictions on building churches imposed by the Turkish administration. The narthex of the period, which was rebuilt no later than the first half of the 18th century, has not survived. However, permission for the repair of the narthex was issued by the Turkish authorities in 1630, while a built-in inscription informs about the renovation of the catholicon in 1627–1628. The outstanding frescoes are the work of Theophanes of Crete and his son Simeon: the fresco painting began in 1545 and was finished the following year. The wood-carved iconostasis was built according to an inscription preserved on it in 1743. Its dodecaorto, with 15 icons, the work of two craftsmen (who might have been Theophanis and Simeon), is one of the finest on Mt.

The tower is located next to the main entrance, in the middle of the south wing. Its floor plan is square (8.5 x 8.5 m.) and has a total height of 25 m. In 1982 it was maintained and in 1997 it was restored and turned into an exhibition space to house the Sacristy and Icon.

Sacristy

The Vault of the Stavronikita monastery is currently housed in the basements of the northeast wing, after their restoration in 2008–2009. The monastery has many valuable heirlooms, including nineteen gold embroideries, crosses, wood carvings, carvings.

Iconostasis

The iconostasis of the Stavronikita monastery is housed in its tower. There are kept the icons that used to be in the iconostasis or in the iconostasis of the catholicon or the chapels. Among the most important portable icons are Saint Nicholas, the Transfiguration of Saint John the Theologian, Saints Peter and Paul, Saint Luke the Apostle, the Three Hierarchs, Saints Andrew and Mark, Saint Auxentius, Saint Antipas, the Four Saints Martyrs, of the Annunciation and the Nativity of the Virgin, of the Holy Cross, of St. Eustratios, of the Infant Virgin Mary (who is, however, in the catholicon), of the prophet Elias and others.

The most important relic in the monastery's catholicon is the mosaic icon of Saint Nicholas of Streidas (14th century), a name given to it because, when fishermen took it unchanged from the sea, where it had been thrown during the years of iconoclasm, on the saint's forehead an oyster was stuck, which, when removed, bled. The date of its discovery is uncertain, but it is placed in the years of the rebuilding of the monastery by Gregory, in the 1530s, and during the reign of Patriarch Jeremiah I.

Library

The Library of the Stavronikita monastery has been located on the ground floor of the southwest wing since 1990, when its renovation work was completed. In addition to manuscripts, it also hosts several printed books.

It has been hypothesized that the first establishment of the monastery dates back to the end of the 10th to the beginning of the 11th century, but from the end of the 12th century and for the next three centuries the monastery reached such a point of decline that it was almost deserted. However, the existence of important manuscripts from the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries connects the original monastery with the current one, refounded in 1536, indicating its survival over time.

During the 17th century, the abbot of the Stavronikita monastery was Ierotheos Koukouzelis, a well-known scribe, who worked around 1625.

In the middle of the 18th century, a large part of the biblical collection was kept in the katholikon. Vasily Barski, on his second trip to Mount Athos, in 1744, visited the monastery and reports that in its catholicon he saw a fairly large church library, with many manuscripts and over 100 printed books, but which did not include didactic, philosophical works and Greek.

In 1839, the English traveler Robert Curzon reported that the monastery's library had about 800 books, of which more than half were manuscripts; of these, about 200 were parchments, while the remaining 400 were printed.

Archive

The Archive of the Stavronikita Monastery, which today belongs to a specially designed space in the Monastery Secretariat, does not include documents from the Byzantine period, as it was founded in the post-Byzantine era. However, it preserves documents of particular historical importance, which are not often found in the archives of the other monasteries of Mount Athos. These are the documents of the founder, Patriarch Jeremiah I, the First and the Holy Synod, where the founding process of the monastery, its integration into the hierarchy of monasteries, its administration and its spiritual life are recorded.

An unspecified number of documents were destroyed in the fire of 1607. In 1632, the monks appealed to the patriarch, having in their hands the remains of the preserved documents related to Kassandra's share, and asked him to revalidate their rights over it. Similar are the cases of other documents validating ownership rights, such as the one from 1614. It is therefore clear that after 1607 the monastery is trying to reconstruct its archive.

The documents of the Monastery Archive dating from 1533 to 1640 amount to 29. From 1640 to 1710 there is a large gap: only two Greek and six Ottoman documents survive. Then and until 1800, a total of 70 documents are numbered. From the last period, in addition to the general documents, debit bonds, financial statements, payments and receipts, bonds of Cells, etc. are preserved.

A methodical operation of organizing the archive must have been undertaken after the fire of 1607. However, the earliest list of documents that has survived is dated 1888 and is labeled 'The Documents and Other Records'. It does not follow a chronological order, but organizes the material into thematic sections.

In the first decades of the 20th century, the archive became the subject of research by the monk of the Gabriel monastery, who transcribed and published various documents. At the same time he compiled two handwritten catalogs of Greek and Ottoman documents. The first is labeled "From the Archive of the Holy Monastery of Stavronikita" and includes an unsystematic record of personal notes with brief summaries of the documents. The second is labeled "Catalogue of the documents of the real property of the monastery" and is included in the (anecdotal) "Description and history of the Holy Monastery of Stavronikita" (no. 251), which Gabriel compiled around 1930.

In 1967 and 1969 followed the research of Nikos Oikonomides, who in 1970 published a list of 26 documents dating from 1533 to 1661, with a description and brief reference to their content.

In 1986, under the supervision of Kriton Chrysochoidis (KBE / EIE), work was carried out to classify all archival material and a detailed description and cataloging of documents dating back to the 18th century. In 2001, Antonis Giannakopoulos published excerpts of documents from the monastery's archive dating from 1533 to 1800. The Ottoman documents of the monastery have been microphotographed by the research team of emeritus professor of Turkish studies Vassilis Dimitriadis, as part of a program of the Institute of Mediterranean Studies, but remain anecdotes.

Manuscripts-Codices

A total of 169 manuscript codices have been recorded by Spyridon Lambros. For the first 56, which are written on parchment, there is a two-volume handwritten catalog in the library, compiled in 1915–1916, much more extensive than that of Lambros, which has the inscription: "Gabriel Stavronikitianou, The parchment codices of the library of the Holy Monastery of Stavronikita" ( A΄= 1–28, B΄= 29–56). At the end of his list, Gabriel also described five (5) other parchment codices and four scrolls, which were not recorded by Lambros, while he intended to proceed with the compilation of a more detailed list for the remaining codices as well, as evidenced by a handwritten notebook with a code description , which, however, did not manage to complete it.

Linos Politis compiled and published in 1953 a supplementary catalogue, where another eleven codices are recorded and described (nos. 175–185).

Today, the Library's collection includes 206 manuscripts, among which 34 are illustrated.

In five codices of the Library, works of classical and late antiquity are preserved, such as the rhapsodies of the Iliad, the Fables of Aesop, dialogues of Lucian and his work On Dreams, the letters of Synesius and his work On Dreams.

Noteworthy are the parchment Evangelist 43 (end of the 10th century) with representations of the four Evangelists as ancient philosophers, and the artistic Psalter 46 (12th century), written in gold-red characters and decorated with titles and initials.

Printed Books

The library of the Stavronikita monastery has several ancient copies.

Thomas Papadopoulos in the Libraries of Mount Athos (p. 7) mentions that the first Greek edition he found in the Stavronikita monastery dates back to 1523. It is the Great and all-useful Lexicon of Varinos Favorinos, edited by Zacharias Kalliergis.

Source https://www.aboutlibraries.gr/libraries/handle/20.500.12777/lib_454

Manuscripts
Library of Congress
https://www.loc.gov/collections/manuscripts-from-the-monasteries-of-moun...