Sopoćani Monastery
History
The founder of the Sopoćani monastery is Stefan Uroš Nemanjić I, whose relics are in it. The year of construction of the monastery is not known, but it is assumed that it was in the second half of Uroš's reign. The monastery was named after the Slavic word “sopot”, which means “source”. The frescoes of the Sopoćani monastery are a true masterpiece, known all over the world, with the most significant being the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin.1 Although there is not much information about the Sopoćani monastery before the
Turkish rule, it is known that the monastery was rich and had a large number of monks. Sopoćani continued to exist even after the arrival of the Turkish army in this area. Immediately before the First Great Migration of Serbs, the Turks destroyed the monastery. The monastery was already abandoned at that time and remained so until the end of the First World War. The domes and vaults were destroyed, but the frescoes and icons - the greatest wealth of the monastery, resisted the bad conditions to which they were exposed for two centuries. In 1926, the renovation of the monastery began. Since 1979, the cultural and historical region of Stari Ras and the monastery of Sopoćani have been inscribed on the UNESCO list of world heritage sites. The monastery was once a nunnery, and today it houses over thirty monks and novices.
Cultural site details
The architecture of the Church of the Holy Trinity belongs to the classical forms of the Raška school. The base is a single-nave building, with a semicircular apse the width of the nave on the east side. Along the apse, there are side rooms of deacons and rectangulars shape. In the central part rises a circular dome with eight windows, raised by one cubic pedestal which is pulled to the roof. The church was built of hewn siga, in the Romanesque way. This way of building is characteristic of the coast. The church, next to the windows on the dome, is lit by large double windows, three on the north and south sides of the main nave, and one on the west facade and apse. They are made of white marble, in pure Romanesque forms, without any plastic decoration. These same strict forms were repeated on the marble portals leading to the church and from the narthex to the nave. A large open outer narthex with a three-story bell tower was erected in the time of King Dušan. The narthex has the shape of a rectangle whose vaults are supported by twelve columns, six pilasters and two free pillars, all of which are interconnected by arches. The narthex has a gabled roof, which is slightly lower than the roof of the main
Today, there are three studios in the monastery: icon-painting, tailoring and woodcarving. Due to its spiritual and historical significance, the Sopoćani monastery still bears the historical title of the Great Lavra.