Attraction
Jercălăi Monastery
Jercălăi Monastery, officially the "Sfânta Maria" Monastery of Urlați, is an Orthodox monastery for monks in Jercălăi, part of the town of Urlați, Prahova County. Its wooden church, built in 1731 in the village of Luieriu near Reghin and brought here from Bran Castle, was reconsecrated in 1956 and is a class A historic monument (PH-II-m-A-16521).
The monastery lies in Jercălăi (formerly Zărcălăi), part of the town of Urlați, on the hills of the Dealu Mare wine region, beside the ruined church of the former Cricov skete. The skete was abandoned after the secularisation of monastic estates, and its church collapsed in the 1940 earthquake. Near the church stands a sixteenth-century stone memorial cross, a listed historic monument (PH-IV-m-B-16908).
The wooden church was built in 1731 by the villagers of Luieriu, near Reghin in Mureș County, and dedicated to the Archangels Michael and Gabriel. After the villagers built a new masonry church in the 1930s, they gave the old one to Queen Marie for the royal residence at Bran Castle. It was consecrated at Bran by Metropolitan Nicolae Bălan of Transylvania only on 22 July 1939, after the queen's death, and dedicated to St Mary Magdalene. Once the castle became a museum, the church was neglected; on the initiative of Patriarch Justinian Marina it was dismantled, reassembled at Jercălăi and reconsecrated on 8 November 1956 by the patriarchal vicar bishop Teoctist Botoșăneanul, the future patriarch, under its original dedication.
The church has a rectangular plan with a semicircular apse of the same width as the nave, covered by a barrel vault. The porch and the bell tower above the south entrance were probably added in the nineteenth century. The present interior painting dates from 1838, according to the inscription naming the painter Stențel Condrat; scenes in the nave include the Last Judgement, the Sacrifice of Abraham and the Raising of Lazarus.
Between 2018 and 2023 the church was restored through the Regional Operational Programme, with support from Prahova County Council: the foundation, floors and shingle roof were rebuilt, and the interior painting, altar table and liturgical objects were restored. On 3 August 2023 the 1939 consecration act was found inside the base of the altar table, and in July 2025 Patriarch Daniel reconsecrated the church, placing it also under the protection of St Mary Magdalene.
Jercălăi, orașul Urlați, județul Prahova