Pângărați Monastery

Pângărați Monastery lies in the village and commune of Pângărați, Neamț County, on the left bank of the Pângărați stream, east of Mount Botoșanu. It is reached by a road that branches off the Piatra Neamț-Bicaz highway (DN15) towards the "Dimitrie Leonida" hydroelectric plant at Stejaru. It is a monastery for monks under the Archdiocese of Iași, dedicated to the Great Martyr Demetrius the Myrrh-streamer. According to the history published by the monastery, in 1432 the monk Simeon of Bistrița settled here as a hermit, and in 1461, with help from Stephen the Great, he built a wooden church dedicated to St Demetrius, later burned by the Ottomans. The stone church was built by order of Prince Alexandru Lăpușneanu and consecrated in 1560 by Metropolitan Grigorie of Suceava, when Amfilohie was abbot; Lăpușneanu also built the bell tower. In 1642, under Prince Vasile Lupu, the grand treasurer Dumitru Șoldan and his wife Safta renewed the church roof, the tower and the refectory. The present layout of the precinct is due to Archimandrite Varnava (abbot 1833-1859), who built a second courtyard with brick cells and a vaulted cellar and founded the village of Pângărați. From 1872 the buildings were used as a prison, and in 1960 the monastery was closed and handed over to the Stejaru research station. The church reopened as a parish church in 1981 and as a hermitage in 1983, and in 1991 it was re-established as a monastery for monks. The Venerable Simeon and Amfilohie of Pângărați were canonised in 2008. The princely church has two levels: below is a chapel, originally a strongroom for the church treasures, turned into a chapel in 1806, and above is the main church, entered through a side porch added in 1909. The old painting was whitewashed, and the church was repainted and reconsecrated in 2002. The old bell tower collapsed on the night of 11-12 June 1996; the present tower, built in 2008 on the old foundations, reproduces it. The precinct also includes the new church, built while Archimandrite Teofil Lefter was abbot (1996-2012), with mosaics of Saints Simeon and Amfilohie at the entrance and a canopy holding relic fragments. The monastery museum keeps the original iconostasis of the princely church, painted by the hieroschemamonk Daniil, two late sixteenth-century icons of Christ and the Mother of God, a sixteenth-century fresco fragment showing St Demetrius, and old books, including Varlaam's Cazania of 1643. The complex is a class A historic monument (LMI code NT-II-a-A-10637) comprising the church of St Demetrius and the Holy Archangels Michael and Gabriel (NT-II-m-A-10637.01), the sixteenth-century cell building (NT-II-m-A-10637.02), the enclosure wall (NT-II-m-A-10637.03), the bell tower foundations (NT-II-m-A-10637.04) and the north-east tower (NT-II-m-A-10637.05). The monastery is open to visitors and offers accommodation.