Description of the attraction
German monastery of St. Ivan Rilski belongs to the Bulgarian Orthodox Church. It is located in the Lozenskaya Valley, 5 kilometers from the village of German and only 15 kilometers from Sofia. The Germanic monastery is recognized as one of the most ancient monasteries in Bulgaria: it was founded during the reign of Peter in the 10th century, when the veneration of Ivan Rilski was just beginning to spread.
According to legend, in the Byzantine period, the monastery was given gifts from Alexei I Comnenus, the emperor. And during the period of the Turkish yoke, the monastery was repeatedly destroyed. The monastery was completely restored in the 17th century. The monastery was renewed first in 1801, and then again in 1818, when Abbot Antipas added another building to the monastery complex - a stone one-nave church dug into the ground. The residential buildings were renovated in the same year. A crucifix has survived intact from the temple, the inscription on which accurately indicates the year of construction in 1818. It is assumed that the consecration of the renovated church took place in the same year.
From 1870 to 1912, the abbot of the monastery was hajji Nikifor, and his brother, the monk Cyril, helped him. Under their management, the monastery economy included at least 150 hectares of meadows and fields, a water mill, as well as about 150 heads of cattle and small ruminants.
Towards the end of the 19th century, after the liberation of the country, the monastery was renewed again. The old church was dismantled and a new one was built in its place by the craftsmen from Slatina. As a material, they used hewn stone, which was supplemented with three decorative brick rows, and the outer corners were decorated with smooth stone slabs. The church was crowned with a wooden dome covered with tin. A little later, a ten-meter porch was added. The icons that adorned the old church were later transferred to the Historical Museum of Sofia.
An interesting fact: in the 1890s, the Bulgarian Tsar Ferdinand visited the German monastery, who planted two sequoias in front of the northern gate of the church, which still grow here.
The church and monastery buildings were restored again in the 1960s.
