Țipova monastery
The monastery Țipova ( Romanian Mănăstirea Țipova ), also called Uspenski monastery , is a monastery of the Moldavian Orthodox Church in the Rezina district in the northeast of the Republic of Moldova, which was founded in the 18th century . Below today's church, there are caves carved into the limestone cliffs on the banks of the Dniester belonging to the monastery. The oldest of the listed rock caves were created by hermits in the Middle Ages.
location
Coordinates: 47 ° 36 '12.9 " N , 28 ° 59' 6.7" E
The Țipova monastery is located on the right (western) bank of the Dniester (Romanian Nistru) about 17 kilometers as the crow flies south of the city of Rezina, which is separated from Rîbnița on the Transnistrian side by the Dniester . From Rezina a road leads along the river eight kilometers south to Saharna Monastery, the monastery closest to Țipova, which is very venerated by pilgrims. A few kilometers south of Saharna the flat bank area ends and the river flows on its west side along the steep drop of a range of hills, which prevents further progress on foot along the bank. The road leads from Saharna Monastery through the village of Saharna Noua to the west to the larger road R20, which connects Rezina with Orhei . The direct access to Țipova branches off a little south of the R20 and leads past the villages of Mincenii de Jos and Horodişte to the village of Lalova, which is again located on the Dniester. Halfway between Horodişte and Lalova, a three-kilometer gravel road branches off to the north to the Țipova monastery. Țipova is 30 kilometers from Orhei and 100 kilometers by road from the state capital Chișinău .
The landscape in the north of Moldova with heights between 300 and 400 meters is undulating, extensive and originally consists of a forest steppe, in which grasses, bushes and low deciduous trees grow. Except for smaller forest islands, fields with grain and sunflowers predominate. Only the rivers and side valleys of the Dniester and Răut offer natural retreats, which were suitable for the construction of monasteries. Some of the monasteries founded in the 17th and 18th centuries go back to the late medieval caves of hermits, which, apart from the monasteries Țipova and Saharna, existed at the Călărăşeuca monastery further north on the Dniester and in Orheiul Vechi on the Răut.
The village of Țipova, which consists of a few houses at the end of the road, lies on the plain above the 150 to 200 meter high steep drop to the Dniester and on the south side of the Țipova gorge, which runs inland from the Dniester to approximately the village of Horodişte. At the 2004 census, there were 314 almost exclusively Moldovan residents in the village.
From the church on the outskirts, a serpentine path leads down into the gorge to the mouth of the small Țipova stream. To the east, a footpath leads a few 100 meters from the church to the caves of the rock monastery, which are located on the steep slope at a height of 90 to 100 meters above the Dniester.
The picturesque, lush green Țipova gorge is a 306 hectare nature reserve and represents a scenic feature for the whole of Vltava. Several springs in the valley and on the slopes feed the stream, which flows through dense woodland and is reed in the lower area. A third of the area is forested with oaks , maples and other deciduous trees. The meadows in the valley floor are swampy in places. Hazelnut bushes , hawthorns , barberries and other bushes and shrubs grow on the dry grassy slopes of the gorge . A path meanders along the stream and after two kilometers in a basin it reaches the highest waterfall in Moldau at 16 meters. There is a shorter path from Horodişte to the waterfall. The Saharna Monastery is around ten kilometers from the waterfall without a continuous path. From a Dacian fortress from pre-Christian times on the southern slope of the valley, the remains of foundation walls can be guessed. The old traces of settlement, the abundantly blooming vegetation in spring and moist green vegetation in the dry and hot summer months have contributed to the creation of legends. A ghost in the form of a black monk is said to sneak through the rock caves at night and - just as imaginatively, the mythical singer Orpheus is said to have spent his last years in the area. His grave is believed to be in a rock niche by the pond formed by the waterfall.
history
The cave dwellings built in the limestone cliffs above the Dniester are probably the oldest monk caves in Moldova. The first caves served as a retreat from the Muslim Tatars between the 11th and 15th centuries . In the 14./15. In the 19th century a cave group with the rock church St. Nikolai was added. The third group of caves dates from the 16th to 18th centuries. The paths leading to the caves were not widened until the 18th century. Originally they were narrow and could be destroyed during attacks, so that access was then only possible via rope ladders from the river. The third cave group, which belongs to the rock monastery, consists of 18 rooms sunk into the rock on three levels, which are connected by corridors and stairs. In the lower area the water of a spring was collected in case of a siege.
According to a legend, the national hero Ștefan cel Mare , voivode of the Principality of Moldova , married his third wife Maria Voichița, daughter of the Wallachian prince Radu cel Frumos , in 1478 in the Țipova monastery . In the 18th century, the caves, after they had been abandoned, were renovated and re-inhabited. The village of Țipova first appears in a document in 1764. The monk Bartolomeu Ciungu (1739–1798), founder of the Saharna Monastery, had the hermitage and the monks' cells restored in 1776.
Between 1842 and 1919 only a few monks lived as hermits in the caves that were subordinate to the Saharna Monastery. In 1912 the detached church near the village was rebuilt on older remains at the instigation of the monk Inocențiu. During the time of the Archimandrite Sofroni Neaga, the monastery gained independence from Saharna in 1919. It is said that in 1940 the Prophet Bucur lived in the monastery and walked barefoot through the snow. At the time of the Moldavian SSR , no monks lived in the monastery between 1949 and 1994. While all monasteries and their buildings were looted and misappropriated during the Soviet period in the early 1960s, the Țipova caves were at least given the status of a protected monument, even if nothing was done to protect them. After the establishment of the independent state of Moldova (1991), the monastery was restored from 1994. Today it consists of the church on the outskirts and some rock caves that are comfortably furnished and heated. The church is surrounded by a monastery garden, which also includes a residential and farm building.
literature
- Frieder Monzer, Timo Ulrichs: Moldova. With Chișinău, all of Bessarabia and Transdnestria . Trescher, Berlin 2013, pp. 165–168
Web links
- Țipova monastery. moldovaholiday.travel
- Țipova . moldovenii.md (Romanian)
- Manastirea rupestra Tipova . CrestinOrtodox.ro (Romanian)
Individual evidence
- ^ Wilfried Heller, Mihaela Narcisa Arambașa: Geography . In: Klaus Bochmann, Vasile Dumbrava, Dietmar Müller, Victoria Reinhardt (eds.): The Republic of Moldau. Republica Moldova. A manual. Leipziger Universitätsverlag, Leipzig 2012, p. 161, ISBN 978-3-86583-557-4
- ↑ Ţipova, raionul Rezina . moldovenii.md (Romanian)
- ^ Defileul Țipova . moldovenii.md (Romanian)
- ↑ Frieder Monzer, Timo Ulrichs, 2013, p. 167