Bachkovo Monastery
Bulgaria's second largest monastery, founded in 1083, with an eleventh-century ossuary and painted refectory.
The monastery was founded in 1083 by Gregory Pakourianos, a Georgian in Byzantine service who was grand domestic of the West, and his brother Abasius, and its early community was Georgian. The two-storey ossuary that stands a few hundred metres from the main gate survives from that first period and is unusual in the Balkans, its lower chapel keeping frescoes of the eleventh and twelfth centuries. After Ottoman destruction the complex was rebuilt, and the cathedral church of the Dormition of the Theotokos was completed in 1604.
Two courtyards hold four churches, monks' ranges, a library and a museum. The old refectory of 1601 is painted with a Last Judgement and a table of abbots, while the outer wall carries Alexi Atanasov's panorama of 1846 showing the monastery's own history, often called the largest scenic mural in the Balkans. Zahari Zograf worked here in the 1840s. The cathedral shelters a revered icon of the Virgin, and Patriarch Euthymius of Tarnovo, exiled to Bachkovo, is buried in the grounds.
Highlights
- Two-storey ossuary of the 1080s with early frescoes
- Old refectory of 1601 painted with a Last Judgement
- Alexi Atanasov's 1846 panorama of the monastery on the outer wall
- Revered icon of the Virgin in the cathedral church of 1604
![Afrique occidentale française : Cathédrale à St Louis / [photogr. Eugène] Gallois ; [photogr. reprod. par Radiguet et Massiot pour la conférence donnée par] Gallois](https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/0a/Afrique_occidentale_fran%C3%A7aise_-_Cath%C3%A9drale_%C3%A0_St_Louis_-_%28photogr._Eug%C3%A8ne%29_Gallois_%3B_%28photogr._reprod._par_Radiguet_et_Massiot_pour_la_conf%C3%A9rence_donn%C3%A9e_par%29_Gallois_-_btv1b532798828.jpg/500px-thumbnail.jpg)
![[Golestan, Le Salon et Fete de l'equinode, Teheran, Iran (le Pavillion du Trone)]](https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/33/-Golestan%2C_Le_Salon_et_Fete_de_l%27equinode%2C_Teheran%2C_Iran_%28le_Pavillion_du_Trone%29-_MET_DP202918.jpg/500px--Golestan%2C_Le_Salon_et_Fete_de_l%27equinode%2C_Teheran%2C_Iran_%28le_Pavillion_du_Trone%29-_MET_DP202918.jpg)
![Théâtre de la guerre dans l'Inde sur la coste de Coromandel / par M.B.C.T. [Monsieur Bourcet Capitaine ?] ; gravé par Croisey](https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/99/Fort_de_Calicuta_-_btv1b59706294.jpg/500px-Fort_de_Calicuta_-_btv1b59706294.jpg)
