Holy Trinity Monastery - Veliko Tarnovo

Overview

The Holy Trinity Patriarchal Monastery is a Bulgarian monastery. It is located on the right bank of the Yantra River at the foot of the Arbanassi Plateau, in the eastern part of the Dervent Gorge, 6 km north of Veliko Tarnovo.

According to certain data, the Monastery of the Holy Trinity was founded in 1070 by Georgi, a churchwarden, and his son, Kalin, but is more likely to have been built by Patriarch Euthymius with the help of Tsar Ivan Shishman, hence its name of Patriarchal or Shishman's Monastery. For a time it was the centre of the Turnovo School of Literature, headed by Euthymius, probably after he was elected Patriarch in 1375. Language rules and significant spelling reform were introduced by that school. Popular Bulgarian writers were educated there.

The Patriarch Monastery was demolished when Turnovo fell under Ottoman rule. It was restored in 1847 with the financial help of the local people, but in a different place, 1km away from the old monastery. At that time a new church was built, a masterpiece of the famous Bulgarian Kolyo Ficheto. The icons and frescoes were painted by the eminent wall-painter Zahari Zograf. A huge earthquake destroyed a part of the monastery in 1913, including the church,  only the icons, and the iconostasis have been preserved. The monastery was completely reconstructed in 1927, but in an altered, simplified style and the design of rebuilt church differs from that of Kolyo Ficheto.

The monastery was inhabited by male monks until 1946 when the first nuns cаme. The monastery is officially declared to be a nunnery since 1948.