Mezhyhirya Monastery

Although it is unknown when the monastery was founded, there are several different legends and stories about its founding. Some Rus' chronicles mention that there was a nun in Mezhyhirya in the 12th century, which might indicate that the Mezhyhirya Monastery existed at the time, although this is uncertain. A 19th-century Orthodox Metropolitan of Kiev and Galicia, Yevgeniy Bolkhovitinov, claimed{{cite journal|website=1000years.uazone.net|last=Lysenko|first=Valeriy|title=Legends and treasures of the Mezhyhorod place|publisher=The Ukrainian Information Project|year=2007|url=http://1000years.uazone.net/pub/DavnKnyg.doc|format=Word document|access-date=2007-01-05|language=uk|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060615034558/http://1000years.uazone.net/pub/DavnKnyg.doc|archive-date=2006-06-15|url-status=dead}} that it had been founded by the first Metropolitan of Kiev, Michael, along with Greek monks arriving from Byzantium in 988 AD.{{cite web|url=http://www.oko.kiev.ua/Monument.jsp?monumentId=191|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071112013847/http://www.oko.kiev.ua/Monument.jsp?monumentId=191|url-status=dead|archive-date=2007-11-12|title=Kyievo-Mezhyhirya Monastery (did not survive) (ХІІ-ХІХ c.)|access-date=2007-12-26|work=OKO-architectural and local interest site|language=uk}} The claim is likely spurious, since Mezhyhirya is not listed by modern authors among the monasteries of Kievan Rus'.{{Cite web |url=http://www.russiancity.ru/books/b55.htm |title=Л.Х. Азкунбю. Лнмюяршпх Мю Псях Xi - Яепедхмш Xiv Бейю |access-date=2014-03-08 |archive-date=2015-09-24 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924092929/http://www.russiancity.ru/books/b55.htm |url-status=live }}

In 1154, the Prince of Suzdal Yuri Dolgorukiy divided the territory surrounding the monastery's grounds amongst his sons.{{cite web|url=http://www.vyshgorod-museum.org.ua/index.php?go=News&file=print&id=5|title=Kyievo-Mezhyhirksyi Spaso-Preobrazhenskyi Monastyr|access-date=2007-12-27|work=Government historical-cultural reserve in the city of Vyshhorod|language=uk|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111002215233/http://www.vyshgorod-museum.org.ua/index.php?go=News&file=print&id=5|archive-date=2011-10-02}} His son Andrey Bogolyubsky received the lands nearest to the monastery, now the city of Vyshhorod. Not too long afterwards, he is alleged to have moved the monastery to its current location in the hills of the Dnieper,{{Citation needed|date=April 2024}} giving the monastery its name, "Mezhyhirya."{{#tag:ref|In this sense, "Mizh" (or "Mezh") translates as "between", while "hora" (or "hir") is equivalent to "hills" as in "between-the-hills".|group="nb"}}

In 1482, the Mezhyhirya Monastery was attacked by the Crimean Tatars under Meñli I Giray. In 1520, the monastery was restored. In 1523, the monastery was transferred to the King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania Sigismund I. In addition, the monastery was given a full reign over its territory. In 1555, the complex consisted of four churches, including one cave church on Pekarnitsky Hill.

File:Mezhyhirskyi Monastery by Vesterfeld, 1650s.jpg

File:Mezhyhirskyi Monastery by Shevchenko, 1843.jpg, 1843.]]

During the 16th century, the monastery frequently lost and regained its ownership rights. On the funds of the monastery's new hegumen Afanasiy (a protégé of prince Konstanty Wasyl Ostrogski), the monastery's old buildings were demolished, and new ones were built in their place. In 1604, the Gate Church of Ss. Peter and Paul was constructed, in 1609 - the Mykilska Refectory, and the Transfiguration Cathedral in 1609-1611. Under his rule, the monastery was considered as the second lavra (cave monastery) in Ukraine.{{#tag:ref|It was referred to as the "Sviato-Mezhyhirska Lavra" ({{langx|uk|Свято-Межигірська Лавра}}).|group="nb"}}

After its reconstruction, the Mezhyhirya Monastery became a regional center of the Zaporozhian Host, serving the host as a military monastery. In 1610, the monastery received the status of a stauropegic monastery (orthodox church autonomy), under the Patriarch of Constantinople. The universal (act) of Hetman Bohdan Khmelnytsky issued on May 21, 1656 transferred the neighboring settlements of Vyshhorod, Novi Petrivtsi, and Moshchun under control of the Mezhyhirya Monastery. In effect, the universal made Khmelnytsky the monastery's ktitor.{{#tag:ref|A "ktitor" is someone who provides funds for the construction and decoration of a monastery.|group="nb"}} After the destruction of the Trakhtemyrivskyi Monastery by a Polish szlachta army, the Mezhyhirya Monastery replaced it as the main cossack military monastery. As a military monastery, retired and elderly cossacks from the Zaporozhian Host would now come to the monastery to retire and live in until the end of their lives.{{cite news|first=I.|last=Vikovan|title=What is hidden behind the walls of the presidential residence?|url=http://news.uaclub.net/25_256374.html|work=UAКлув|date=November 12, 2007|access-date=2007-12-27|language=ru|archive-date=2011-07-24|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110724114457/http://news.uaclub.net/25_256374.html|url-status=live}}

In 1676, the area was burned down after a fire started in the wooden Transfiguration Cathedral. With the help of Ivan Savelov, a monk who lived in the monastery and later became a Patriarch of Moscow,{{cite web|url=http://gatchina3000.ru/brockhaus-and-efron-encyclopedic-dictionary/065/65524.htm|title=Mezhygorskiy Spaso-Preobrazhenskiy, men's, 1st class monastery|access-date=2007-12-27|work=Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary|language=ru|archive-date=2011-07-19|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110719232314/http://gatchina3000.ru/brockhaus-and-efron-encyclopedic-dictionary/065/65524.htm|url-status=live}} the complex was reconstructed. Two years later, with the help of the cossack community, the Annunciation Church was constructed near the monastery's hospital.{{Citation needed|date=April 2024}}

In 1683, the Sich Rada voted that the ministers in the Sich's Pokrovskyi Cathedral (the main cathedral of the sich) should be only from the Mezhyhirya Monastery. In 1691, monasteries located near the Sich were placed under the Mezhyhirya Monastery's authority. Under hegumen Feodosiy at the end of the 17th century, considered as a period of prosperity, the Mezhyhirya Monastery became one of the largest monastery's in Ukraine. The Mezhyhirya Chronicle, covering the period of 1608 to 1700, was completed around the turn of the century.

At the request of Peter I of Russia, the stauropegic status of the monastery was revoked; it was later reinstated in 1710. In 1717, a large fire destroyed a large portion of the monastery's buildings. The monastery's "military" status was reconfirmed by cossacks in 1735. In 1774, with the funds of the last Koshovyi Otaman Petro Kalnyshevsky, the Ss. Peter and Paul Church was reconstructed. Ukrainian architect Ivan Hryhorovych-Barskyi designed some of the buildings, including the monk's residence.{{cite web|url=http://www.ukma.kiev.ua/ua/general/history/professors/grygoro/index.php |title=Hryhorovych-Barksyi Ivan Hryhorovych |access-date=2007-12-27 |work=National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy |language=uk |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071103114809/http://www.ukma.kiev.ua/ua/general/history/professors/grygoro/index.php |archive-date=2007-11-03 }}

File:Mezhyhirskyi Monastery, postcard.jpg

A period of decline began with the abolition of the Zaporozhian Host by Catherine II of Russia. In 1786 the Russian Imperial government closed the monastery and confiscated its valuable treasures. The remaining Zaporozhian Cossacks soon afterwards left Zaporizhia, and moved to the Kuban region. There they founded the Kuban Cossack Host, which still exists to this day. The cossacks were able to leave with some of the monastery's manuscripts,{{cite web|url=http://www.pushkin.kubannet.ru/1/rk/index3.html|title=Section I. Slavic books with Cyrillic alphabet XVI-1st half of the XIX century.|access-date=2007-12-27|work=Krasnodar Krai Scientific Library of A.S. Pushkin|language=ru |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20071111202358/http://www.pushkin.kubannet.ru/1/rk/index3.html |archive-date = November 11, 2007}} some of which are now kept in the Krasnodar Krai Archive.{{cite news|first=I.|last=Vikovan|title=Kyievo-Mezhyhirskyi Spaso-Preobrazhenskyi Monastyr|url=http://www.novasich.org.ua/index.php?go=News&in=view&id=100|publisher=Nova Sich|date=May 20, 2006|access-date=2007-12-26|language=uk|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110727010428/http://www.novasich.org.ua/index.php?go=News&in=view&id=100|archive-date=July 27, 2011|url-status=dead|df=mdy-all}}

In 1787, Catherine II of Russia came to Kyiv for a visit and wished to see the Mezhyhirya Monastery. She never got to see it, because the monastery mysteriously burned down the night before her arrival.

File:Межигірський монастир. 1934.jpg

In 1796, a German engineer found that the area had suitable clay for the making of faience, and two years later, founded the Mezhyhirya Faience Factory, the first one in Ukraine, at the site of the unused monastery. By 1852, the faience factory had become the largest industrial complex in Kyiv.{{harvnb|Makarov|2002|p=277}} During its existence, the factory produced a variety of crockery and ornamental vases and figurines.{{cite web|url=http://www.mundm.iatp.org.ua/EXHIBIT/TEA-THINGS.SHTML|title=Exhibit of items from porcelain and faience factories of Ukraine from museum collections (July 6-August 31, 2005)|access-date=2008-01-05|work=Museum of the National Ukrainian Decorative Art|language=uk|archive-date=2008-03-20|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080320133917/http://mundm.iatp.org.ua/EXHIBIT/TEA-THINGS.SHTML|url-status=live}} In 1884, the faience factory was closed down after it failed to bring any profit.{{cite web|url=http://www.oldkyiv.org.ua/data/mezh.php?lang=ru |title=Mezhigorye - Mezhigorskiy monastyr |access-date=2007-12-28 |work=oldkyiv.org.ua |language=ru |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071108192343/http://oldkyiv.org.ua/data/mezh.php?lang=ru |archive-date=2007-11-08 }}

In 1894, the Mezhyhirya Monastery was rebuilt and transformed into a women's monastery. After its reconstruction, the monastery was transferred to the authority of the Intercession of the Saints Monastery in Kyiv.{{cite web|url=http://www.nice-places.com/articles/ukraine/kiev/227.htm|title=Sviato-Pokrovskyi Monastery. Second continuation|access-date=2007-12-27|work=Nice-Places.com|language=ru|archive-date=2007-12-21|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071221164005/http://www.nice-places.com/articles/ukraine/kiev/227.htm|url-status=live}}

After the Russian Revolution, the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic's capital moved from Kharkiv to Kyiv in 1934, and the city was in need of a suburban residence for government officials. Mezhyhirya was chosen as the site of the new government residence.{{cite news|first=Kutsyi|last=Oleksandr|title=On the residence of Viktor Yanukovych an underground passage is being built|url=http://www.gpu-ua.info/index.php?&id=175890|work=Gazeta po-ukrayinski|date=August 3, 2007|access-date=2007-12-26|language=uk|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071109214605/http://www.gpu-ua.info/index.php|archive-date=November 9, 2007|url-status=dead|df=mdy-all}} The decision of the Politburo in April 1935 ordered the demolition of the whole complex. Before the scheduled demolition in 1936, the architecture and buildings of the monastic complex were photographed. During the demolition, an underground library was supposedly discovered, full of handwritten manuscripts.{{cite web|url=http://sovremennik.ws/2007/09/17/zagadka_biblioteki_jaroslava_mudrogo.html|title=Tale of the library of Yaroslav the Wise|access-date=2007-12-26|last=Tsalyk|first=Stanislav|author-link=Stanislav Tsalyk|work=Biblioteka Sovremennika|language=ru|archive-date=2013-07-09|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130709211357/http://sovremennik.ws/2007/09/17/zagadka_biblioteki_jaroslava_mudrogo.html|url-status=live}} There were speculations that the discovered books belonged to the lost library of Yaroslav the Wise,{{cite news|last=Sverbyhuz|first=Volodymyr|title=Secrets of the Mezhyhirya Saviour|url=http://day.kiev.ua/65335|work=Den|date=September 14, 2001|access-date=2007-12-27|language=uk|archive-date=2011-08-07|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110807163135/http://www.day.kiev.ua/65335|url-status=live}}{{cite news|last=Pavlov |first=Mikhail |title=Life of Yaroslav |url=http://www.uatoday.net/rus/article/history/47552 |work=uatoday.net |date=July 9, 2007 |access-date=2007-12-27 |language=ru |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071212210922/http://www.uatoday.net/rus/article/history/47552 |archive-date=December 12, 2007 }} or perhaps of a later period, during the times of the Zaporozhian Host.{{cite web|url=http://www.cossackdom.com/doc/slutskyi_monostir.htm|title=This book is of the Mezhigorskiy monastery|access-date=2007-12-26|last=Slutskiy|first=A.|work=cossackdom.com|language=ru|archive-date=2012-08-10|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120810010526/http://www.cossackdom.com/doc/slutskyi_monostir.htm|url-status=live}} But during archaeological excavations from 1990 to 1994, neither the alleged basement nor the purported manuscripts were found. The only thing that remains now of the monastic complex is a water well.{{cite news|title=Yanukovych is living in a medieval monastery|url=http://www.obozrevatel.com/news/2007/8/3/183156.htm|work=Obozrevatel|date=August 3, 2007|access-date=2007-12-27|language=ru|archive-date=2011-05-25|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110525201901/http://www.obozrevatel.com/news/2007/8/3/183156.htm|url-status=live}}

During Soviet times, the area served as a residence for Leonid Brezhnev and Volodymyr Shcherbytsky, who worked in the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic's government at the time.{{cite news|last=Stakhovsky|first=Dmytro|author2=Tetyana Chornovil|title=Residence of Yanukovych|url=http://www.unian.net/ukr/news/news-207470.html|work=UNIAN|date=August 13, 2007|access-date=2007-12-26|language=uk|archive-date=2007-12-13|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071213001111/http://unian.net/ukr/news/news-207470.html|url-status=live}} During this period, its location was concealed from the public.{{Citation needed|date=April 2024}}

• Athanasius
• Isaiah (Kopinsky)

• Mezhyhirya Chronicle
• Mezhyhirya Residence

;Notes

{{reflist|group="nb"}}

;Footnotes

{{reflist|2}}

;Bibliography

{{refbegin}}

• {{citation|last=Makarov|first=A.N.|title=Little Encyclopedia of Kiev's Antiquities|publisher=Dovira|year=2002|location=Kyiv|isbn=966-507-128-9|language=uk}}

{{refend}}

{{commons category|Mezhyhirya Monastery}}

• {{cite web|url=http://litopys.org.ua/sborlet/sborlet04.htm|title=Mezhigorskaya Letopis|access-date=2007-12-27 |work=litopys.org.ua|version=(in Old East Slavic)}}
• {{cite web|url=http://www.antiq.info/glass/3010.html|archive-url=https://archive.today/20070823075440/http://www.antiq.info/glass/3010.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=August 23, 2007|last=Petrakova|first=A.|title=Faience creations of the Kiev-Mezhigorsky Fabric|date=April 3, 2002|access-date=2007-12-27|work=Русскій Антикварiатъ|language=ru}}
• {{cite web|url=http://www.novydom.com.ua/?m=4|title=Cottage village|access-date=2007-12-27|work=Novyi Dim|language=ru}}
• {{cite web|url=http://lb.ua/news/2010/01/20/21107_Avto_YAnukovicha_Yizda_bez_pravil_.html|script-title=uk:Авто Януковича. Їзда без правил з липовою "ксивою"|access-date=2011-01-03|work=Tetiana Chornovol|date=20 January 2010 |language=uk}}
• {{cite web|url=http://lb.com.ua/news/2010/12/28/79587_Itogi_goda_s_Tatyanoy_CHernovil.html |title=End of the year with Tatyana Chornovil: End of the Donetsk Mafia |access-date=2011-01-03 |work=Tetiana Chornovol|language=uk |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110101022502/http://lb.com.ua/news/2010/12/28/79587_Itogi_goda_s_Tatyanoy_CHernovil.html |archive-date=2011-01-01 }}
• {{cite encyclopedia|url=http://www.encyclopediaofukraine.com/display.asp?linkpath=pages%5CM%5CE%5CMezhyhiriaTransfigurationMonastery.htm|title=Mezhyhiria Transfiguration Monastery|access-date=2016-01-27|encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Ukraine|language=en}}

Category:Houses completed in 1894

Category:Buildings and structures in Kyiv Oblast

Category:Zaporozhian Host

Category:Eastern Orthodox monasteries in Ukraine

Category:Former religious buildings and structures in Ukraine

Category:1935 disestablishments in Europe

Category:Demolished churches in Ukraine

Category:Monasteries of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate)

Category:Nunneries in Ukraine

Category:988 establishments

Category:Religious buildings and structures completed in the 980s