Manasija Monastery: A History

With God's help, monastic life in Manasija Monastery was renewed at the beginning of the 19th century, and this holy place itself was gradually restored as well. The 19th-century restorations of Manasija mentioned above, although significant and although they saved the monastery from decay, were nevertheless not complete but partial. In the Manasija complex it was necessary to restore other buildings as well, first of all to provide living quarters, and it was also necessary to furnish the monastery with all the things needed for monastic life. From travel notes of the mid-19th century we learn that the Manasija monks lived very modestly, and that there were not many of them. The German mining engineer Wilhelm Richter (?) visited Manasija in 1839 and, admiring the Manasija fortress, wrote that the old holy place was inhabited by only two monks.⁸⁸ But the monastery was alive, and the situation was changing rapidly. In the literature one finds mentions of various Manasija monks from the middle of the 19th century: besides the abbots already mentioned, the Manasija community in this period also included the hieromonk Grigorije Stojanović (superior of the Miljkovo monastery, who moved to Manasija in the autumn of 1837),⁸⁹ as well as the widowed priest Zdravko Simić from Grnčarica (likewise enrolled in the Manasija brotherhood in the autumn of 1837),⁹⁰ who took the name Zosim in monasticism,⁹¹ the hieromonk Pantelejmon Popović (c. 1796–1868; a native of Gložani; in Manasija in 1848;⁹² transferred from Manasija to the Miljkovo monastery in 1852 or 1853; later abbot of the Miljkovo monastery),⁹³ the hieromonk Mihailo (transferred from the Miljkovo monastery to Manasija in 1852),⁹⁴ the hieromonks Simeon Popović and Mihailo Miljković, who are mentioned in 1853,⁹⁵ the hieromonks Mihailo, Genadije and Kiril, who are mentioned in the official data for 1854, and also for 1855 and 1856,⁹⁶ in 1857 the hieromonks Kiril, Mihailo and Evstratije,⁹⁷ in 1858 and 1859 the hieromonks Kiril and Mihailo, as well as the monk Julijan, while together with Father Pantelejmon in the Manasija metochion, the Miljkovo monastery, the hieromonk Timotej is mentioned in 1858,⁹⁸ the hieromonks Kiril, Mihail and Gerasim in 1860 and 1861,⁹⁹ and other monks; unfortunately, the history of Manasija Monastery is to a great extent unknown, and the names of the Manasija monks have not yet been systematically researched and listed, so that many of them remain unknown to us. But some information about the monastery from this period is known from the literature. The first artistic depictions and drawings of Manasija Monastery have survived from the middle of the 19th century. The painter and writer Dimitrije Avramović (1815–1855) drew the Resava fortress in 1846, showing the appearance of the fortification from the west side.¹⁰⁰ In the same year, Janko Šafarik (1814–1876) published three drawings of Manasija Monastery.¹⁰¹