Jazak monastery, Orthodox monastery in Fruška Gora mountain, Serbia
Jazak Monastery is a Serbian Orthodox women's monastery on the southern slope of Fruška Gora, founded in 1736. Its complex consists of the Church of the Holy Trinity with a three-storey bell tower, surrounded on three sides by residential wings, with a wall and vaulted entrance on the fourth. The church has light-rendered walls, a shallow dark gabled roof, and two towers with dark onion domes.
The monastery was founded in 1736 on the Gradac site, on the southern slope of Fruška Gora, during the time of Metropolitan Vićentije Jovanović. The Baroque Church of the Holy Trinity was consecrated in June 1758 by Metropolitan Pavle Nenadović, and the old monastery's inventory was transferred into it. The nearby Old Jazak, first recorded in 1522, was dissolved in 1773 under Maria Theresa's decree reducing monasteries and soon fell into ruins.
The name Jazak comes from the nearby village, and the monastery is now a women's community led by abbess Paraskeva (Drapšin) since 1990. The iconostasis, made between 1759 and 1769, holds 58 icons by Dimitrije Bačević with assistants Teodor Kračun and Dimitrije Popović; the carved woodwork is attributed to Marko Vujatović. In 1899 Pavle Čortanović painted oil murals of national and Christian saints on the church walls.
The monastery is an active women's community under abbess Paraskeva (Drapšin), who has led it since 1990, so visits are made around the nuns' daily services. The church stands in the middle of the walled courtyard, with the quarters for the sisters on three sides and the walled, vaulted entrance on the fourth. The monastic prnjavor lies on the road toward Jazak village, and the ruins of Old Jazak are about two kilometres north.
The monastery holds the relics of Emperor Stefan Uroš V, transferred from Nerodimlje in 1705, which gave the community lasting prestige. The founder of the older Jazak Monastery, now in ruins about two kilometres north, is by tradition Despot Jovan Branković, son of Stefan the Blind and Mother Angelina.
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