Zymne Monastery, Cave monastery in Volyn Oblast, Ukraine.
Zymne Monastery is a walled complex on the Holy Hills above the Luha River near the village of Zymne. Its centrepiece is the three-nave stone Assumption Church, with a two-tier tower attached to the northeast. The defensive walls have five gates and three corner towers, and a gate bell tower stands on the south side. North of the plateau, beside the small Trinity Church, a slope entrance leads to caves with the underground Church of Saint Barlaam.
Tradition credits Prince Vladimir with founding the monastery in 1001, though the first written record dates to 1458. In the mid-15th century Fedir Chartoryisky built the stone Assumption Church and fortress walls; his son Oleksandr cast a bell in 1566 that survives. The monastery passed to the Uniates in 1682, was closed, and reopened as a women's convent in 1893 under the Korets Monastery.
The monastery is now a women's community, restored in 1991 by nuns from the Korets convent, and stauropegial since 1996. Its wonder-working Zymne Icon of the Mother of God, a Greek-style image on cypress wood, returned to the Holy Mountain in 1995. The nuns run a gold-weaving workshop and a bakery, and the monastery hosts a children's ophthalmology clinic and summer camps.
Zymne Monastery stands on the Holy Hills above the Luha River by the village of Zymne, a few kilometres from Volodymyr in Volyn Oblast. The main buildings sit on a plateau reached on foot; the small Trinity Church and the entrance to the caves with the underground Church of Saint Barlaam lie north of the plateau, in the hillside.
Although the monastery is rooted in Orthodox tradition, some of its stone buildings show Gothic architectural elements more commonly found in Western Europe. This mix came about through the long influence of the Polish Kingdom over the region during the medieval period.
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