Our Bulgarian friend Metodi Mladenov invited us on September 18th 2023 to join a tour in the library of Sografou monastery. It lies on top top floor, almost above the trapeza.
From the top-floor of the West wing of the monastery we had a beautiful view on the courtyard with its chapels, katholicon, phiale and cenotaph.
From the top floor I could make some pictures of the courtyard: old pine trees with the Katholicon
The library is located near the tower of the monastery and includes 126 Greek and 388 Slavic manuscripts, as well as about 10.000 printed books. Most of the old Bulgarian manuscripts are written in “Old Bulgarian“.
Perhaps the most important manuscript of the monastery is the Bulgarian code no. 17, Rabomir’s psalter of the 13th century. Also, three Slavic manuscripts are considered of high historical value: the 13th century Dragan’s Calendar with the lives of the martyred Saints, the Slavic codex no. 28, a Tetraevangeli in Slavic from 1569 and finally, the Slavic codex no. 1 of 1762, which essentially constitutes the first recording of the history of Bulgaria by the monk Paisiy (read more below).
It contains the earliest documented evidence of Sografou and his land. Monk Thomas, abbot of the monastery of Cyrus Antonius, sold to Cyrus Onesiphorus the monastery (agros) called Xirokastro and dedicated to the holy Apostles. The border description is a valuable testimony of the early period of the history of the Sografou monastery, which probably acquired the monastery “Holy Apostles” together with the property documents towards the middle of the 13th century. The deed has been preserved in two medieval copies – one, on parchment, from the 12th century, drawn up according to the original, and a second one, on paper, from 1311, drawn up according to the first copy. At the end, the painting abbot Macarius puts his signature for certification.
Mansucript on the right: A Sultan’s ferman of 1462 Imperial order of Sultan Mehmed II (the Conqueror), guaranteeing tax privileges to the monks of Mount Athos for raising small cattle. The ferman was drawn up on August 25, 1462 in the military camp near Yenidze Vardar (present-day Yanitsa in Greece)
Another important book in the library is the book of father Otets Paisiy Hilendarski, or Father Paisiy of Chilandar. He was a monk in the monastery Chilandar in 1762. Chilandar was controlled by Serbs, but many of its monks were actually of Bulgarian origin, including Paisiy and his elder brother, who was the abbot.
Father Paisiy started writing his book while in Chilandar but an internal conflict between the monks forced him to move to another monastery on Mount Athos, the Bulgarian-controlled Sografou. There, in 1762, he finished what he called “a small history”, with long and official name: Slav-Bulgarian History. On the Bulgarian People, Kings and Saints, and All Bulgarian Deeds and Events. Read here how it was stolen in 1984 by the Bulgarian Communist state security and brought back again in the late 1990s and how it “somehow ended up on the desk of the then director of the National History Museum”. The book was returned to monastery in 1998.
Wim Voogd, 28-12
