The holy monastery of Agios Nikolaos of Varsa is 12 kilometers from Tripoli and is located near the village of Neochori. It is a male stauropigian monastery dedicated to Agios Nikolaos. Stavropigiaks are the monasteries in which the patriarch sends a cross to be placed on the foundations of the monastery church, an act that leads to the monastery's dependence on him.
The Monastery celebrated, for an unknown reason, except for Saint Nicholas, also Saint Constantine. In this celebration, the inhabitants of the surrounding villages would gather and the unmarried men would choose their future wife.
The name of Varsi is old. It probably has a Slavic root, which is related to water.
According to one version, the word is compound: Var=has and son=water, i.e. a place that has water.
In fact, there is a spring in the Monastery, from which the Monastery is irrigated until today. The water springs from under the Holy Step of the Catholic Saint Nicholas. The entrance to the spring, as well as its passage, have been carved into the natural rock. In the past, this source gushed a lot of water and the monks watered many orchards, which they maintained under the Monastery.
The Monastery is one of the oldest in Peloponnes. The date of its foundation according to tradition and according to the inscription, which is walled in at the entrance of the Narthex, is the year AL (=1030 AD)
The door of the Monastery, the main entrance, is located on the east side and leads through the arched "passage" to the courtyard of Agios Nikolaos. The fortress character of the Monastery is obvious, as the Monastery is organized on different levels due to the morphological configuration of the land.
The courtyards are divided into three levels - tiers. In the northern part (to the right of the person entering) there is a three-story wing, in which the Bank, the Archontariki and the Despotic are located. Also, a three-story wing rises to the west, where the abbot and the monks' dormitories are located. Around the various buildings form a parallelogram. On the middle level, the Catholic Church, the Church of Agios Nikolaos, was built, parallel to the rampart wall. Thick lime mortar has covered the temple's masonry.
WALL PAINTINGS
In the main Church, the iconographic program is divided into three horizontal zones. In the first zone from below, on the long and western wall, full-length Hierarchs, Prophets, Apostles, Ascetics, etc. are depicted. In the second zone martyrdoms of Saints are depicted. On the west wall, "Every breath" is particularly extensive, on the north wall, representations of the life and miracles of the honored Saint Nicholas. Various figures and breastplates on the legs. The third zone is occupied by Akathistos Ὕmnos. In the cross arches, performances from the life and miracles of Jesus.
The usual topics have their place in the areas of the Holy place according to zones. Subjects from the Old Testament, figures of Hierarchs and Apostles in various positions inside the niches, walls, domes and pessos, as well as martyrdoms of Saints, are preserved in relatively good condition. The Trollos depicts the Pantocrator, surrounded by a decorative belt and in the central arch the Platytera throne.
The condition of the frescoes dating back to the 16th - 17th century is good, although they have been covered with a layer of moss and have occasionally received repaintings and newer repairs. Certain areas of the frescoes, mainly in their lower part, have been coated with varnish, which shows intense oxidation. Finally, almost all the painted surfaces carry salts.
In the summer of 1999, some maintenance work was carried out on the upper part of the frescoes.
DOCUMENTS
From the preserved archive and the code of the Monastery we have successive testimonies of the monastic brotherhood during the 18th century, both in the care of maintenance and in the increase of the building complexes, but also in matters of an internal nature. In the Monastery there are manuscripts from 1700-1800, seals of Patriarchs and Turkish. Also, the...
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