Stephen the Great
Research and Documentation Centre
“Stephen the Great” Research and Documentation Centre was established at the Holy Putna Monastery on the 2nd of January, 2005, with the blessing of His Eminence Pimen, Archbishop of Suceava and Rădăuți.
The scientific events organized at Putna Monastery during “Holy Stephen the Great 500” – 2004 commemorative year revealed the need for a structure meant to foster knowledge and research of our past.
Excerpts
from our publications
The masters who worked in the Putna workshop perfectly mastered the secrets of embroidery and were able to produce original pieces. The tomb cover of Maria Asanina Palaiologina, the consort of Stephen the Great, is a unique piece in the whole post-Byzantine world. Decorated with Byzantine monograms and symbols, it is a lively expression of what was Moldavia during the time of Stephen the Great: a "Byzantium after Byzantium”.
Just as the Holy Voivode Stephen the Great has a special place in the heavens of the Romanian soul, "his beloved monastery” has a special duty so that, through prayer and ascetic deeds, the will of God may be fulfilled with our nation: ORTHODOXY AND THE ROMANIAN SPIRIT.
And the path on which it takes us is written into the message inscribed on the charter borne by the hands of our Glorious Voivode in his icon, calling us into the eternity of divine love: "Above our ease lies the holy duty to defend the being and independence of our country.”
Hit by armies, robbed by foreign and domestic thieves, threatened by foreign and indigenous persecutors, Dragomirna – with all that she stands for – remains a place of remembrance. It expresses and brilliantly proclaims the victory of the soul and spirit, of love for beauty and harmony, of the sacrificial thought through which all of the world unites and ascends.
Dragomirna Monastery. The Memories of a Place of Remembrance
“Mitropolit Iacov Putneanul” Publishing House
PUBLICATIONS
Annals of Putna
Journal
“Annals of Putna” is the only scientific journal which focuses on the epoch of Stephen the Great and the history of Putna Monastery.
It was created to stimulate and focus the historians’ efforts on these two main topics of research. Its scientific span was subsequently enlarged to include the history of other monasteries from Bukovina.
Since 2004, the “Holy Stephen the Great 500” commemorative year, Putna Monastery has co-organized several scientific international seminars on our holy ancestor, his epoch and heritage, and the history of the first monastery that he founded.