Khutyn Monastery
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Khutyn Monastery of Saviour's Transfiguration and of St. Varlaam (Russian: Хутынский Спасо-Преображенский Варлаамиев монастырь) used to be the holiest monastery of the medieval Novgorod Republic. The monastery is situated on the right bank of the Volkhov River some 10 km north of Velikiy Novgorod, in the area known as Khutyn, whose name is derived from the Old Russian word for "devilry".
The cloister was founded by the Novgorodian boyar Oleksa Mikhailovich, who was appointed its first hegumen in 1192 and died the next year. As many miracles were reported at his tomb, Oleksa was canonized by the Russian Orthodox church as Saint Varlaam. He was the patron saint of Novgorod and the patrilineal ancestor of many families of Russian nobility, including Chelyadnins and Pushkins, of which Alexander Pushkin was a member.
As the story goes, Ivan III visited the cloister and wished to see the relics of Saint Varlaam in 1471. When they opened the saint's tomb, it was full of smoke and fire. Afraid of inflicting divine wrath, Ivan III fled the monastery and Novgorod altogether, leaving his staff as a curiosity to local monks. This staff was exhibited at the cloister's sacristy for centuries to come.
Ivan's son Vasily III, wishing to augment his influence in newly-conquered Novgorod, ordered the old monastery cathedral to be demolished and replaced with a noble six-pillared edifice, intended to demonstrate the might and wealth of Muscovite rulers. The new church, completed by 1515, was evidently patterned after the Assumption Cathedral in Rostov. It was the first piece of Muscovite architecture in the Russian North-West and a venerated model for many subsequent churches in the region.
The annex of St. Gabriel, added to the cathedral in 1646, received its present name after the poet Gavrila Derzhavin had been interred here in 1816. The refectory with St Varlaam Church was built on behest of Ivan IV in 1552. The Neoclassical belltower dates from the reign of Catherine the Great.
During the first decades of Soviet rule the monastery housed a lunatic asylum. It was restored to the church in 1993.
