Patmos Monastery: A Spiritual and Arts Treasury
The fortified Monastery of St. John the Divine towers majestically, both physically and spiritually, over the entire island. It stands on a hilltop opposite the port of Skala, clasped tightly by the brilliant white medieval town of Hora.
Inside the Monastery are various buildings that have been added over the centuries of its existence, so that today it appears as a complex maze of buildings on different levels.
Gracing the walls of the Monastery church and chapels are important Byzantine frescoes. In its museum, visitors get a taste of the vigor and fame it has known during its journey through time; the monks have preserved the Monastery's valuable relics, despite the periods of privation and decline through which it has passed.
Elaborate Byzantine artwork, vessels fashioned by silversmiths and goldsmiths, gold-embroidered vestments, and an extremely rich collection of icons make up a mosaic of ecclesiastical art from the 11th through the 18th centuries.
Also of great importance is the Monastery library, which houses 1,000 parchments and 1,000 different volumes, dating from the time of the first printing presses and up to the 18th century. The archive of Codices is unique for its chronological continuity and its significant collection of Byzantine documents. Today, organized according to modern methods of library science, it is available to scholars of Byzantine history.
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