Agia Lavra
Agia Lavra is an Eastern Orthodox monastery near Kalavryta in Achaea, on Chelmos Mountain in the Peloponnese, Greece. It sits about 961 meters above sea level and is considered one of the oldest monasteries in the region and a symbol of modern Greece.
The monastery has been burned and rebuilt many times. Turks destroyed it in 1585, it was rebuilt in 1600 with frescoes by Anthimos completed in 1645. It burned again in 1715 and in 1826 during Ibrahim Pasha’s campaigns, and was rebuilt in 1850 after Greece’s revival. German forces burned it in 1943, and it was rebuilt afterward.
Agia Lavra is famously connected to the start of the Greek War of Independence. On March 25, 1821, Bishop Germanos of Patras gave a blessing and swore the Peloponnesian fighters to liberty or death under a plane tree outside the gate, raising the revolutionary flag that day.
The monastery’s museum holds many important items: vestments, documents, icons, the Gospel of Catherine II of Russia, sacred vessels, crosses, and relics of Saint Alexios given in 1398 by Byzantine emperor Manuel II Palaiologos. It also preserves 16th-century embroidery from Smyrna and Constantinople. A monument to the heroes of 1821 stands on a hill opposite the monastery.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 16:56 (CET).