Panagia Soumela

By tradition two monks, Barnabas and Sophronios, founded the monastery in 386 on a cliff face in the Pontic mountains above Trabzon, to house an icon of the Theotokos painted by St. Luke. It was the spiritual heart of the Pontic Greeks for 1,500 years. When they were driven out in 1923, the monks buried the icon, and it was later recovered and taken to a new Panagia Soumela in northern Greece. Since 2010 the Liturgy has been allowed once a year at the old monastery on August 15.

• Date: 386