Bucharest Antim Monastery and the palace within is one of the buildings that dictator Ceausescu moved to build a new capital center. This happened from 1977 to late 1987. Wonder how can you move an entire monastery since it seems impossible? They call it translation and we will explain how it works. Since we live here, we were interested about it and learned more because we visited Bucharest Antim Monastery and it is an architecture masterpiece. You will read about things that were not on the internet when we had started to gather information for you.

WHERE IS ANTIM MONASTERY AND VISITING HOURS

You can visit Bucharest Antim Monastery on your tour around House of the People and the Old City of the Romanian capital. This is one of the oldest monasteries and is dated back to Constantin Brancoveanu reign in the Romanian Country. This means the dawn of the 18th century. This lord had a short reign because he was executed with his sons by the Turks. Communists wanted to demolish part of the monastery because they wanted to build the new center of the capital. The monastery is in the center of Bucharest, at Antim Ivireanul Street No. 29, not far from the House of People and the Romanian Patriarchy Headquarters. Bucharest Antim Monastery is opened daily from 7 AM to 8 PM. 

WHO BUILT BUCHAREST ANTIM MONASTERY AND WHEN?

Antim Ivireanul was a priest who built the monastery from 1713 to 1715 and he had the help of citizens for this. He made the plans of the building and put his money for it. Many people from Bucharest helped him to build this monastery near the Patriarchy Palace of that time. According to historians, he carved the iconostasis in stone with his own hands and he also made the main door of the building. Antim Ivireanul was a scholar, architect, priest, writer and philanthropist. He built the monastery in Brancoveanu style. 

PUBLIC LIBRARY AT ANTIM MONSTERY IN BUCHAREST

In the beginning, Antim Ivireanul called the monastery All Saints and here functioned a printing house and, perhaps, the first library in the country. The founder himself wrote a note to learn the priests how to lend books to people. He who borrowed a book, had to sign for that and bring it back. This was in 1715. Bucharest Antim Monastery was not only a worship place because the monks helped people in many ways. Its founder decided that part of money the monastery made to be used to help youth who wanted to study. All the people in need who have no money or food could come here. Also all young women who had not enough money to get married following tradition were welcomed here. After his death, people of Bucharest called the monastery simply Antim as a sign of gratitude.

WHO WAS ANTIM IVIREANUL?

Antim Ivireanul was born in 1650 on the territory of nowadays Georgia, at the Black Sea. The soldiers of the Turkish Empire took him as a slave and sent him to the capital. There, he learned Greek, Turkis and Arab languages, sculpture and painting. The Romanian Lord of that time, Constantin Brancoveanu brought him in the country in 1690 and he soon became a high priest of the country. He printed 63 books and made everything possible for people to learn how to read and write. After Brancoveanu’s death, the new lord of the country sent him to jail. He should have been imprisoned for life in a monastery at Mount Sinai, but on the way, the Turkish soldiers killed him. They  threw his body in the river Tungia, near nowadays city of Edirne. In 1992, the Romanian Church made Antim Ivireanul a holy martyr and a saint. 

ANTIM MONASTERY IN BUCHAREST NOWADAYS 

 After Antim’s death in 1716, Greek monks, brought by the new lord of the country, Nicolae Mavrocordat, managed the monastery and  lead it to financial collapse. The political power was in the hands of the Greek boyars from Fener, a part of nowadays Istanbul. Yet, in the beginning of the 19th century, Bucharet Antim Monastery  became a School for priests and also a worship place. In 1821, here used to meet the head of a popular revolt, Tudor Vladimirescu with a priest because it was a kind of conspiracy house. They tried to change the Turkish-Greek regime, but they failed. The Monastery almost fell into ruin after an earthquake in 1836. Fortunately, authorities restored and in 1854 it was safe enough to house the Archives of the State. 

In 1912, the Palace of the monastery appears and it is the building that an engineer managed to move entierly when, later, communists wanted to demolish. It was a worldwide event to move on heavy wheels a huge building without damages. But we’ll tell you about it in a second. Because of World War 2 and another earthquake, the priests had to stop all educational projects. Authorities also rebuild the monastery from 1937 to 1947. 

ENTRANCE TO ANTIM CHURCH IN BUCHAREST

HOW THEY MOVED BUCHAREST ANTIM MONASTERY 

When the communist regime under Nicolae Ceausescu’s rule( want to see the Ceausescu’s residence in Bucharest?) started the works for the House of People and for the entire Unification Square, they demolished many buildings. Among them was also Antim Monastery, its palace and the monks’ rooms, but there was a problem. The monastery palace was 9,000 tons and in the world nobody had moved such a heavy structure before because, probably, nobody thought it was possile. The entire project started in 1984. So, how did they do it?

WHO MOVED ANTIM MONASTERY?

An engineer, Eugeniu Iordachescu, had to supervise the workers who were to demolish a lot of churches to make way for the new Bucharest center. It was in 1982 and he had an idea: why destroy them when we can move them? His strategy is called Iordachescu strategy since nobody has ever managed a project like that. In the winter of the year 1985 and they dug under the palace of the monastery although it was very cold, 20 degrees below 0.

LIFTING CHURCHES

They made huge reinforced concrete beams under the building and, then, they lifted it more than 1 meter, using a complex hydraulic weight lifting system. Workers used, then, heavy wheels to move the palace 33 meters. It had 9,000 tons with 100,000 books in it and they were not put out, but left in the library during translation. It took about 12 hours to move the building and, thus, save it from destruction. In the same year, another church also moved is MIHAI VODA MONASTERY.

Nowadays, here you can visit an ecclesiastical art museum and a lapidarium because here have been brought funeral stones from all the worship places destroyed in Bucharest in time. First time travel to Bucharest? Legends said that in the time of Dracula was built a church!

Antim Monastery might be an interesting stop in your journey in the center of the capital which is UNIFICATION SQUARE where from you can go the Patriarchy Hill or to the Old City to have lunch. You can get to Antim Monastery walking from Unirii Square because it is quite close to it.