Stavropoleos Monastery, also known as Stavropoleos Church during the last century, when the monastery was dissolved, is an Eastern Orthodox monastery for nuns in central Bucharest. The name is a Romanian rendition of a Greek Stauropolis (The city of the Cross), and the patrons are St. ArchangelsMichael and Gabriel. It was built in 1724 in Brâncovenesc style, during the reign of Nicolae Mavrocordat (Prince of Wallachia between 1719 and 1730), by archimandrite Ioanichie Stratonikeas, came in from Epirus. Within the precinct of his inn, Ioanichie built the church, and a monastery which was economically sustained with the incomes from the inn (a relatively common situation in those times). The inn and the monastery's annexes were demolished at the end of 19th century. Over time the church suffered from earthquakes, which caused the dome to fall. The dome's paintings were restored at the beginning of the 20th century.
All that remained from the original monastery is the church, alongside a building from the beginning of the 20th century (constructed following the plans of architect Ion Mincu) which shelters a library, a conference room and a collection of old icons and ecclesiastical objects, and parts of wall paintings recovered from churches demolished during the communist regime. The library has over 10,000 Romanian, Greek, and Church Slavonic books of theology, byzantine music, arts and history, more than 80 manuscripts and 400 printed works. The Byzantine music books collection is the largest in Romania, and consists mostly of the donations of two Romanian byzantologists, Sebastian Barbu-Bucur, and Titus Moisescu. The community living here, besides routine worship, is engaged in renovating old books, icons and sacerdotal clothes. The music sung during the offices is neo-Byzantine, based on the works of 19th century Romanian psalmodists, Greek chants translated into Romanian, or modern compositions.
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