Byzantine Crimea
The Crimea is a peninsula of towering peaks, balmy seas and a colourful population. The Russian Tsars and Soviet elite spent summers here, in its Cold War heyday when it was a workers’ paradise, and with its Mediterranean-style climate it’s still the perfect holiday retreat.
It became a semi-autonomous region of Ukraine when the country became independent after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, but it remained culturally Russian – it was invaded by Russia in 2014 which now claims it as its own.
Crimea has been conquered and controlled many times throughout its history and occupied by a cast of thousands -from Byzantine Greeks, Genoese, Mongols and Tatars, to Cimmerians, Persians, Goths, Huns, Bulgars, Khazars, Kipchaks, Golden Horde Tatars and Ottoman Turks.
At the Bakhysaray Monastery & Holy Assumption Church you can experience Byzantine mysticism and even help rebuild a monastery by hand
Yes, Ukraine is teeming with Byzantine monasteries but the Holy Assumption Church is said to be the “cutest in the country”.Crammed into a cliff-face of limestone rock, and built inside a cave, this gold-domed church was built by Byzantine monks in the 8th or 9th century. The adjoining Bakhysaray Monastery claims to be the oldest in Crimea. The builders followed the natural contours of the cliff to build a series of chapels and cells right inside the rock.
Today, it’s home to an order of Russian Orthodox monks and is also an increasing popular pilgrimage site whose fountain is said to bring health and blessing to those who drink from it. Travellers can stay here for up to three days – but first need to seek permission from the monastery abbot. Guests are provided with food and accommodation but have to get up early and be prepared to work hard. When they’re not busy praying, the monks spend most of their day rebuilding their monastery by hand.
Chufut Kale
This medieval ruin perches high on a plateau, next door to the adjoining Bakhysaray Monastery and is one of most visited of Crimea’s sixteeen cave cities. This honeycomb of caves and structures where people took refuge for centuries – especially Turkish Jews until the mid-19th century – is known today as the Jewish Fortress. It’s a fascinating place to explore – especially the burial chambers which are literally hewn out of the rock face like Swiss cheese, their open windows offering vertigo- inspiring viewsto the valley below. The cave complex was first recorded as Kyrk-Or (Forty Fortifications) and was settled between 6th and 12th centuries by Christianised tribes. The city streets are still intact and the ruins make for interesting exploring.
Chufut Kale is the closest cave city to Bakhchisaray but Mangup Kale is probably the most interesting, and Tepe Kermen the most remote and least visited. You can walk from Bakhchisaray to Chufut Kale and Tepe Kermen, all the way up to Mangup Kale via the town of Kuybyshevo ,a distance of 30 kilometres.
