St. Panteleimon Monastery — the last refuge of Prince Boris I

Although no precise information has survived as to exactly which cloister the prince chose, most historians believe it was the monastery of Sveti Panteleimon, located 6 km from Veliki Preslav, Bulgaria’s second capital. This monastery is also known as the Patleina monastery.

A long history

Built at the end of the 9th century, the monastery was one of the largest monasteries near Preslav. As in other monasteries, here they

copied and translated books, and also trained future priests. Moreover, this place was also a centre of the ceramics industry: the monks

expertly produced ceramic icons, tiles and tableware. In the 9th–10th centuries the scale of production was such that the craftsmen’s wares became famous beyond the country’s borders.

The monastery church was richly decorated and faced on the inside with ceramic tiles, in all likelihood of its own making. The floor was covered with marble mosaic. The remains of the church altar, which have miraculously survived to our day, are impressive in their elegance and splendour. Unfortunately, almost nothing of the original buildings has

survived: in the 11th century the monastery was destroyed by the Byzantines, and later it was repeatedly plundered by the Pechenegs. In socialist times the buildings were used as a sports base.

Today the monastery is designated a cultural monument, but entry is closed, and the cloister where Prince Boris the First spent the last years of his life can only be seen from the outside. This important historical monument is gradually falling into ruin. Although the site could become a place of pilgrimage for tourists, the Bulgarian authorities do not include it in the list of the country’s most important landmarks and, accordingly, no one allocates money for the monastery’s restoration.

Pliska: the cradle of Bulgarian statehood

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