Gavrilo of Lesnovo

Gavrilo of Lesnovo (Serbian: Gavrilo Lesnovski; Osičko Polje in the 10th century) was a venerable Serbian hermit who lived in the tenth century and did much good. His contemporaries were John of Rila and Prohor of Pčinja.[1]

Biography

Gavrilo of Lesnovo was born in Osičko Polje (Osiči) in the 10th century.[2] As the only child of rich parents, he received all the attention and was provided with the best education. When he grew up, he married a girl of the royal family who died soon after.

He was a Balkan Slav, a friend of Prohor Pčinjski and Jovan Rilski (John of Rila). He struggled in the 10th century near Kratovo on Mount Lesnovska, where he built a temple to the Holy Archangel Michael and was its abbot, with numerous fraternities that soon came to him.[3][4] He became known as a miracle worker both during his life and after his death. The current church located at the present-day monastery was built by Despot Jovan Oliver, a nobleman under the Emperor Dušan the Mighty. Saint Gavrilo died in the Lord toward the end of the tenth century.

There are three biographies of the Venerable Gabriel. The first Life was written in 1330 by the monk Stanislav in the Lesnovo monastery. It is probably an abbreviated transcript of an earlier life. The other two biographies date from the 15th and 16th centuries and provide more details about Gabriel. They state that the Patriarch of Trnovo and the Bulgarian Tsar Jovan Shishman (1371-1391) transferred the relics of the Venerable Gavril Lesnovski to the Church of the Twelve Apostles, near the Church of John of Rila, where they are still located today. Saint Gabriel passed away at the end of the 10th century.

The Serbian Orthodox Church celebrates it on January 15 according to the church calendar, and on 28 January according to the Gregorian calendar. His character is preserved on the frescoes in the monasteries of Lesnovo, the Patriarchate of Peć, Gračanica, Orahovica and Jurca near Bitola.

It remains still unsolved whether Gavrilo founded a monastery or was it founded on the spot close to his hermitage. Very little is known of this original monastery since Gavrilo's relics were taken away and the first and only mention of the old monastery comes only from 1330 in a chronicle by monk Stanislav of Lesnovo, who mentions Gavrilo's funeral.[4]

See also

References
  1. Serbia), Muzej primenjene umetnosti (Belgrade (February 23, 1981). "Zbornik" – via Google Books.
  2. "Slovo-ASO Project: Lesnovo Monastery". July 6, 2011. Archived from the original on 2011-07-06.
  3. Gabelić, Smiljka (February 23, 2017). "Relief panels on a three-light window from Lesnovo. Proposing an interpretation of the semiotics of carved motifs". Zograf (41): 157–168. doi:10.2298/ZOG1741157G – via www.doiserbia.nb.rs.
  4. Smolčić Makuljević, Svetlana (January 1, 2011). "Death in the Medieval Visual Culture of the Balkans". IKON. 4: 45–58. doi:10.1484/J.IKON.5.100682.
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