Virgin (Holy Mother) Iconography of Moldova and its Balkan Origins
Virgin (Holy Mother) Iconography of Moldova and its Balkan Origins

Summary/Abstract: The Virgin iconography of Moldova Among refers to rare models of Holy Mother, which have direct tangency to Bessarabian art of the 18th and the 19th centuries. Aware of irretrievable losses during the Soviet times, when monasteries and churches were closed (1957–1961), and cult items were confiscated or destroyed, it is too difficult to assess the national medieval icon, because of this void left of masterpieces from different epochs. This is also true for the Virgin of Moldova icon, mentioned by the Russian researcher Evgeny Poselyanin in Holy Mother: Illustrated Description of Her Life and Wonderworking Icons (Moscow, 1914) and served as a model for Bessarabian painters during the medieval period. The Virgin of Moldova icon from the Monastery of St. Nicholas, Kherson eparchy (the early 19th c.) is a specific interpretation of the 12th-century Virgin iconography of the Monastery of St. Catherine in Sinai; The Mother of God Pelagonitissa fresco (1318) at the church of Staro Nagoričane or Playful Child (Evhaitskaia, 1345) iconography at Chilandari Monastery, Mt Athos; in The Mother of God Pelagonitissa from Dečani (14th century), and similar icons from Skopje (1422, artist Makarios), of Nikolo-Ugreshsky Monastery (18th century, Russia) and many more. The article seeks to show how this iconographic model for the respective icons had been formed and developed, but also their common and specific peculiarities.

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