Pantanassa Monastery
Ruins of a monastery of the Despotate of Epirus, near Lake Ziros and Filippiada.
- Location
- About 17 km from Arta and 5 km from Filippiada
- Founded
- Mid-13th century, by Despot Michael II
- Today
- Ruins, with the chapel of Saint Basil
- Excavations
- From 1971
Pantanassa lies north of Arta, near Lake Ziros, on the old Ioannina–Preveza road. It is about 17 km from Arta and 5 km from Filippiada. It belonged to the former prefecture of Arta; today Filippiada is in the Preveza regional unit.
History
It was founded by Despot Michael II Komnenos Doukas as penance for his way of life and his treatment of his wife Theodora, later a saint, according to her biographer, the monk Job Melias. The katholikon was built in the mid-13th century and the surrounding ambulatory was added at the end of the century. By the 15th century the church was badly damaged and the monastery was abandoned. In 1820 the English traveller Thomas Hughes described its ruins.
Architecture
The church is a rare variant of the complex cross-in-square type, with influences from Constantinople and five domes. A Π-shaped ambulatory surrounds it, with two domed chapels at the eastern ends. Only the southern one, of Saint Basil, survives; it was restored after the excavations that began in 1971. The masonry is cloisonné, with stones framed by rows of brick.
