25 years ago, a terrible tragedy occurred in the village of Kamany. Abkhaz troops, which included Russian militants, who launched a large-scale offensive along the entire front, after landing troops in Tamysh and storming Georgian positions on Gumista on the night of July 5, 1993, captured the high-mountainous village of Kamany, famous for its monastery of St. Basilisk. According to legend, here in 308 the holy martyr Basilisk was killed and buried. Near the monastery in Kamany, the spring of St. Basilisk flows, in which there are stones on which, according to legend, the blood of St. is visible. Basilisk

In Kamany there is one of the world's Christian shrines - the sarcophagus in which St. John Chrysostom, who served here in exile and went to the Lord with his last words: “Glory to God for everything!” Body of St. John Chrysostom was kept in this sarcophagus for thirty years, after which it was transferred with honors to Constantinople.

The head of John the Baptist was also hidden there from the Romans during the persecution of Christians.

Under the communists, all this was abandoned; a reservoir was dug next to the source so that people would not go to it. Abkhaz businessman Yuri Anua in the early 80s undertook to restore the monastery, he built a staircase of 1,500 steps so that one could climb to the place where the head of John the Baptist rested, rest areas were arranged on this staircase so that it would be easier for people with poor health to climb up .

The village of Kamany was defended from the attackers by only 35 local Georgians. When at 3 o'clock in the morning the battle approached the monastery of Fr. Andria said to those in the monastery, “We must expect death every minute. Let us prepare for confession and communion,” and he took the chalice from the altar and for the last time communed the people saved in the monastery with the holy blood and body of Christ.

There was a knock on the door outside.
· Open up!
Yuri Anua, who was just ordained subdeacon with the blessing of Fr. Andrey opened the doors. He was the first to be taken out into the yard, being urged with rifle butts.
· What is your nationality? - they asked him.
· I am Abkhazian. - Yuri Anua answered.
· Ahh, Abkhazian, that is. What are you doing with the Georgians?
· I know who the real Georgians were and who owns this land.
· On knees! - the militant growled.
· Never…

That night, Father Andria and Yuri Anua were killed.
Eternal memory to the defenders of Sukhumi and the innocent victims of that war!

The village of Kamany after the war

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The village of Kamany (Abkhazia) is translated as “holy place”. And the name is completely true. This place is thrice holy. Why does a secluded small village, located 15 kilometers from the capital of Abkhazia, Sukhumi, attract hundreds of pilgrims from all over the world?

Thrice holy place

The village of Kamany (Abkhazia) is a major center of pilgrimage because it is associated with the names of three saints. The relics of the Holy Martyr Basilisk rest here. In the same village, one of the three Ecumenical Hierarchs, John Chrysostom, died before reaching his place of exile. Kamana (Abkhazia) is also closely connected with John the Baptist.

It is necessary to immediately clarify the point why the village’s affiliation specifically with Abkhazia is specified in brackets. In Asia Minor there is also a settlement of the same name, and for a very long time the fact of the death and burial of John Chrysostom in the Abkhaz village was disputed. And for some reason it was especially vehement in Soviet times. But research has confirmed that the relics of the saint were transported to Constantinople precisely from the Abkhazian Kaman.

Difficult moments in history

These three names mean a lot for Orthodoxy. Here, evidence of their actual stay in the mentioned place has been preserved to this day - the Chapel with the relics of the Martyr Basilisk and the holy spring that flowed in response to his prayers; a grotto with a miraculous trace of the head of John the Baptist; a stone sarcophagus weighing 1 ton, in which the remains of John Chrysostom rested.

Truly holy places, prayed for, blissful, capable of healing ailments and strengthening faith... So Orthodox pilgrims from all over the world come here. And not only believers - atheists also come. It should be noted that these holy places, namely the village of Kamany (Abkhazia), suffered under the atheistic government - for example, the Basilisk-Chrysostom Monastery was turned into a nursing home. The village was also severely damaged during the military conflict of 1992-1993.

Holy Martyr Basilisk

Who are these saints? A famous Christian martyr was Theodore Tiron. His own nephews - Basiliscus, Cleonicus and Eutropius, young Roman soldiers - were thrown into prison for preaching Christian sermons among the pagans. The reigning emperor at that time, Maximian Galerius (305-311 AD), was particularly cruel towards Christians. It is he who is considered the initiator of anti-Christian persecution. The righteous in prison did not repent, and the two Basilisk brothers were crucified on crosses. He himself was sent into exile by the cruel pagan ruler Agrippa, who arrived in Amasia - the city where the events described took place. In order to show that Basilisk would publicly renounce his faith, he led him to a pagan temple. But in response to the demand to make sacrifices to pagan idols, Basilisk said that he constantly makes sacrifices to his God. And then fire came down from heaven and incinerated both the temple and the idols... The enraged Agrippa ordered Basilisk to be sent to Camana, which was then considered a distant place of exile, and he was ordered to be led in copper boots with nails protruding from the soles inward. Having reached their destination, the martyr was chained to an old withered oak tree and, in response to requests for a sip of water, was ordered to ask his god for it. The Basilisk asked. At the same moment, a spring burst out of the stone, which still exists today. Holy water gave him drink and washed him, but the guards, enraged by what they saw, cut off his head. The saint's body was bought by residents of the village of Kamany (Abkhazia). A monastery at the site of the execution was erected a few years later - in 308.

It has not survived, and the relics still rest under a stone tombstone. And no matter how much they later tried to transport the remains of the saint to another place, every time something prevented this. Now a chapel has been erected there, and next to it an ancient holy spring flows, possessing amazing power. At the bottom, on the stones, red spots are clearly visible, and thousands of believers consider them traces of the saint’s blood.

Ecumenical Saint John Chrysostom

Three Ecumenical saints - Basil the Great, John Chrysostom and Gregory the Theologian - lived in the 4th-5th centuries. John Chrysostom, as you might guess, was so nicknamed because of his amazing eloquence, which he used for the benefit of the Christian faith. As Archbishop of Constantinople, he tirelessly consoled the suffering and converted pagans to the faith. Constantinople at that time was mired in shamelessness, especially the imperial court. The dissolute Empress Eudoxia was zealous in her sins. John Chrysostom entered into an irreconcilable struggle with her. Several times, at the request of the saint, the Lord showed his power (an earthquake and a strong fire) and frightened the crazy woman for a while, but she came to her senses and again fought with the righteous man. In a final fit of anger, she ordered his execution, but her more prudent husband, Emperor Arkady, replaced the cruel sentence with exile to the edge of the empire, to distant Armenia. In exile, Chrysostom, famous for his phrase “Thank God for everything,” taught parishioners and followers to thank the Lord for every day they lived, even for the suffering sent. And in his distant exile, he did not stop his educational activities and corresponded with like-minded people - 245 of his letters have survived to this day.

This vigorous activity did not go unnoticed, and it was decided to send him even further. Probably, the village of Kamany (Abkhazia) seemed to the rulers of those times something similar to hell, if they sent their worst enemies there. And now, a hundred years later, the story of the Basilisk Martyr repeated itself. For three months, cruel guards, mocking the sick and exhausted escort in every possible way, took him to the village of Kamany, where he died two days later, uttering his famous phrase before his death. And in Constantinople everyone remembered and remembered their beloved mentor. And so, at the request of the city residents, in 438, Theodosius II returned the relics of the saint to the capital of Byzantium. But the sarcophagus, carved from a single limestone block, in which the Ecumenical Saint rested, remained in Kamany, and in honor of the saint, local residents built a temple over it, the renovation of which began in 1989. At the same time, during the construction of a three-tier bell tower, the famous sarcophagus was found, the memory of which the Soviet government tried in every possible way to exterminate. Before the war of 1992-1993, the shroud of St. John Chrysostom was kept in the temple. It was lost (presumably stolen) during difficult and troubled war times.

John the Baptist

The third patron of the Kaman holy places baptized Jesus Christ himself in the waters of the Jordan. Born a little earlier, by his birth he anticipated the imminent arrival of the Savior, which is why he is called the Forerunner.

A legendary figure whose importance for the entire Christian world cannot be overestimated, he was killed by beheading by Herodias, a Jewish princess. Her daughter Solomea took John’s head (this plot is depicted on many canvases of world painting) and hid it. Then the misadventures began. There were three discoveries of the head of John the Baptist. The third and last thing happened in Kamany. The head was secretly taken here in the 9th century during the persecution of Christians. The valuable relic was found thanks to a prophetic dream of the clergyman Innocent.

Michael III, Emperor of Byzantium, sent an embassy to Camany in 850, and the head was returned to Constantinople with great honors. Before that, it was kept by monks at the foot of a picturesque mountain in the village of Kamany (Abkhazia). A photo of the grotto with a miraculous trace from the head is attached below.

Revival of the monastery

The village of Kamany is located on the western reaches of the local river Gumista. And there is also the Eastern branch. Between them rises Mount Gumbikha, on which is located the Temple of St. John Chrysostom, where monastic life has resumed since 2001.

The ancient church, built no later than the 11th century, has been surrounded by a stone fence since ancient times. On the basis of the foundation of the ancient church, the walls of the new temple grew, with two newly created chapels.

Pilgrims and their reviews

Below it, on the right side, are the ruins of the Vasilisko-Zlatoust convent, founded in 1898. The village of Kamany (Abzazia), whose monastery united on its territory the objects of worship of the entire Orthodox world, has become even more popular in our time - up to 50,000 pilgrims a year come to the walls of the monastery. It should be noted that the authorities of the unrecognized Abkhaz Republic in February 2011 donated the facility to the Orthodox Church. Not far from the monastery, on a hill there is the grave and source of St. Basilisk. The Orthodox pilgrimage center - the village of Kamany (Abkhazia) - can only have rave reviews. This is God's place, filled with goodness.

People come here to worship holy places; they come in winter and summer not for comfort, but for help. The fame of the healing power of this place and the holy spring spread very far. Those who arrive stay near the monastery in tents. Near all holy places, at the peak of pilgrimage, the ground is simply covered with straw, on which people who arrived in the village of Kamany (Abzazia) sleep. The monastery is being rebuilt all the time through the efforts of Abbot Ignatius. Thus, the bridge, destroyed by the war, was restored, as a result of which it was necessary to get to the monastery along an unsafe road through the village of Verkhnyaya Eshera. Now everything is different...

Easy to get to

It was already noted above that just 15 km from Sukhumi is this world famous center of pilgrimage - the village of Kamany (Abkhazia). How to get to these holy places? The village lies higher in the mountains (relative to Sukhumi). If you move north, then after 12 km you can get to the village of Shroma (Guma), beyond which the desired object is located at the confluence of Western and Eastern Gumista.

The road runs past the famous monkey nursery, through the Gumista gorge, then through the village of Mikhailovka with the Transfiguration Church. You can visit these holy places, located within a half-hour drive (if you travel by car) from Sukhumi, under the program “To the Holy Places of Abkhazia”. Every year the direction “Kamany, Abkhazia” becomes more and more popular. Monastery". Absolutely every resident of this country knows how to get there; in addition, there are many signs and guidebooks are sold, so you don’t get lost.

Abkhazia, Sukhumi district, village. Kaman

The village of Kamany (Koman, Komany) in Abkhazia is one of the most revered places by Christians, whose history goes back more than two thousand years. It is located in the Sukhumi region, 15 km from the center of the Abkhaz capital on the banks of the Western Gumista River. The name of the settlement is translated as “Holy Place”.

According to Christian legends, in 308 the Holy Martyr Basilisk died and was buried here. In the village of Kamany there is a wooden chapel of a Christian martyr, and there is also a holy spring that came out of the ground in the place where the saint’s head was cut off. The water from this source is believed to have healing powers. Every year during Epiphany, a large number of believers come to the source not only from all over Abkhazia, but also from other countries. According to belief, whoever plunges into the water of the spring on this day will receive forgiveness of his sins and the blessing of the Almighty. That is why, even in the coldest winters, on Epiphany you can see many people here who want to feel the miraculous power of this water.

A century later, in 407, John Chrysostom died in Comana, who was one of the three Ecumenical saints and teachers along with Basil the Great and Gregory the Theologian. Until 483, the body of the saint was in the village, after which it was transferred to Constantinople. There is a monastery of St. John Chrysostom in Comana. During the construction of the bell tower, a tomb was discovered in the ground, in which the saint was presumably buried before his body was transferred to Constantinople. Currently, the tomb is located in the temple, and the place of the original burial of John Chrysostom has become a center of pilgrimage for Orthodox believers.

In the village of Koman, not far from the Church of St. John Chrysostom, there is another holy place where pilgrims come from all over Russia - the grotto where the head of St. John the Baptist, the closest predecessor of Jesus Christ, was hidden. In the 18th century, the relic was stolen and secretly taken from Byzantium to Abkhazia. A century later, it was found and returned to Constantinople, and the grotto in Comana began to be revered as a sacred place for Christians around the world.

Today, the small village of Kamany in Abkhazia is the largest pilgrimage center and excursion site. From 1898 to 1924 there was a convent here, which was destroyed during the USSR period.

You can book an excursion to Kamany at any excursion bureau in Abkhazia or from private owners who organize trips to local attractions. The closest way to get to the village is from Sukhumi, so if you are on vacation in Sukhumi, be sure to visit this amazing place - Koman.

Kaman shrines in photographs

“Once upon a time, not very long ago, at the confluence of two mountain rivers there stood an ancient temple. There is a large village around. The people there were pious, visited the temple every Sunday and maintained its beauty. For this, God gave them wealth, the villages began to grow, the shacks turned into palaces and soon the village began to look like a beautiful city. But the time came when people lost interest in God and stopped donating to the temple, which no one needed anymore. Then the punishment befell them, the war began and those who managed to survive were forced to flee to other lands only with what they could take with them. So, in a very short time, the populous village was deserted.”

The war doesn't want to go away

This is the true legend that local residents tell about the Kaman Temple and the large Mingrelian villages of Shroma and Akhalsheni that surrounded it in the past, now lying in ruins. Conversations on the bus fade away as pilgrims and tourists drive along a rutted road among ruined houses and huge cemeteries, heading towards the Kaman monastery. Behind the rickety, rusty fences, the gardens are still bearing fruit; luxurious granite slabs with Georgian script are riddled with machine gun fire.

As if from the rich pre-war era, a Svan tower, decorated with crosses, rises above the valley. In ancient times, such towers, symbolizing the strength and power of the clan, were built by the noble families of the Svans (an ethnographic group of Georgians). The tower in Yashtukha was built about half a century ago, when many wealthy families lived here.

In the inhabited part of the village of Yashtukha, on a pedestal, there is a tank with photographs of the dead crew. This is a monument to that very war, the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict, which destroyed life in this picturesque valley. At the exit from Shroma, a low concrete slab with the inscription “The HALO-Trust” is nestled on the side of the road. Such signs are installed on all roads in Abkhazia, the demining of which was carried out by a British charitable organization. This means that the path along the road is safe, and it is better not to deviate into the forest thickets. The war is scattered across the slopes with hundreds of shells and mines.

Ancient river and mysterious caves

The path to Kamany begins on the outskirts of Sukhum, passing by an overgrown botanical garden and a monkey nursery. The city quickly retreats and turns into a semi-inhabited large settlement - Yashtukha. Two high mountains, similar to pyramids, pass a road between them. This gorge is called the “Dead Valley”. In ancient times, a river flowed here, the ancestor of Eastern Gumista, and flowed into the sea in the area of ​​​​the marine terminal. Tens of thousands of years ago it connected with Western Gumista in the area of ​​​​present-day Kaman, and the valley gradually dried up. And now, during heavy rains, small lakes form here, which quickly disappear into karst sinkholes.

All these cataclysms could have been observed by primitive people who settled on the territory of Yashtukha about 120 thousand years ago. One of the largest Paleolithic sites was found here, and archaeologists are constantly working on it.

When the road leaves the Dead Valley towards Mount Abhyuk, a grotto is visible at an altitude of about 80m. This is one of several Gumista caves, previously called Mikhailovskaya, later - Shromskaya. The cave goes half a kilometer up the mountain. Animal and human bones, as well as objects from the Bronze Age, were discovered here. Everything suggests that it was inhabited in primitive times, and later served as a burial place. Already at the beginning of our era, the cave became very damp from underground springs and was overgrown with stalactites.

Several more similar caves, two Akhalshensky and Shakalya, will be encountered along the way already beyond Kamany. Each of them is unique in structure, decorated with stalactites and underground lakes. The roads to them are now forgotten and this is for the better. Frequent visits to caves on excursions cause irreparable harm to both the fragile beauty of their decoration and the rare species of animals living there.

Lost City

The road rises slightly uphill and, having passed the former village council, rushes down the serpentine road. Below is the glittering arm of the Eastern Gumista, squeezed between two mountains. After crossing the bridge, the village of Kamany begins. It is also destroyed. During the war, the front of the struggle for Sukhum passed here. The shells did not spare a single house, except for the high Kaman temple, visible from afar.

Archaeologists suggest that the temple was built in the 11th century and looked more modest then: a small stone “box”, which was already completely destroyed by the time the Russians arrived. The high bell tower and both chapels were added only at the end of the 19th century. In Soviet times, the bell tower was destroyed and the complex that now stands in Kamany very vaguely resembles the original architecture.

During the Middle Ages, the village was a real city. In the surrounding gorges, the remains of fortresses, churches and dwellings dating back to Roman times are found every now and then. Russian travelers who visited here in the middle of the 19th century heard legends from the Abkhazians about the holiness of these ruins, and they came to them with offerings and requests.

The name “Kamana” itself was officially adopted for the “holy hill” only with the light hand of the Greek archaeologist Constantine Vrisis. In 1884, he arrived in the Abkhazian mountains with the intention of finding his “Troy”, the city of Komani, mentioned in historical documents since the 4th century, where several glorious events of Christian history took place. But since then much has been forgotten. The Christian honor of the Abkhaz Kamans can be challenged by two more cities with the same name, now located in Turkey. While historical disputes are ongoing, the Abkhazian Kamans have already become one of the greatest and most visited shrines.

Saint

The history of Kaman is closely connected with the legend about the death of the famous Christian saint John Chrysostom, who lived in Byzantium in the second half of the 4th century. A zealous champion of piety, Saint John found himself in conflict with the queen and was exiled to Pitiunt (now Pitsunda), which was then considered a remote and deserted place. But on the way there from Constantinople, tired of the heat and labor, the 51-year-old saint died, as the documents say, before reaching Pitiunt, in Kamany.

The already buried body of the saint, at the urgent requests of the people of Constantinople, was raised from the grave and sent to his homeland. Only a stone sarcophagus remains here; it can be seen inside the church.

Warrior

But not only John Chrysostom brought glory to the ancient city. The Kamans are mentioned in the “Life of the Holy Martyr Basilisk,” a Christian warrior who lived shortly before the saint, at the beginning of the 4th century. Abkhazia was then a Roman province and unreliable citizens were exiled here. Angered by the inflexibility of Basilisk's faith, the pagan Roman ruler ordered his execution right here in Camana.

The pile of stones behind the fence, where one of the pilgrimage paths leads, is called the martyr’s grave. Archaeologist Vrisis identified the stonework as the remains of a church built over the burial site of Basilisk in the 4th century.
Not far from here is a small wooden chapel, recently built with funds from a benefactor who received a miraculous healing here. In the clear water of the spring, which according to legend appeared after the burial of the Basilisk, you can find stones with red spots. They are called traces of martyr's blood.

...and the prophet

There was another event for which Christians strive for the “holy hill”. The “head of John the Baptist,” the greatest Christian shrine, was temporarily hidden in Kamany. From the middle of the 8th century, the “iconoclast heresy” reigned in Byzantium; all material objects of worship were subject to confiscation and destruction. Since iconoclasm lasted quite a long time, almost 100 years, the place where the shrine was kept was forgotten. According to legend, John himself appeared to the Byzantine emperor in a dream, pointing out a small grotto near Kaman, where the head was found around 850.

There are two roads leading to the place where the head of John the Baptist was found. The first is called the “path of sinners.” She walks up a steep slope, the climb is quite difficult and, apparently, is intended to remind the walker of the gravity of the evils committed. The other path, although longer, is easier. This is a gravel road going through Camany further into the mountains. Vehicles can pass through it freely.
Both paths converge in a small clearing, from where a steep climb up a metal staircase begins to reach the grotto itself. They say that it was made at his own expense by a rich Abkhazian who received instructions from the saint himself in a dream.

Sukhumi hydroelectric power station

The road winds even higher into the mountains, clinging to the left steep bank of Gumista. In the 30s, this path was equipped for another tourist attraction - the Sukhumi hydroelectric power station. It is unlikely that any of the “uninitiated” will be able to visit the operating power plant, but the way here is clear: after the war of the 90s, the station stopped working. Like all the architecture of the 30s of the last century, good buildings were made elegantly and thoroughly. Once upon a time