Solovetsky Islands

This card of Solovetsky Monastery arrived recently with part of a mini-sheet of stamps showing points of interest on the Solovetsky Islands, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  The islands are in the White Sea to the north west of Russia.

The full sheet which is made to look as though the stamps were printed on a parchment map, can be seen here.  I can remember making maps of that sort when I was at school, maybe a history lesson or to illustrate Treasure Island.

There was another stamp too, this one showing Petropavlovskiy Sobor, the Peter and Paul Cathedral  in St Petersburg:

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, now hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"

Royal Monastery of Santa María de Guadalupe

The monastery dates from the 13th century when a shepherd found a statue of Mary dating from the 8th century.  The statue had apparently been hidden when the area was invaded by the Moorish army.  A chapel was built nearby to house the statue and after enlargement to a church and then the monastery, it grew into one of the most important in Spain.  It dominates the small town of Guadalupe in the centre of Spain.

Because it became closely associated with the monarchy, it was very influential in the history of Spain.  It is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery

The Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery was once the largest monastery in Russia though it started out as a cave dug by St Cyril (Kyrill) on the bank of Lake Siverskoye. It now covers 12 hectares and has 11 churches, all surrounded by a wall.

Lindisfarne Priory

Off the north east coast of England lies Holy Island.  Holy Island is only just an island - it's joined to the mainland by a causeway which is covered at high tide.  If you visit you do need to check the tides or you may find yourself stranded.

I was sent this lovely card by John from Photo Curios where you can see John's own views of the Priory. On his other blog,English Wilderness, he has a photo of St Cuthbert's Isle.  St Cuthbert was one of the abbots of the monastery in the 7th century.  He was such a popular saint in the north of England that his life and works were recorded by the Venerable Bede in the 8th century.  Amongst many other things, St Cuthbert created some laws to protect birds nesting on the island, maybe the earliest bird protection laws in the world.

An Irish hermit and a library

Once upon a time (in the 6th century) an Irish man called Columbanus left Ireland because his exceptional good looks meant he was struggling not to be led astray by women.  He set off with twelve companions first for Britain and then for mainland Europe.

One of these companions was Gall who stayed behind in present day Switzerland when he fell ill. He recovered and established a hermitage which was eventually to become the Abbey of St Gall.  The Abbey has existed since 719.  For centuries it was one of the most important abbeys in Europe.

Irish and Anglo Saxon monks came to copy manuscripts which were the foundation of its library, one of the richest medieval libraries in the world.  There are over 400 manuscripts surviving from the early days and are over 1000 years old.  During the 10th century some of the books were removed for safe-keeping when the Abbey was threatened and not all were returned.  A little later a fire almost destroyed the abbey but the library fortunately survived.


There are now 160,000 books in the library at the Abbey of St Gall, of which 2,100 are hand-written.  Recently the Abbey has started to digitise the manuscripts to provide online access to them.  So far there are 405 available on the Codices Electronici Sangallenses (Digital Abbey Library of St. Gallen) web page.

The "real" library is open to the public and is visited by both tourists and researchers from all over the world.

King John's Cloister (Claustro Real)

The Monastery of Santa Maria da Vitória, or the Monastery of Batalha, is one of the finest examples of late Gothic architecture in Portugal.  The cloister shown here was a later addition, in the mid 15th century, and is of a less ornate style than the rest of the building.  The central garden was added later.  It must be absolutely spectacular to see in real life.