Pyuhtitsky monastery

Puuhtitsa Convent (Estonian: Kuremaae Jumalaema Uinumise nunnaklooster, Russian: Пюхтицкий Успенский женский монастырь) is a convent located in Eastern Estonia (Ida-Viru County) between Lake Peipus and the Gulf of Finland. The convent is located on a site known as Puuhitsetud ("blessed" in Estonian) since ancient times. According to a 16th century legend, near the local village, Kuremaae, a shepherd witnessed a divine revelation near a spring of water to this day venerated as holy. Later, locals found an ancient icon of Dormition of the Mother of God under a huge oak tree. The icon still belongs to the convent. A small Orthodox Christian church was built in Puhtitsa in the 16th century. In 1888, the Russian Orthodox Church sent a nun from Kostroma Ipatiev Monastery to establish a convent in Puuhtitsa. The convent was founded in 1891. The main Cathedral of the convent - Cathedral of the Dormition of the Mother of God - was built to a design by Mikhail Preobrazhensky in a Russian Revival style and was fully completed in 1910. There are also Refectory Church of St Simeon the Receiver of God and St Anna the Prophetess (1895), Church of St Sergius of Radonezh (1895), Graveyard Church of St Nicholas and St Arsenios the Great (1885), Baptism Church of St John the Baptist and Saint Priest and Martyr Isidore of Tartu (Yuryev) (1990), Church of St Alexy and the Great Martyr St Barbara (1986). The convent was first Orthodox monastery built in Estonia to the delight of mostly Orthodox local Estonian and Russian peasants of Jyohvi county.