Krka Monastery is the best known monastery of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Croatia and it is officially protected as part of the Krka National Park.
The oldest extant mention of the monastery was in 1345, when it is listed as an endowment of princess Jelena Nemanjić Šubić, half-sister of the Serbian emperor Dušan and wife of Mladen III Šubić Bribirski, Croatian duke of Skradin and Bribir. The Catholic monastery was built on top of a Roman site, and Roman burial catacombs exist beneath a part of the church.
The current church of St. Archangel was erected in 1422 on the location of an earlier Gothic structure. Ottoman Turks devastated the church around 1530 but it was restored on several occasions. Other monastery buildings (18th–19th century), the church, and the bellfry are situated around a rectangular cloister with arcades.
In mid-17th century monks were forced to flee from the Ottomans and found shelter in Zadar, where pope Innocent X in 1655 gave them two churches, that had previously been in possession of Franciscans of the Third Order, named 'Glagolitians' (glagoljaši) . In a subsequent agreement with the Franciscans, the monks declared that they 'live in the service of the Greek Church, the old illyrian language.'
After Operation Storm in 1995 the monastery was looted, but not significantly, as it was protected by the Croatian authorities, abandoned, and the seminary shut down and relocated to Divčibare and, later, Foča. The monks returned in 1998, however, and the seminary reopened in 2001.
The belltower of this monastery was built in the Romanesque style. The complex also includes a chapel of Saint Sava built in the 19th century, under the tutelage of the Serbian Orthodox Bishop of Dalmatia Stefan Knežević, as well as a new building of the seminary and an additional dormitory building. The monastery has its archives and a library with a variety of ancient books and valuable items from the 16th to the 20th century, a collection of wooden icons (St. John the Baptist from the 14th or 15th century, work by the so-called Master of the Tkon Crucifix), silverware and embroideries.
References:Kakesbeck is one of the largest medieval fortifications in Münsterland and the oldest castle in Lüdinghausen. The imposingly grown complex originated in 1120 as a motte, a small hilltop tower castle. After numerous changes of ownership, the castle was extended onto two islands, but it was not until the 14th century that it underwent significant alterations and extensions under the von Oer family. The estate experienced its heyday in the middle of the 18th century, when it covered an area of almost one square kilometre and consisted of five further outer castles in addition to the core castle, which were secured by ramparts and moats.
The well-maintained condition of the castle today is thanks to the late Wilfried Grewing, the former lord of the castle. The foundation named after him has been particularly committed to preserving the property since 2020.