Katarínka Monastery Ruins

Katarínka was a Franciscan monastery and church dating back to the early 17th century, located deep in the forests of the Little Carpathian Mountains in western Slovakia. The church was dedicated to Saint Catherine of Alexandria, and that is where the nickname of the place Katarínka comes from.

First Gothic chapel was made of stone on the site in the late 1400s. The monastery was established in 1618 when count Krištof Erdödy, the domain owner, issued the foundation document establishing a Franciscan monastery on this site. In 1645 St Catherine’s monastery was plundered and set on fire during an armed rebellion of the Hungarian nobility. In 1663 monastery was attacked again first by the Turks, later on by emperor’s army. The soldiers killed noblemen who were seeking refuge from persecution at St Catherine’s. In 1683 another raid carried out on the monastery by the troops of Imrich Tököly.

In 1701 Juraj and Krištof II Erdödi issued a deed of gift of 500 ducats for the church’s maintenance. In the 18th century numerous donors also gave large gifts to the monastery. Families of noble origin built their crypts on this site (e.g.Erdödi, Apponyi, Labšanskí). In 1786 Joseph II Emperor’s decree abolished St Catherine’s monastery as “useless”, together with 738 monasteries in the empire, which did not take care of the poor or educate the youth and in 1787 it was transferred to state control. Valuable equipment and inventory were step by step moved to surrounding churches and monasteries, many of these were spontaneously stolen or lost forever.

References:

• Wikipedia

Address

Trnava, Slovakia

Details

Founded: 1618
Category: Miscellaneous historic sites in Slovakia