Rujan Monastery is located on the top of a hill overseeing lake Vrutci. From the monastery, the view on the lake is beautiful and the general setting is spectacular. Rujan Monastery is actually a reconstruction of the former Rujno monastery, destroyed by the Ottomans because it held one of the first printing house in the Balkans. The ruins were submerged by lake Vrutci in 1984.
Rujan Monastery is a reconstruction of a monastery built in the XV century. It belongs to the Diocese of Žiča of the Serbian Orthodox Church. It is located in the area of the village Vrutci, about 17 km away from Užice, under the Ponikve mountain, on the Djetinje River.
The origin of the name Rujan comes from the plant ruj, which grows in the valley of the Djetinje River, after which the whole area got the name Rujno. The monastery has a special significance for Serbian culture because the first printing house in Medieval Serbia was created and worked in it.
Details of the tower of the monastery Rujan
In 1536 and 1537, the monk Teodosije printed the famous Rujan Four Gospels, the only complete surviving copy of which is housed in the National Library in Prague, as part of Šafarik’s collection and has a total of 300 pages.
The National Library of Serbia owned one copy that was destroyed in the bombing of Belgrade in 1941, so only one fragment (with 92 pages) has been preserved and it is in the museum of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts.
The Basilic and the setting of the monastery Rujan
It can be an interesting stop over on the way to or from Zlatibor or Tara.
All photos by Lionel Mestre (All rights reserved).
