The Twenty Monasteries

The twenty ruling monasteries are the sovereign constituent members of the monastic republic — a number fixed and unchangeable, each house autonomous in its internal life, all ranked in a traditional order of precedence with the Great Lavra first. The first file surveys the twenty and their hierarchy; the second treats the non-Greek houses — Hilandar (Serbian), Zographou (Bulgarian), and St. Panteleimon or Rossikon (Russian), with the Georgian origins of Iviron — and Athos as a pan-Orthodox commonwealth.

Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (Athonite)

This section treats the constituent monasteries. The first file, the-ruling-monasteries.md, lists and characterises the twenty in their order of precedence and explains the sovereign, fixed, and autonomous character of the ruling houses. The second file, the-pan-orthodox-mountain.md, treats the international composition of the Mountain — the non-Greek ruling houses and the Georgian, Serbian, Bulgarian, Russian, and Romanian presence — and Athos as the spiritual centre of the whole Orthodox world.

Contents

File	Description
the-ruling-monasteries.md	The twenty sovereign monasteries and their fixed hierarchy — Great Lavra first; Vatopedi, Iviron, and the rest; the autonomy of the ruling houses
the-pan-orthodox-mountain.md	The non-Greek houses — Hilandar (Serbian), Zographou (Bulgarian), St. Panteleimon/Rossikon (Russian); Iviron’s Georgian origins; Athos as pan-Orthodox centre

See Also

• Mount Athos (master README)
• The Holy Community and Karyes — the government the twenty monasteries constitute
• The Forms of Monastic Life — the ways of life the houses shelter
• Charters, Empires, and Ottoman Centuries — the foundations of the houses in history