Oltenia de sub munte
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Bolnița Church - Bistrița

From the Craiova's foundation, only the Bolnița church (1520-1521) remains today, a modest construction (11 x 4 m), made of stone (river boulders) and sometimes brick, of the nave type, without a spire, covered with a roof. The church has a square nave with a rounded altar inside, without a pronaos.The vault is cylindrical and without a spire (an indicator of its old age, similarity to Cotmeana).

The church has an impressive interior fresco, painted by Dumitru Chirtop around 1520, the second oldest in Oltenia after the Cozia monastery (1388), from the late Palaeolithic tradition, when artistic elements used by Cretan iconographers began to permeate the Balkans. The church is dedicated to the 'Transfiguration'. Later, the vicar Serban Cantacuzino (his portrait is painted to the left of the door, together with his wife Adriana) added an open porch of masonry on stone pillars, painted by Joseph the Hieromonk and Harinte, in the Branco-Venetian style (1710).

In the vicinity of the Bolnița church, you can still see:

  • The sickhouse - built by Archimandrite Gavriil Petrovici in 1836, its spaces have been used for different purposes: hospital, school, priorship, residence (priests' house) and Ion Antonescu's forced residence
  • The Dăscăliței vault - built of brick by the architect Nae Panait, housing the remains of Maria Dumitrașcu, the first teacher of the orphanage
  • Bishop Vartolomeu Stănescu's Vault - a monumental Byzantine-style building dating from 1933
  • Bishop Vartolomeu's Villa - built in 1933 by the same bishop, it stands out for its authentic Romanian style, with open arches and semicircular arches, set on carved and painted wooden pillars.
  • A few specimens of secular edible chestnut trees (Castanea sativa) in the garden to the west of the monastery
  • Bibescu Voda Bridge, at the exit of Bistrita from the quay, built between 1846 and 1848
  • The monumental crosses dug into the right wall of the Bistrita gorge, at its exit from the limestone walls, dating from the reign of Charles I (probably 1867, following his visit).