Diveyevo Obediences: Photographs from the Early 20th Century

On June 14/27, the Fourth Portion of the Mother of God on Earth—Diveyevo Convent—honors its own saints. Before the revolution in 1917, there were approximately 1700 nuns and novices in the monastery. Only one of them, Schemanun Margarita (or as they used to call her, Grandma Frosia) lived to the reopening of the monastery and the return of St. Seraphim’s relics. Nevertheless, the pre-revolutionary day-to-day life of the monastery and its sisters were preserved in photographs, some of which were found in the personal photo album of Abbess Alexandra (Trakovskaya †1942), the last abbess of Diveyevo. Fortunately this album was preserved, and it we gladly present these unique pictures here.