Norwegian money will enable the repair of the northern part of the Rajhrad Monastery

Rajhrad (Brno region) - The Benedictine monastery in Rajhrad will be renovated for more than eight million crowns, which it has obtained from so-called Norwegian funds, for the second floor of the northern wing of the monastery. The new rooms will serve the Memorial of Literature in Moravia, which will thus gain a comprehensive tour circuit two years after its opening. Hundreds of millions of crowns are still needed for the complete reconstruction of the neglected monastery, but no one is able to specify the exact amount.
    Today, the ambassador of the Nordic country, Peter Reader, visited the places where the Norwegian money will be used. "The monastery left a huge impression on me. We know that our contribution is just a drop in the ocean, but I believe it will contribute to the restoration of this place," Reader told reporters. Norway finances a number of projects in Europe, thus paying for the use of some advantages of European integration, in which the kingdom does not directly participate.
    "For eleven years, I have been doing nothing else but collecting drops. I believe that eventually, they can create a beautiful sea," said Benedictine abbot Augustin Gazda. The money for the restoration of the monastery is being sought by a small religious community from many different sources, with a significant part consisting of small contributions from believers and residents of Rajhrad. The repairs of the monumental Baroque complex have barely reached half in the last decade.
    Currently, only a small part of the monastery is accessible to the public, which has deteriorated since the internment of the Benedictines in 1950. A small community of Benedictines lives in the reconstructed rooms. Other spaces house the Memorial of Literature in Moravia, which includes an extraordinarily rare library with 64,000 historical volumes. It continues to provide surprises for researchers. Recently, they found a fragment of a manuscript from the turn of the 8th and 9th centuries on the front pastedown of a younger book.
    Since its founding in the 11th century, the Rajhrad Monastery has been a significant center of education. However, only a limited number of manuscripts produced by the local scriptorium have survived.
    "The Rajhrad manuscripts were not protected by solid city walls against all the invasions, wars, and raids that devastated predominantly the southern and eastern regions of Moravia, depriving them, unlike the better-protected Bohemia, of architectural and other monuments," states historian Vladislav Dokoupil in the publication "Inventory of Rajhrad Manuscripts." The monastery was gradually plundered by Tatars, Cumans, Hungarians, Austrians, Swedes, Prussians, and even French.
    Until the end of the 17th century, the Rajhrad monastery and church essentially had a Romanesque appearance. The current shape is Baroque, significantly influenced by the famous architect Jan Santini Aichl.