Churches in Zelenika and Kuti
Church of St. Andrew
Church of St. Andrew
According to folklore, a ruler from the Kosača dynasty built this church in the 15th century. The church was built on the remains of an older one. It is located near the Ožegović family homes. According to the priest Savo Nakićenović, the church was a parish church until the 19th century, and a monastery was once in its place. According to Nakićenović, the antimins was consecrated by Metropolitan Vasilije Petrović, and the renovated church was consecrated in 1799, by Archimandrite of Savina monastery Inokentije Dabović, with the blessing of Petar I Petrović Njegoš. Today, the church has a single nave with a rib vault, a semicircular apse, and a bell tower with one window for the bell. Above the portal is a semicircular vaulted niche, and a high narrow window above it. A sundial is built into the southern wall between the windows, which is a unique case in this area.¹
Until 1908, the church was also a people’s school.
The priest and ethnologist Sava Nakićenović is buried next to the church’s south wall.
The remains of the church of St. Apostle Thomas
The church of St. Apostle Thomas was located in Presjeka, and it dates back to the 9th century. It belongs to the Southern Dalmatian type and the Zeta-Zahumlje group of churches. The preserved part of the walls allows for a complete reconstruction of the church. It was a central building with a dome, with walls adorned with lesenes on the outside and niches on the inside. The apse is square from the outside and semicircular from the inside. Inside the church, an altar screen was discovered, with several preserved elements, including a parapet plate that was undamaged. The architecture and relief of St. Thomas in Kuti show the characteristics of developed pre-Romanesque from the 11th century.¹
The remains of the iconostasis of this church are characterized by exceptional skill and plasticity. The upper part of the parapet slab contains, in a three-part winding vine, depictions of birds and dragons, and in the main field, the theme of the Worship of the Cross. There are two standing angels in a prayerful stance facing the cross, decorated with a three-part band, while below their feet, there are two eagles with outstretched wings.
The remains of the church of St. Apostle Thomas
The remains of the church of St. Apostle Thomas
Ornamentation gives way to depictions of animals and figures; surface treatment is replaced by rounded relief.
The frescoes were painted, in the early 12th century, by, without a doubt, the best painter of this area at the time. He molded the form with the greatest skill, making smooth transitions between illuminated and shaded parts of faces, but still emphasized the eyes with deep shadows and emphasized details on the heads with strong lines. His colors were rich and vibrant. And just as the reliefs of the iconostasis belong to the end of the pre-Romanesque sculpture, so does the painting mark the end of the same period in painting. All of this makes the church of St. Thomas the most interesting pre-Romanesque building in the Bay of Kotor.
Its founder is unknown, but it could be the Travunian prince Dragomir, after whom the nearby hill is named. Priest Savo Nakicenovic cites an interesting legend about the destruction of the church: ‘Legend has it that it was built by Herzog Stefan, who had a son. This son got engaged to a girl whom his father’s, being a widower, took away from him. Therefore, to avenge himself he raised an army and destroyed every church his father had built, including St. Thomas.'”
The Church of the Holy Mother of God
The Church of the Holy Mother of God
Also knowns as the Church of the Lady, is the smallest church in Kuti. Nakicenovic says: ‘Everything in it is old and dilapidated. The legend says that it is the oldest in these parts, that the Greeks and the Serbs built it together in three nights, because they could not work during the day due to fear of the Saracens; that it was first covered with straw, then with tiles, and finally with a dome.’ The church is a single-nave building with a semicircular apse and a bell tower on a beam with one window for the bell. The apse is covered with stone slabs.
Monastery of St. John
The remains of this church are not far from Nakićenović brotherhood, in the Seferović heritage. Priest Savo Nakićenović says that according to the legend here was a nunnery, that was destroyed by the Turks in the 17th century.
Church of St. Eliah
The church was built in 1912 in the hamlet Lastva in Kuti, at the place where the smaller church used to be. The common cemetery of Lastva and Presjeka is located there. Priest Savo Nakićenović was responsible for the renovation of the church. It is a single-nave building, with a cross-shaped base, two side niches and an axis is the east-west direction. An octagonal tambour with a dome is raised at the intersection of the longitudinal nave and the side niches, supported by pendentives. The tambour has one window on each of its four sides. During the church renovation in 1930, the dome was strengthened with concrete. The bell tower on a beam has three semicircular windows for the bells.⁶
Above the portal, there is a profiled lintel, and above it, there is a semicircular niche. Above the niche, there is a circular opening with a stone rosette.⁶
Church of St. Eliah
Church of St. George
Church of St. George
The church is located high up, near the village of Pestorići, and is believed to have been built around 1550. The church is single-nave, with a semicircular apse and a bell tower on a beam with one window for the bell. It is constructed of unevenly sized stone blocks laid in rows of different heights. Above the door framed with stone thresholds, there is a stone semicircular arched niche, the width of the door, and above it there is an oculus in a monolithic stone. The inscription on the lintel says the church was renovated in 1801.
The Church of the Holy Trinity
The church of the Holy Trinitiy is a parish church. It was built on a hill above the Kuti field. According to Nakicenovic, the church was constructed in 1756 on the site of an older church. The bell tower was built from 1812 to 1836.
The church is single-nave, divided into three unequal bays with two pairs of pilasters with arches. Above the central bay, on a high cubic base, rises an octagonal tambour that carries a dome, externally finished with a roof in the shape of an octagonal pyramid. On each of the four sides of the tambour is a semi-circular arched opening.²
The bell tower on the first floor of the front facade has a stone rosette, and on the second floor, an imitation of a clock, while the third floor is open on all four sides with two semi-circular arched openings. The bell tower is topped with a dome that lies on a tambour in the shape of an octagonal prism with small semi-circular arched openings on each of the four sides.³
The church portal has profiled stone door jambs and an architrave beam above which is a semi-circular arched niche. Another door is located on the southern longitudinal wall of the church.
The Church of the Holy Trinity
Adventist Church
There is also a Christian Seventh-day Adventist Church in Zelenika. You can find more information on their official Facebook page.
References
[¹] Diana Generalić Radojičić – Graditeljsko nasljeđe opštine Herceg Novi – Crkve, Podgorica: Arhitektonski fakultet 2009, 65.
[²]J. Kovačević, I. Pušić, Iskopavanja na ruševinama crkve sv. Tome u Kutima – Boka Kotorska, Arheološki pregled I od 1959, str. 156-159; Istorija Crne Gore I, str 432, sk 67, str 434, 437
[³] Istorija srpskog naroda, Prva knjiga, Srpska književna zadruga, 2000, str. 244, 247.
[⁴]Diana Generalić Radojičić – Graditeljsko nasljeđe opštine Herceg Novi – Crkve, Podgorica: Arhitektonski fakultet 2009,
[⁵]Ibid., 64.
[⁶]Ibid., 64.
[⁷]Ibid., 64.
[⁸]Ibid., 98.
[⁹]Ibid., 98.