Church

The Three Holy Hierarchs Church is the only wooden church in the Maramures style and it's a true oasis of spirituality.

Located near the Cathedral, it is the oldest palce of worship in the former village of Mioveni. Kept with a household spirit, the church offers a space of meditation, under the caring of the parson Gheorghe Răducanu. According to the brief history of the place of worship - written by Father Constantin Gh. Franculescu, former parson of the church - on the actual construction site, there was a monastic church, built in "the days of the voivode Gligorie Ghica", as mentioned in a fragment of the inscription stone placed on the floor of the place of worship.

The church was repaired and other annexes were added in 1877, by the Lord Gregory Racoviceanu; the inside was repainted almost entirely by George Stănescu, which has his signature in the nave and the door made of thick planks of oak, situated between the porch and narthex, has several long trails of strikes, due to the fact that the building served a shelter for the local boyars, during the Turkish attacks, up until they raised the Manor located at a stone's throw from the place of worship. The church kept its actual form since 1910 and 1935, when it was repaired once again. After that came a long period of decay, which was stopped when, in 1981, when the Father Gheorghe Chiliment, a local citizen, became the parson of the church.

The building thrones in the city's centre, basically defining the city's architectural blazon, being one of the most impressive buildings of its kind in all of the country. In 1992, with a single existing church in the city of Mioveni, and with a growing population due to the development of the local industry, the new cathedral was designed at huge dimensions, being nowadays the largest place of worship of the archiepiscopacy of Arges and Muscel. The foundation stone of this cathedral was placed on 29th June 1993, by His Eminence Calinic, on a plot of land offered by the prefecture of the Arges county, with the permission of the actual president of the Local Council of Arges. After 20 years of efforts made by the entire community, the new cathedral from Mioveni was consecrated in the summer of 2012, by His Eminence Calinic, together with His Eminence Varlaam from Ploiesti, Patriarchal Vicar delegate of His Beatitude Daniel, Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church.

It is a construction of the famous and brave boyars of Golești (a family descending from the family of the Basarabi Craiovesti), and is situated on the valley of the river Vierosul, surrounded by beech forests. It was built in a traditional “muscelean” style, between the 1571 and 1573 by the steward Ivascu Golescu. He steward's descendants, Stroe Leurdeanu and his wife Visa, repainted and partially rebuilt the monastery in 1645. Also, in 1825, Samuil Tartasescu, the future lieutenant of the bishop of Arges, rebuilt and repainted the place of worship at his own expense. The monument was restored, eventually, in 1924-1927 and 1978-1984. A team of archaeologists from the County Museum discovered several hundred-year old vestiges at the Vierosi monastery, vestiges made by the boyars of Golesti, dating back from 1573-1575. The diggings also revealed remains of constructions made in the XVIth and the XVIIIth centuries (annexes of the monastery). The trail of a water supply channel was also identified, this being built at the beginning of the XVIIIth century. The archaeologists also found several terracotta tiles which represented a two-headed eagle, a shield framed by the heads of four Turkish men. At the access limit to the monastery a stone cross was placed (1836), this being a presumptive argument of the existence, inside the monastery, of a masons’ workshop. The assembly has more elements: the main church – “The Entrance of the Virgin Mary into the Temple”, the small church from the cemetery – “The Dormition of the Mother of God”, the bell tower, the priorship, the sanctums, the monastary wall. In time, the components of the monumental assembly have degraded intensively. Thus, except for the churches, all of the other elements are already considered ruins. The bell tower was the first one affected by the degradation, becoming a ruin in time; nowadays, only its southern part is visible. The historic research revealed the fact that the alcoves and the columns that edge the church entrance, are not corresponding with other contsructions made in the same period, as they have a strong romano-catholic influence, thus being argumented the hypothesis that, when the monument was built, the workers and architects were catholics. At the entrance to Vierosi monastery, we can see Samuil Tartasescu's stone cross.