Room 10 – Saint Nicholas Chapel and Prince Vasile Lupu

Narration text

We enter the Chapel of Saint Nicholas, one of the most beautiful spaces in the citadel. Its centrepiece is the iconostasis, restored by the museum's specialists. The chapel's story is tied to Prince Vasile Lupu, who reigned from 1634 to 1653.

After the campaign of Michael the Brave, the Ottomans viewed any fortification in Moldavia with deep suspicion. To avoid arousing it, Vasile Lupu built the Church of Saint Nicholas here, on the site of an older chapel, and the citadel's rooms took on the look of monastic cells. The Catholic missionary Marco Bandini described the dome of Saint Nicholas, "built with remarkable art, adorned with golden images of Christ and his Mother," yet noted that the place "looks more like a fortress than a monastery."

Indeed, the citadel remained a refuge for the princely family and a place to keep the treasury. In 1650, when the Tatars raided Moldavia, Vasile Lupu sent his wife here, together with the families of his boyars.