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Velušina, Church of the Dormition of the Holy Mother of God
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Place
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Description: The Church of the Dormition of the Holy Mother of God is situated in the village of Velushina, 10 km south of Bitola, Republic of N. Macedonia, on the well-known Roman road Via Egnatia. It was most likely built at the end of the 10th or at the beginning of the 11th century. It is a small three-aisled basilica. The building was probably abandoned for a long period of time, until the first half of the 18th century, when many repairs were carried out. In the 19th century the Church of the Dormition of the Holy Mother of God received the new fresco layer and icons for the new, wooden iconostasis.
Architecture
First phase of construction: The original part of the building is the central aisle with triple arched passages (tribelon) towards the southern, northern and western sides of the nave. They represent the communication between the narthex and the nave, that is, the central and side aisles.
Parallels: Tribelons surrounding the central space of the church have their origins in early Christian architecture and were applied in some of the most significant and monumental domed basilicas or cruciform churches with ambulatories from the 9th to the 11th century. Examples include the Church of Chora Monastery in Constantinople, Hagia Sophia in Thessaloniki, and the Church of the Dormition of the Virgin Mary in Labova, Albania. The basilican type of small dimensions, like the church in Velušina, are characteristic of the regions of Thessaly, Epirus, and Macedonia from the 10th-11th centuries. Geographically, the nearest church is the Church of the Holy Apostles on the island of St. Achilleios on Prespa. Parallels also include the Church of Taxiarches at Kostur, the Church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary in Kalambaka, the churches of Sts. Peter and Paul and the Assumption of the Virgin Mary in Voden (Edessa). A similar spatial concept was realized in the Church of St. Nicholas in the village of Manastir in Mariovo.
Dating: end of the 10th or the beginning of the 11th century
Reconstruction/Renovation:The western tribelon was reconstructed later on, while the passages through the northern and southern walls had been changed: the northern wall was expanded, while a part of the passage of the southern wall was blocked. The repairs carried out later on are the following: the upper demolished parts of the walls were rebuilt; new and much wider lateral aisles and a narthex was constructed along with a flat ceiling and tiled roof cover. The porch around the southern and western façades and both of the annex buildings on the western side were built at the beginning of the 20th century.
Painted Decoration
First Layer: A fragment of fresco painting was discovered during the research in 2002, beneath a more recent layer of paintings on the southern wall of the naos. It depicts a standing figure of a saint, dressed in an archbishop's vestments, next to which a Greek inscription Saint Simeon is preserved.
Parallels: the frescoes in the Church of the Holy Unmercenaries at Kostur
Dating: Based on the stylistic characteristics, this fresco is dated to the late 10th or early 11th century. However, the possibility that it might have originated later (end of the 12th - beginning of the 13th century) is taken into consideration, given the presence of reminiscences of older monumental painting during that time.
Second Layer: In the 19th century the walls of the central aisle were painted as well as the icons for the new wooden iconostasis.
Architectural Sculpture
Parts of a marble altar screen; a fragment of a marble ciborium with the representation of Christ the Good Shepherd; a capital with a relief representation of two confronted birds and acanthus leaves, and fragments of a marble column
Dating: Early Christian
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