Pechenga

Pechenga lies by a river and inlet on the northern coast of the Kola Peninsula, in a country inhabited by Sámi communities. In 1533 the monk Tryphon founded the Monastery of the Holy Trinity on the Pechenga, seeking to bring Christianity to the local Skolt Sámi. By 1572 it housed about fifty monks and two hundred lay followers, a northern outpost linked to both the sea and the inland fishing grounds.

In 1589 a Swedish raid burned the wooden monastery and killed many of its inhabitants. Tsar Fyodor ordered the community re-established near Kola in 1591, but the new hermitage also burned in 1619. The monastery was later moved into Kola itself and ultimately dissolved in 1764. The Pechenga river and bay remained landmarks of a contested northern frontier.