Historical Context
Joachim lived during the period when the lands of the First Bulgarian Empire had passed under Byzantine rule, and he belonged to a generation of hermits who drew the faithful toward the ascetic life in the mountains of the medieval Balkans. He is consistently grouped with his near-contemporaries Gabriel of Lesnovo, Prohor of Pcinja and John of Rila, anchorites whose seclusion exerted a lasting social and cultural influence across the Balkan Peninsula.
His formal elevation to sainthood took place in the twelfth century at Staro Nagoricane, in the Church of Saint George built by King Stefan Milutin. The Bulgarian Orthodox Church is noted as the first of that era to foster the cults of holy monks and hermits, a movement of which Joachim's veneration formed a part.
Relics & Shrines
Joachim's principal shrine is the Osogovo Monastery, which stands near Kriva Palanka in North Macedonia, roughly ten kilometers from the Bulgarian border, set on Osogovo Mountain at an elevation of about 825 meters. The monastery was founded in the twelfth century by a priest of Ovce Pole named Teodor, who became a monk under the name Teofan; he gathered a community, built the church and monastery dedicated to the Venerable Joachim, and served as its first abbot.
The smaller of the monastery's two churches took its present form in the fourteenth century, while the larger church was raised in 1851 by the master builder Andrey Damyanov, crowned with twelve cupolas representing the twelve apostles. Over the centuries the monastery received the patronage of Serbian rulers, including King Milutin and Saint Stephen of Decani. A mural depicting Saint Joachim survives at the Poganovo Monastery of Saint John the Theologian, dated to 1499.
