Venerable Anatolius of the Kiev Near Caves

Historical Context

The Near Caves to which Anatolius belongs were established by Saint Anthony of the Kiev Caves, who had trained on Mount Athos before settling at Kiev around the middle of the eleventh century and withdrawing to a cave near the upper monastery in 1057. From this beginning grew one of the principal centers of monastic life in Rus'.

The Near Caves hold the relics of many monastics of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, among them figures such as Nestor the Chronicler. Anatolius belongs to this body of Kiev Caves ascetics, though the specific period and circumstances of his life are not recorded in the surviving sources.

Relics & Shrines

His relics rest in the Near Caves of the Kiev Caves Monastery, where the bodies of the monastic saints have long been venerated. Left uncovered during the Soviet period, they were after the fall of the Soviet Union covered with a cloth and remain so, the caves continuing as a place of pilgrimage.