At the end of the 19th century, there was no monastery larger than that of St. Michael’s Monastery of Mount Athos in the Northern Caucasus. In 1877 the monastery’s location on the slope of Gora Fiziabgo was decided. It was constructed with the help of many hands from people all over the world - following the suggestion of Father Martyrius, the monastery’s first abbot, each pilgrim travelling to the monastery brought a stone with him that would be used to help build the holy structure. Over ten years the monks managed to build an entire religious complex with multiple churches: The Church of the Transfiguration, of the Holy Trinity and of the Assumption as well as churches built in the name of Archangels Michael and Alexandra. A century ago thousands of pilgrims visited St. Michael’s Monastery of Mount Athos every day. After the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 however, the revolutionary government declared war against the church, closing the monastery and destroying the churches. Nevertheless the monastery overcame these trying times and came back from this destruction and abandonment. Nowadays as the monastery works to gain back the care and glory it once had, some pilgrims bring stones with them as they remember the monastery’s old tradition and work to restore the Church of the Transfiguration of God that once stood on the peak of Gora Fiziabgo.