The Monastery of Saints Fanentes was built on the Kyatis hill of the citadel of Classical Same, inside its fortification walls. A tower of the ancient walls was incorporated in the monastery’s defensive tower. According to tradition, the saints’ relics were found in a cave of the area and were lost in a shipwreck in the sea area of Fiscardo as they were being transported to the West. According to another version, the name of the monastery is related to the Gnostic philosopher Epiphanes of the 2nd century AD, who according to Clemes the Alexandrean was honoured as god at Same. The monastery was built before 1264, the year of its first recording in the proceedings of Kephallenia’s Latin Diocese. After flourishing in the 17th century as a significant spiritual centre with a hieratic school, it was closed down in 1805.
References:Visby Cathedral (also known as St. Mary’s Church) is the only survived medieval church in Visby. It was originally built for German merchants and inaugurated in 1225. Around the year 1350 the church was enlarged and converted into a basilica. The two-storey magazine was also added then above the nave as a warehouse for merchants.
Following the Reformation, the church was transformed into a parish church for the town of Visby. All other churches were abandoned. Shortly after the Reformation, in 1572, Gotland was made into its own Diocese, and the church designated its cathedral.
There is not much left of the original interior. The font is made of local red marble in the 13th century. The pulpit was made in Lübeck in 1684. There are 400 graves under the church floor.