Church of St. John the Baptist

The Church of St. John the Baptist is a genuine miracle in Nessebar’s history. The structure from the 10th century has been meticulously maintained.

The Church of Saint John the Baptist is a cruciform church with an unadorned stone dome. It is one of Nessebar’s most well-preserved churches. It’s length is 12 meters and width is 10 meters. The construction of the church comprises of two intersecting cylindric vaults in the composition’s center. The brickwork is composed of broken stone and pebbles, and the facades were likely plastered neatly. It was erected in the eleventh century. There is no narthex.

Three semicircular apses make up the altar area. Four huge columns create the cross and support the dome. Within the church, the walls are uniform and undamaged. The façade lacks the elaborate niches and ceramic plaques that are characteristic of the ornamental style. Over the entryway, in the jagged cornices, and around the windows, bricks were employed as a decorative accent.

Inside the church, you can see that the walls were plastered and then decorated with paintings. Despite the fact that the most of them have been gone, a few portions have been saved. During archaeological digs, it was determined that the church rests on the ruins of a pagan temple from the fourth century BCE. There are also traces of a basilica from the Early Byzantine period dating to the sixth century on the site.