Venerable Barlaam (Varlaam), Hegumen of the Kiev Caves

Venerable Barlaam (Varlaam) was the first hegumen of the Kiev Caves Monastery. Living in eleventh-century Kiev, he was the son of Ioann, a boyar close to Prince Iziaslav Yaroslavich. From his youth he frequently visited St. Anthony of the Caves and, drawn to monastic life despite his father's objections and his own young marriage, received tonsure from St. Nikon the Great. When the brotherhood gathered around St. Anthony grew to twelve monks, Anthony appointed Barlaam as hegumen and withdrew to live in solitude in another cave. Under Barlaam's leadership a wooden church of the Dormition of the Mother of God was built above the caves. He was later made hegumen of the newly founded Monastery of St. Demetrius in Kiev. After two pilgrimages to Constantinople and the Holy Land, St. Barlaam died in 1065 on his return journey at the Holy Dormition Monastery near Vladimir-Volynsky, and was buried in the Near Caves of the Kiev Caves Monastery.