JASOV, ABBEY OF

Premonstratensian monastery, located near Košice in Slovakia. It was founded c. 1220, but the Tatars destroyed the buildings and reduced the archives to ashes. King Bela IV (d. 1270) rebuilt and enlarged it. From 1436 to 1591 Jasov was besieged by the Turks; after 1552 it was held by commendatory abbots and no canons lived there. From 1614 to 1650 it was the seat of the cathedral chapter of Eger. The premonstratensians repossessed it in 1697 and under Abbot Andraeas Sauberer (1745–70) it was restored and proclaimed independent of Klosterbruck. Joseph II suppressed the abbey on March 26, 1787, but 25 years later it was reestablished. Jasov controlled the Institute Norbertinum in Budapest and conducted gymnasia in Leles, Great Varadin, Košice, and Rožňava. In 1922 Jasov became an abbey nullius with eight incorporated parishes. In 1924 Jasov opened a gymnasium with a resident community in Gödöllö, and in 1935 a gymnasium was added to the community in Košice. After World War II Jasov's possessions were confiscated by the government, and when the religious orders were suppressed Jasov became a concentration camp for religious women. On April 14, 1950, Premonstratensians, Jesuits, and other religious men from Slovakia replaced the sisters in the camp.

Bibliography: Schematismus ven. cleri admin. apost. Cass. Satmar. (Košice 1948) 63. Schematismus ven. cleri dioec. Cassoviensis (Košice 1943) 32. Katolické Slovensko (Trnava 1933) 179–181. v. wagner, Dejiny výtvarného umenia na Slovensku (Trnava 1930) 172–173. Acta Apostolicae Sedis 14 (1922) 582–584. a. y. zak, Contributions to the 800th Anniversary of the Premonst. Order (Rožňava 1920), in Hung. n. backmund, Monasticon Praemonstratense, I–III 1:445–448.

[j. papin]