The "St. George" Church - Old Metropolitanate of Iași is an Orthodox church in the city of Iași, which was built between 1761 and 1769 by Metropolitan Gavriil Callimachi to serve as the metropolitan cathedral. This place of worship is located in the center of Iași, on Bd. Ștefan cel Mare și Sfânt no. 16, within the complex of the Metropolitanate of Moldavia and Bukovina. It has two patron saints: "St. George" (April 23) and "St. Teodora de la Sihla" (August 7).
This place of worship is known today as the Old Metropolitanate or the Old Cathedral. It served as the cathedral of the Metropolitanate of Moldavia until 1887, when a new cathedral was consecrated nearby.
Metropolitan Gavriil Callimachi is attested as the founder of this church by the inscription on his tombstone located in the church porch, which reads, as well as by an inscription on a ceslov printed in 1874 at the Neamț Monastery, which states that "(...) he made the Church of the Holy Great Martyr George of the Metropolis with all its interior decorations in the year 1761."
As there is no inscription, the precise period in which this church was built is not known. Based on several historical documents stating that this place of worship was under construction, Bishop Nestor Vornicescu, the future Metropolitan of Oltenia, assumed that the "St. George" Church was erected between 1761-1769. The reasons for the construction of this new cathedral are unknown. Bishop Nestor Vornicescu assumes that its construction was also based on economic reasons, the descendants of some founders who had donated the estates of the "St. George" Church in Suceava (former metropolitan cathedral) demanding their estates back on the grounds that the new metropolitan cathedral in Iași no longer had the patron saint of "St. George". To resolve this situation, Metropolitan Gavriil Callimachi allegedly decided to build a new metropolitan cathedral, which would have St. George as its patron. Regardless of the reasons that were the basis for the construction of this cathedral, the attribution of the patron saint of Saint George proved its usefulness after the occupation of northern Moldavia (Bukovina) by the Austrians (1775). In 1782, the new Habsburg authorities established there intended to confiscate the estates of the monasteries in the occupied area. Metropolitan Gavriil Calimachi countered by claiming that with the relocation of the metropolitan residence to Iași, the respective possessions no longer belonged to the "Sf. Gheorghe" church in Suceava, being transferred to the new metropolitan cathedral in Iași, which had the same patron saint.
The Church of Saint George, known as the Old Metropolitanate, presents an exterior ornamentation in which the facets are covered with pilasters that have capitals with Corinthian-style ornamentation. In the lower register of the facade there are niches with the upper part in a broken arch and the lower part in a triangle. Above them, the place of worship is surrounded all around by a braided belt.
Next to this church is the Metropolitanate of Veniamin Costache, whose construction began in 1833. The current Metropolitanate Palace dates from 1901. According to the description, the old Metropolitanate was then a "small church near Ulița Mare (B-dul Ștefan cel Mare), enclosed in an enclosure wall and on the left, in the courtyard, was the Metropolitan's residence. Next to the wall is the Church of St. George. The new Metropolitanate from 1682 was formed on a vast quadrangle, by purchasing several boyar courtyards that were on Ulița Mare or behind, on Ulița Ciobotărească.
After its consecration, the Church of "St. George" became for more than a century the Metropolitanate cathedral, where the hierarchs of Moldova were ordained and where the great church ceremonies were held. The old cathedral, the Stratenia Church, has remained since then for the spiritual benefit of the teachers and students of the Princely Academy founded or reorganized in 1765 by Prince Grigore III Ghica (1764-1767, 1774-1777). During the Russo-Turkish War of 1787-1792, Metropolitan Leon Gheucă ceded this church to the Russians so that they could hold their religious services there.
After the inauguration of the new cathedral, services were only sporadically held in the "St. George" Church, when repairs were made to the new cathedral or on certain religious holidays, it being preserved as a historical monument. After the completion of the consolidation works (the sixth decade of the 20th century), the Old Cathedral became a metropolitan museum, exhibiting several church artifacts of historical value: old church prints, old manuscripts, masterfully crafted icons and embroideries, parts of the old frescoes from the churches of "St. Nicolae Domnesc" and "St. Trei Ierarhi" extracted during the restorations carried out on these historical monuments at the end of the 19th century, a polychrome with the initials of Vasile Lupu, brought from St. Trei Ierarhi, etc.