The monastery served as a dynastic abbey of the Dadiani of Mingrelia and housed several Christian relics and icons.

[2] The first recorded mention of Khobi, then more commonly referred to as Khopi, and its bishop Egnate, occurs in a Georgian document from the Monastery of the Cross, dated to the period between 1212 and 1222.

The monastery served as a familial abbey and burial ground of the Dadiani, a princely dynasty of Mingrelia.

The 17th-century visitors to Mingrelia reported that Khobi was venerated for the Christian relics it contained, such the Virgin May's robe and body parts of the saints Marina and Cyriacus.

[2] A lengthy inscription on the southern chapel, in the medieval Georgian asomtavruli script, relates that a large collection of marble columns, capitals and fragments of the ambo was brought by Vameq I Dadiani (died 1396) from his victorious campaign against Zichia.