[1] Roman burial catacombs, Romanesque belfry,[2] Gothic window and other parts of the building (including graves),[3] show that the Orthodox monastery was previously home to a late medieval Catholic church or monastery (c. 14th century),[3][4] whose architectural style was uncommon for the Serbian-Byzantine Orthodox churches of the time.

[4][5][6] According to most recent synthesis of archaeological, architectural, conservation-restoration research, the monastery's church had three building phases: a late medieval, second-half of the 16th century, and one beginning in the 1780s.

[9] The most significant finding useful for the dating of the late medieval church is a fragment of a profiled Gothic frame with the remains of a rosette which was found in a wall under a layer of cement mortar.

[10] According to the common folk story about the foundation of the Orthodox monastery, claimed by the Serb Orthodox eparchy's clergy, it was founded in 1345 or 1350 when it was listed as an endowment of Serbian princess Jelena Nemanjić Šubić, half-sister of the Serbian emperor Dušan and wife of Mladen III Šubić Bribirski (not Mladen the II), Croatian duke of Skradin and Bribir.

[1][5][12][13][14] Such a claim is not found in any previous official Serb Orthodox schematism, leading to the conclusion that there is no historical information available about the monastery's foundation.

[24] At the beginning of the Cretan War (1645–1669), specifically in 1647, the monastery's clergy was anti-Ottoman and in the Venetian service as a result of it being attacked and plundered by the Ottomans.

[29] From the 1960s onwards, the monastery was a place of annual gathering by local Serbs and Croats, but in August 1989, after the Gazimestan speech, many people from Serbia arrived, promoting Serbian national claims, later followed by formation of SAO Krajina and the beginning of the Croatian War of Independence.

[30] After Operation Storm in 1995 the monastery was looted, but not significantly, as it was protected by the Croatian authorities (police), abandoned, and the seminary shut down and relocated to Divčibare and, later, Foča.