Pitsunda Cathedral

The Cathedral of St. Andrew the Apostle, additionally referred to as the Pitsunda Cathedral or Bichvinta Cathedral is a Georgian Orthodox Cathedral positioned in Pitsunda, in the Gagra district of the de facto impartial Republic of Abkhazia, across the world regarded as constituting a part of Georgia.

The cathedral is currently used by the Abkhazian Orthodox Church and serves as that frame's seat, although this usage is disputed by means of the Republic of Georgia and is taken into consideration irregular by the Eastern Orthodox communion. Pitsunda Cathedral was constructed on the top of the tenth century through King Bagrat III of Georgia. It served as the seat of the Georgian Orthodox Catholicate of Abkhazia till the late 16th century whilst Abkhazia came beneath the Ottoman hegemony. According to 17th-century French traveler Jean Chardin, Catholicos, who no longer lived in Pitsunda, visited the cathedral as soon as a year with the retinue of bishops and princes to carry out the sanctification of chrism. The cathedral changed into reconsecrated in 1869 whilst Abkhazia was already part of Russian Empire.