The Church of St. Petka in Staničenje (, ) is the oldest church in Staničenje, Serbia. In the Middle Ages it was known as the Church of St. Nikola, a Bulgarian monument<ref>Бакалова, Елка. Сръбските учени за монументалната църковна живопис от XV век в България, Зборник радова Византолошког института XLIV, 2007, с. 500 </ref> from the beginning of the rule of Tsar Ivan Alexander.
In 1967, the church was declared a Culture Monument of Exceptional Importance in Serbia. It was visited by Radivoje Ljubinković (1910–1979), adviser of the Archeological Institute in Belgrade, in 1972 and later, between 1974 and 1977. He conducted a research program on the archeological site, which led to preserving the church's architecture and frescoes in 1979. Final conservation and restoration of painted walls (frescoes) was made between 1975 and 1978 by Zdenka Živković, a picture restorer from Belgrade.
The church is located near Pirot, about 10 kilometers west at the foot of Belava Mountain. It was built on an elevated plateau above the river coast of Nišava, near Staničenje village and the confluence of Temštica, near the main road from Sofia to Niš. A fresco notes that the church was built from 1331 to 1332, at the time of Bulgarian Emperor Ivan Alexander and Vidin master Belaur.
History
Construction period
The Church of St. Petka, formerly the Church of St. Nikola, is the oldest church in Staničenje. The fresco epitaph which is written on the west wall above the entrance notes that Arsenije, Jefimija, Konstantin and some other members, whose names have been erased by time, painted and built the church between 1331 and 1332. In the time of Bulgarian Emperor Ivan Alexander (bulg. Ivan Asen) and Vidin master, Bulgarian noble Belaur. Some mentioned on the fresco epitaph were already dead by the time the church was completed, so construction was finished by their sons. Later, a narthex and porch on the south side of the church was built but not preserved. A vestibule with an open wooden porch was built in the 19th century.
Turbulent times
No written information has been found about the church during the Middle Ages under its former dedication to St.Nikola. In the search for possible records, it was assumed that the church was mentioned as the Church of St. in one Ottoman document, dated to sometime during the rule of Sultan Mehmed III. In later centuries, several historical sources of data recorded statements which illuminate the fate of the church in Staničenje in the late 18th century and the first decades of the 19th century. In some memoirs of archpriest Aleksa Minčić from Staničenje, the following is noted: "A long time ago, it must have been at the end of the 18th century, the priests and all the people who happened to be [in the church] perished, so after that the church was closed for the next 30 years. And it was like this: one year, just for Annunciation, in the time when the priests organized a Divine Liturgy, in the church and the churchyard were many people. Suddenly, [the thugs from] Kardzhali struck and attacked the people in the church and churchyard, and the most horrible killing and slaughtering of people and priests began. All people and priests were killed that day. Everything was plundered and the church was almost destroyed in that Kardzhali action. And today, when someone digs in the churchyard, human bones are found. Those are the bones from the Annunciation. Since then, the church in Staničenje could no longer serve its purpose until 1829. In that time, [it] did not have a priest because they were often killed. In that year, 1829, the people of Staničenje get one priest and they ask the landowner to allow them to recover back the church so it can serve its purpose. The landowner accommodates them under the condition that they must give him, in the name of a church holiday, 26th July, a sterile sheep every year. People of Staničenje recovered the church and it began to serve again to its purpose, and the landowner, since that year, received sterile sheep from the village every year."
Thanks to some surviving records, that event can be reliably dated to the 1796. In a liturgical book from the Monastery of St. Dimitrije near Bela Palanka, it was recorded that those years Kardzhali plundered and burned many villages and towns. The same event was mentioned in the record of priest Nikola on a manuscript of the Gospel, which is now held in Sofia. The church was desecrated for the last time in the fall of 1877, following the liberation from the Ottoman Empire. The Circassians plundered, looted, and desecrated all of Staničenje, burning all the liturgical books in the Church of St. Petka as well.