The Monastery of Heroitsa (or Roytsa) is located near the village of Melissa, 52 km from Sparta and belongs to the Municipality of Sminos. It is said that there was a temple of the goddess Athena in the area. The Monastery was named after the Source of the Living Spring (The Flow of the Spring) located there. The monastery area consisted of an abbess, oven, auxiliary spaces, cells. of which only a ground-floor building (probably a cell) and the rectangular temple with a sloping tiled roof survive, joined on their sides by a low wall. It is said that the church is a building of 1600. The newer church, dedicated to Zoodochos Pigi (Roitsa), has inside a small iconostasis in an olive shade with a representation of the "eye" of God - inside a triangular frame - on the pediment. The roof of the church represents the starry sky while the walls are painted in 1996 with images of full-length Saints. In the church, a pilgrimage to the miraculous Byzantine icon of the Life-giving Spring is held every year on Good Friday.
Editor: Niki Kalopaidis