The icon of Our Lady of Neamts refers to the iconographic type of Hodegetria (She who shows the Way). It is a copy of the miraculous icon presented by the Byzantine Emperor John Palaeologus to the Governor of the Moldavian Principality Alexander Voevoda, and then transferred to the Ascension of Christ Monastery of Neamts, that had been founded in Moldavia in the 14th century. The inscriptions in the Moldovan and Church Slavonic languages on the reverse side indicate the belonging of the icon to the monastery (photo next).
