Part of the monastery complex is the church. Its icon to the Blessed Virgin is considered one of Rhodes’ most important; it is miracle working (especially for the ill) and protects the village. Legend has it that a heretic stabbed the painting many centuries ago and brought blood from Mary’s cheek and the brown stains are still visible. At Easter the icon is carried from house to house and village to village until it finally comes to rest for a period on the island of Halki. Most of the present buildings date from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries built around a thirteenth-century Church of the Holy Cross.