The monastery is located at the edges of the old Roman and Byzantine "Siperant". The monastery complex, consisting of four churches, of which three churches connected as one whole, was built in the first third of the 13th century, 1321–24, and 1330–37. It is presumed that the site became a "metochion" (land owned and governed by a monastery) of the Žiča monastery, the seat of the Serbian Archbishopric at that time, while Archbishop Sava (d. 1235) was still alive. In the first third of the 13th century, Archbishop Arsenije I (s. 1233–63) had the Church of the Holy Apostles built on the north side. That church was decorated on Arsenije's order in ca. 1250 or ca. 1260. In 1253, Arsenije I moved the Serbian Church seat from Žiča to Peja amid foreign invasion, to a more secure location, closer to the centre of the country. The Serbian Church seat was then shortly returned to Žiča in 1285, before being moved to Peja in 1291, again amid foreign invasion. Archbishop Nikodim I (s. 1321–24) built the Church of St. Demetrius on the north side of the Church of the Holy Apostles, while his successor, Archbishop Danilo II (s. 1324–37) built the Church of the Holy Mother of God Hodegetria and the Church of St. Nicholas on the south side. In front of the three main churches, he then raised a monumental narthex. In the time of Archbishop Joanikije II, around 1345, the hitherto undecorated Church of St. Demetrius was decorated with frescoes. Serbian Emperor Stefan Dušan (r. 1331–1355) raised the Serbian Archbishopric to the patriarchal status in 1346, thus creating the Serbian Patriarchate of Peć.