The Valaam Monastery is a stauropegic Orthodox monastery in Russian Karelia, located on Valaam, the largest island in Lake Ladoga, the largest lake in Europe.

A stauropegion, also spelled stavropegion, is a monastery or a parish which depends directly on the primate or on the Holy Synod of a particular Church, and which is not under the jurisdiction of the local bishop. The name comes from the Byzantine tradition of summoning the Patriarch to place a cross at the foundation of stauropegic monasteries or parochial churches.