makaravank
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"Makaravank Monastery"
© 2000 Raffi Kojian, All Rights Reserved

Location in ArmeniaThe architectural ensembles of Makaravank (Idjevan district) and Khoranashat (Shamshadin district) in the north of Armenia occupy small high-altitude areas of theforested slopes of the Bazum mountain ridge. At one time there used to be vast settlements around these complexes, which was of substantial importance for the growth of the monasteries. The monasteries were surrounded with mighty walls, their gates were decorated with columns. Numerous residential structures were situated on an enclosed territory. There were architecturalpavilions housing mineral springs among them. Makaravank’s structures are built of dark-pink andesite and red tufa, with occasional greenish stones; Khoranashat is built of bluish basalt.

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The most ancient structure of all is Makaravank’s tenth-century cross-winged domed church with annexes in the corners, which differs from the ordinary structures of this type by rich carved ornamentation (floral and interlaced linear) on the wall of the altar dais and on the framings of the main windows of the interior.

The main temples of the complexes have much in common. Almost equal in size, they belong to the same type of the domed hall. The diameters of the high domes are quite large, and the under-dome space predominates in the structures’ interior. The vertical orientation of the interior of both temples is emphasized by the pillars supporting the dome. Attached to the pillars are severe facetedpilasters and half-columns which form, at the top, semi-circular and pointed arches bearing the supporting girth of the domes. High niches, semi-circular in the plan, framed with graceful arcatures on twin half-columns, which decorate the bottom of the altar apses, harmoniously fit in with the pillars. In Khoranashat there stretches, above the arcature, a cornice cut with profiled triangular recesses which combine harmoniously with various many-foil crowns of the niches.

The walls of altar daises, decorated with geometrical ornaments, are of extraordinary interest. In Khoranashat these ornaments are composed of diamonds and hexahedrons forming a net-like interlacement. In Makaravank the profiled eight-pointed stars and octagons between them, arranged in two rows, are covered with varied and rich carving unique in the architecture of medieval Armenia. It features various floral motifs, making up unusual bouquets, all kinds of fishes and birds, as well as sphinxes and sirens. Of interest are a boatman looking ahead, and a man’s figure, placed inside an octagon up the left edge of the altar dais wall and inscribed "eritasard" - probably a self-portrait of the carver. All this is enclosed in a strongly profiled frame which draws the onlooker’s attention to the reliefs inside it.

"Makaravank Portal"
© 2000 Raffi Kojian, All Rights Reserved
The exterior decoration of Makaravank’s main temple is the more expressive. Over the central window of the southern facade there is a sun dial and below it, on the cantilever column, a representation of a dove; the round windows vary in their shapes and ornamentation. The entrance portals are rectangular, with a semi-circular inner niche. As in Khoranashat, the tympanum and the spandrel are composed of stones of various shapes and colors. The dome drum is skirted by a graceful twenty-arch arcature on twin half-columns.

The arches are made as an ornamental band; the same band passes between the arches and the cornice. The arcature is harmoniously proportionate to the dome and to the overall volume of the church.

The church of Astvatsatsin in Makaravank is a miniature building which belongs to the type of the four-apse centric round monuments of the tenth-thirteenth centuries such as the church of St. Grigory in Sanahin, etc. But as distinct from them the church of Astvatsatsin is round only in its lower part and octahedral in its upper part, with four triangular niches crowned with various conchs. The dome is proportionate to the lower round bulk. The decoration of the church is in stylistic harmony with that of the main temple and the vestry. The profiled girth skirting the building passes across the ends of the niches and the window openings. On the northern side there are eye-catching reliefs of a stork and a snake, and over the southern window a scene showing two beasts locked in a fight.
"Makaravank Chapel"
© 2000 Raffi Kojian, All Rights Reserved
The small chapels built of ashlar stones have carved door platbands. Makaravank’s chapel has a vaulted ceiling, while Khoranashat chapel’s is dome-shaped with a high drum elongated from west to east with a steep conic roof.

The vestries of both complexes are four-columned. In Makaravank the vestry, built before 1207, catered to both temples at one and the same time; in it there was a door which led to the communion bread bakery, a small vaulted loom. The decoration of the vestry is subordinated to the artistic features of the main temple, which shows especially clearly in ornamental carving. The western portal has, like that of Geghard vestry, a stepped framing which includes the window above. Bas-reliefs are carved on the middle ledge, at the sides of the window. At the right side there is a winged sphynx with a crown on its head, and at the left side a lion attacking an ox.

The shaft of the south-western column of the interior is girdled with an eight-arch arcature, the capital is accentuated, on the transversal axis, by a large rosette above which, on the face of the arch, there is a relief representation of a dove with a lifted wing. The abutment on the western side, corresponding to the column, has smaller vertical divisions than the other wall-attached abutments. Rosettes of various designs, painted white, yellow and red, were cut on the flat ceilings of the corner sections. The decoration of the central section was richer. Floral ornaments covering the shield-shaped pendentives show birds in various attitudes. The girth of transition to the 20-hedral base of the ceiling which probably consisted of six intersecting arches is composed of groove-divided triangular slabs, vertical and inclined.

   MAKARAVANK FLOORPLAN
  1. a 10th century church
  2. the main temple of St. Astvatsatsin, 1204
  3. a rotund church of 1198
  4. a chapel of the 12th-13th centuries
  5. a gavit, before 1207
  6. a communion bread bakery of the 13th century
  7. service premises of the 11th-13th centuries
  8. the main entrance of the 11th-12 centuries
  9. remnants of a fence
  10. a spring well of the 12th-13th centuries

    Copyright © 1999 Raffi Kojian n_w$$h