Armenian Christianity in Eastern Turkey - a pilgrimage and a history

Church of the Holy Cross Aktamar 

By now my readers will be used to the idea that pretty much everything about the history of the areas we were visiting in this beautiful region of Eastern Turkey has been extremely complicated. It was little wonder that I sometimes found it hard to get my head around all the dates and names and battles and so on that our guide was telling us about in the coach as we traveled on between our many and varied stopping points.

Armenian church of St Gregory of Tigran Honents at Ani

But to gain the most out of this pilgrimage it really was important to understand some of the background history to the area and especially its churches and monasteries,
and as far as the history of the Armenian Church is concerned, I have identified the following which I see as the main facts relevant to this pilgrimage:

1. It was two of the disciples of Jesus Christ, Thaddeus and Bartholomew, who first brought Christianity to the ancient Kingdom of Armenia, in about the middle of the first century AD. They helped spread the religion in the Kingdom and it is said that they may have been martyred in Armenia.

Ani church of St Gregory of Tigran Honents

2. St Gregory the Illuminator (otherwise called St Gregory the Enlightener, and so called because he enlightened the nation with the light of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, was responsible for the Armenians embracing Christianity. He was brought up in Caesarea in Cappadochia as a Christian and was imprisoned and tortured for many years in a deep dungeon by the pagan Tiridates. The story goes that at that time King Tiridates III succumbed to a dreadful affliction brought on after the King had a group of Christian nuns murdered in a fit of spite because his amorous advances were rejected by one of them. So Gregory was brought up from his dungeon, where in spite of the awful treatments inflicted upon him he had survived, and sure enough did indeed cure the king, converting him to Christianity from Paganism at the same time. This was good news for Armenian Christianity as in gratitude the King declared the official religion of Armenia to be Christianity.
This made Armenia the first country to have a national Christian Church. 
Within just a few centuries, with royal support, Christianity had spread rapidly throughout the country and even permeated the Armenian culture.
The frescoes in the eastern part of the Church of St Gregory of Tigran Honents at Ani are devoted to the life of St Gregory the Illuminator.

3. There were three other very significant events in early Armenian church history:

a. In the mid fifth century the Persians wanted the Armenians to denounce their faith and follow Zoroastrianism. The Armenians fought for their right to remain Christian at the Battle of Avarayr where St Vartan and over 1000 noblemen were defeated, but after 30 years of persecution the new Persian Shah acknowledged the right from then on for the Armenians to pursue their Christian faith without hindrance.

b. Until much the same time there was no written Armenian language and Greek or Syriac was used in worship. In 404 AD the monk Mesrob, later to become St Mesrob, invented an Armenian alphabet enabling him to translate the Bible so that the written word was available for all.

c. The third event of significance is somewhat more complicated and theological and concerns the way that followers of Jesus understood his nature as both perfect God and perfect man; basically whether Christians emphasized the diversity or the unity of the incarnate God – “the Word become flesh.” Those who believed in the unity of the incarnate God were accused of denying the humanity of Christ while the diversity group were said to be effectively splitting Christ into two persons. The argument is a difficult theological one, and the matter was put up for discussion and decision by the fourth Ecumenical council held at Chalcedon near Constantinople in 451 AD. Far from bringing the two sides in the debate together, in fact the council were accused of leaning too far towards the diversity idea and this split the churches into those that accepted Chalcedon (The Eastern Orthodox Churches as well as the Roman Catholic Church) and the non Chalcedonian churches including the Armenian, Syrian and Coptic Oriental Orthodox churches.

For some time from 992 Ani was the main See or center of the Catholicus or leader of the Armenian Church, and had many of the finest examples of Armenian Church architecture, sadly mostly in ruins as we had seen. Ani was the capital of the medieval Armenian Kingdom (Bagratuni) from 961 – 1045 and by the beginning of the 11th century it had a population of well over 100,000 (some say even up to 200,000). It was renowned not only for its churches but also for its elaborately fortified walls and was known as “the city of forty gates” as well as the “city of a thousand and one churches.”

Church of the Holy Cross Island of Aktamar

It was important for us to understand as pilgrims the persecutions and oppressions suffered by the Armenian Church through the ages, 
right up to the devastating genocide in 1915 already mentioned and subsequent limitations on worship in Soviet Armenia.
It says a great deal for the strength of their faith that the church has survived as it has, and at the same time it was sobering to see so many beautiful Armenian churches in different states of ruin or abandonment. 

So where does the Armenian church stand today? I quote below from an article by Michael B Papazian on The Armenian Church from which some of the above information was also obtained:

“The mission of the Armenian Church today is the re-evangelization of Armenia following its emancipation from coercive atheism as well as the renewal of religious life in a Diaspora that is increasingly threatened by materialistic and secular influences (I so agree!) The mission today to integrate all aspects of Armenian life with the Gospel remains fundamentally the same as that of St. Gregory the Illuminator at the Armenian Church’s beginning.”

I also used another excellent source, from the Armenian Culture website, on the “History of the Armenian Church”  by James R. Russell, Columbia University. 1981 and it seems appropriate to close with passages taken from the final paragraphs of that article:

"Religious intolerance, violence, and the fanatical propagation of one's own ideas without regard for the convictions and dignity of others, are the denial of civilization. …
The Armenians became more than a culture with Vartan, separating themselves decisively from Iran -- they became a civilization. No king led them into battle, nor did any hope of victory or gain spur them; they fought with simple bravery and fine reluctance, only for the right to be themselves. Such a nation is so enlightened, cupped in the very hand of God, that it can never really be defeated. Armenia celebrates in Vartan the victory, not of arms, but of an idea. That idea is the freedom of the spirit, the basis of liberty, of creativity, of thought and of life.”

Other sites that may be of interest:
http://www.armenianchurch-ed.net/our-church/history-of-the-church/history/ in USA http://armenianchurchsydney.org.au/our-church/church-history/ in Australia

Pilgrimage to Armenian and Syriac Christianity in Eastern Turkey - children, cows, food, snow and rainbows!

the cathedral or Church of the Holy Mother of God

As with many sites we were to visit over the course of the next week, our group at Ani soon attracted the attentions of the young children of the area. Some offered their services as guide, some were selling items of hand knitted baby wear, some simply begged; “money, money”, but a casual shrug and smile usually sufficed to prevent any real pestering.

In the cathedral, (or Surp Asdvadzadzin, church of the Holy Mother of God - Cathedral here does not have the same connotation as many Christians are used to, denoting the seat of the diocesan bishop, but is simply a big grand church) we handed one lad a tube of polo mints. He tore off the wrappers, which were tossed on the floor, and proceeded to share the mints equally with another lad; clearly his senior, because he remonstrated with the younger boy about the tossed litter, picked it up and went to hide it out of sight within the crevices of the ruins!


Walking further along the path the same young lad saw some fresh cow manure in our way ahead. He promptly picked it up with his bare hands and threw it to the side on the grass,
where several cows were grazing, free to roam across the whole site. Clearly sweet wrappings are considered less offensive than cow manure!

At Ani - the "cathedral" and mosque in the distance

Whilst in the mosque, a small family group of muslims, female and veiled, asked to have their photo taken with me. They were so friendly. It made me reflect, as so often on this journey, that most of us, of whatever color or creed, simply want to get on with our lives in peace. We all have the same basic human needs of food, water, shelter, health and education. Most of us do not want antagonism and violence. Would that we could all learn from history. I believe it was the Spanish philosopher, essayist, poet, and novelist George Santayana who said: ‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’ Human nature being what it is, I wonder if it is really that simple?

A short walk away from the outside wall of this ruined city, just past the improvised and very rocky village football pitch, we found the restaurant. It is clearly geared for the coach loads of tourists that must visit the site in the more hospitable summer weather, and it actually had modern toilets in a new toilet block, although there was no water in the taps the day we visited!

As a vegetarian I sometimes found the choice of dishes available severely limited in this country of predominantly fish and halal meat eaters.
But I could always rely at lunch on the excellent local dish of Turkish omelette or menemen.  
This is simply a light juicy scramble of onions, tomatoes, sweet red peppers and eggs, and is actually a traditional breakfast dish for the Turks, who take this first meal of the day very seriously. All the restaurants we visited for lunch could rustle this up for me even if it wasn’t actually on the menu, and each chef had a different take on its presentation, giving me several variations on the same theme. However served, it was always delicious with the lovely fresh Turkish breads that were always provided generously at every meal. I look forward to recreating this simple and nourishing meal for my family back home.

Eating breakfast is an important part of Turkish family tradition. Pretty much the same breakfast is dished up across the country, which I find surprising given a culture which is rich in regional cuisines. Typically at breakfast the Turk will eat fresh white bread, Turkish cheese like the white cheese or "kaşar" (ka-SHAR'), black olives, sliced tomatoes and cucumbers with honey or fruit preserves. We were to find this basic fare repeated in the monasteries we were to visit in a few days time, served with simply delicious fig jam. After we had eaten well, I watched the waiter curiously, as he was gathering up the glasses, throw any remaining water from them onto the carpets in the aisles between the tables. I read later that this is the custom at least in that part of Turkey. It is hospitable to offer water to visitors on arrival. The glass of water is offered to the first visitor, emptied of dregs, refilled and passed to the next person, and so on. Later in the week, when we arrived at some of the monasteries in the Tur Abdin, we were all given our own individual sealed plastic pots of water, before the glasses of cay came around!

During lunch at Ani a blizzard of driving sleety rain had blown up. It was bleak and grey and very cold and we were glad to have seen the ruins in the morning, and to be back in the comfort and warmth of our coach to continue our journey to our next overnight stop at Dogubeyazit, close to Mount Ararat. There was a couple at the restaurant who wanted a lift back to Kars. Since we had plenty of spare seats we were more than happy to oblige. As we approached Kars where turned left away from that town to take the road towards Igdir and Mount Ararat, our lucky hitchhikers left our coach just in time to catch the local bus on its way into Kars.

So we left Kars once more behind us, driving across the plateau in a south easterly direction, down towards Igdir, 170 kms away and nudging the Armenian border. The mist came down, so thick at one point that our driver struggled to slowly find his way. The sleety rain turned to snow and the black ploughed furrows on either side of the road glistened white with dustings of snow through the murky mist.

The bad weather looked to be set in, and we saw a herdsman bringing his huge head of cattle down off the plateau to lower ground and the relative shelter of the farm below. We came below the snow line again at Digor, and back to better visibility. But the snow pole markers by the sides of the road were evidence of harsh winter weather in this area.

this of course is not the rainbow in Turkey !

Then we saw the most amazing sight before us; a beautiful rainbow arced across the sky, brilliant in all its colors. How incredible was this, given that we were on our way to Mt Ararat, the traditional place where Noah's Ark came to rest after the great flood waters had receded, and when God put a rainbow in the sky as a sign of his covenant with all living creatures that never again would he send a flood to destroy all life. 

Sadly I could not get a picture of it. 

So in my next post I shall write about Mt Ararat and our journey onwards to Lake Van...

Pilgrimage to Turkey: Ani the "City of 1001 Churches" ...

Ani from the outside

This one-time wealthy and powerful Armenian capital city and trading hub has suffered a terrible, violent and bloody history with dreadful massacres of its overwhelmingly Christian citizens. 

It was attacked and sacked respectively by both Byzantine and Seljuk Turkish armies and later suffered terribly at the hands of the Mongols in 1236 from which time it started its gradual decline. The site had been entirely abandoned by the middle of the 18th century. (As with all this area, the history is complex and much more can be found on the internet - see also my own historical summary of the region posted a couple of days ago) 

Over the years earthquakes, (in 1319, 1832, and 1988), vandalism, neglect, earthquakes, amateurish restorations and excavations have all taken their toll on this amazing site of Ani. The Turks blame the Armenians for damaging some of the monuments by quarry blasting across on the other side of the gorge. The quarry is clearly visible. The Armenians accuse the Turks of neglect and there is talk of deliberate “cultural cleansing”. Until quite recently tourists needed to obtain special permission to visit from the tourist office in Kars and photography was strictly not allowed. 

In about 2004 these restrictions were relaxed, and it would also seem that Turkey is now committed to trying to conserve and develop this site. 

The Church of the Holy Redeemer being restored

There was evidence of current conservation at the time of our visit, apparently being undertaken by the World MonumentsFund in partnership with the Turkish Ministry of Culture. 

This is the Church of the Holy Redeemer. It was completed around 1035 and has a unique design: 19-sided externally, 8-apsed internally, with a huge central dome set upon a tall drum. Sadly in 1955 the whole Eastern side collapsed in a storm.

I really hope and pray that this important heritage can be preserved sympathetically for future generations as a reminder of such an important historical past.There is no shortage of information available about the site, in guide books, websites and web reviews from the many travellers who are drawn to this important place. Most stress that it takes 4 or 5 hours to do it justice, (I would say longer is needed) and advise carrying a picnic and a water bottle. For us it was cold, but at least sunny, and when we visited a perfectly adequate restaurant near the site was open for lunch time refreshment.

remains of an oil press at Ani

During the morning we wondered all over the ruins, visiting not only the said church of St Gregory, but also exploring the massive cathedral (or church of the Holy Mother of God, started in 989 but not finished for another 12 or so years), the mosque of Minuchir and the Citadel, the highest point, from where we had a panoramic view of the whole area. I was personally fascinated by the ruins of the houses, with fireplaces, niches for ornaments perhaps, evidence of a chapel perhaps and signs of an underfloor heating system.

Inside the massive cathedral, or Church of the Holy Mother of God

evidence of a chapel among the dwellings?

ruins of dwellings Ani

remnants of bridge in arpa cayi gorge

There is a map of the site at Wiki which shows just how many churches there are at this important ancient stronghold of Armenian Christianity. Clearly very much more needs to be done to discover, chart, research and conserve this wonderful place.
I have a few more stories of Ani to come, before we make our way south via Mt. Ararat and Lake Van on our way to the Tur Abdin region and the Syriac Orthodox monasteries ....

Pilgrimage to Turkey: the Ancient Armenian City of Ani

exterior animal carvings on Church of St Gregory Ani 

I mentioned already that it was sometimes difficult to remember on this trip that we were pilgrims first, not tourists.
We were urged regularly by our long-suffering leaders that the first thing we should do at each place visited was to be quiet, reflective and prayerful. 
Photos could follow later. It has to be said that we didn’t always remember this advice. 

But once inside the church of St Gregory, commissioned by the wealthy Armenian merchant Tigran Honents, finished in 1215 AD and easily the best preserved monument at Ani, the pilgrim in us took over completely. The interior was simply fabulous, adorned with the most beautiful frescoes, which depict the life of Christ, the life of Saint Gregory the Illuminator and scenes from the life of St. Nino, who converted the Georgians to Christianity. In the narthex or outer lobby area and its chapel fragmentary frescoes survive that are more Byzantine in style. The church is tucked away down the side of the gorge and hidden from immediate view from the main path. It meant a bit of a clamber down a reasonable pathway that sadly some found too challenging; because the rewards were great. The exterior of the church is also quite simply stunning. Its setting nestled into the side of the cliff down into the deep gorge is special enough. But it is decorated on all its four sides with ornate stone carvings of animals, both real and imaginary which were quite marvellous. As I gazed in delight at these wonders, my attention was caught by the most haunting and beautiful sound coming from inside the church. I listened outside for a while, captivated.

The church of St Gregory, Ani 

Then I forgot my camera and hastened to the doorway. There within was a member of our group, a deacon from Iraq, singing something that brought me out in goose bumps.
The sound was captivating, and a deeply spiritual moment for me and I suspect for many others. It was only afterwards when he had finished that I learnt he was singing the Lord’s Prayer in Aramaic. None of us really wanted to spoil this moment for quite some while as we all stood, united as pilgrims, to reflect on the past history of this place, full of reminders of the glories of Armenian Christianity in another age long ago.

 The ensuing and deeply spiritual silence in this beautiful church was finally brought to a gentle finale by the bishop leading us in saying the Kyries;
Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy, Lord have mercy. And we all stumbled out from the gloom into the light with tears in the eyes of more than a few of us.

There is simply no shortage of information available about this site, in guide books, websites and web reviews from the many travellers who are drawn to this important place. Most stress that it takes 4 or 5 hours to do it justice, and advise carrying a picnic and a water bottle. For us it was cold, but at least sunny, and there is a perfectly adequate restaurant off site for lunch time refreshment.

During the morning we wondered all over the ruins, visiting not only the said church of St Gregory, but also exploring the massive cathedral (or church of the Holy Mother of God, started in 989 but not finished for another 12 or so years), the Church of the Holy Apostles, the mosque of Minuchir and the Citadel, the highest point, from where we had a panoramic view of the whole area. I was personally fascinated by the ruins of the houses, with fireplaces, niches for ornaments perhaps, and signs of an underfloor heating system.


More about all this tomorrow with lots more photos of Ani....

more of the outside of the church of St Gregory of Tigran Honents at Ani

Pilgrimage to Eastern Turkey: the Road to Ani

Snow was again falling when we woke up the next morning in Kars, and the day looked grey and cold. We started with a celebration of the Eucharist in a hotel meeting room from where we went off to breakfast; spiritual nourishment for the soul, food nourishment for the body, although this first meal of the day was a distinct disappointment after the lavish spread in the previous hotel just 24 hours before. The food was distinctly 3 star fare at this hostelry in Kars, and our room smelt vaguely of stale cigarette smoke. Anyway, we were not sorry to be packing our bags again and setting out on the road, this time to Ani with its spectacular setting on the Aras river.

Ani was once the huge capital city of the Armenian kingdom, which covered much of what today is Armenia and Eastern Turkey, and anyone visiting this part of Turkey really should make sure they see this historic site. This vast medieval ruin is full of reminders of the glories of Armenian Christianity and much else besides. But first we had another scenic coach journey.

The first hint of more fertile and workable soil on this volcanic plateau was the enormous black mole hills dotted over the fields soon after we had left Kars. There had also been attempts at tree planting along both sides of the road – perhaps to break the winds that must blast across this flat landscape? Anyway the trees looked decidedly sickly and I’m not sure the planting program, for whatever purpose, had been a success.

Again we saw huge herds of cows; and for the first time on this trip I noticed that they were being confined by long stretches of brand new barbed wire fencing along the edge of the road – perhaps to keep cars, lorries and cattle safely apart rather than because of any need for boundary marking? There were army sentries positioned at high points along the route, again in towers protected all around by sandbags; signs of the time and the tensions still in this area. There was plenty of fly tipping at Kars and indeed everywhere in this region: it's so very sad to see beautiful countryside despoiled in this way. Domestic rubbish just seems to get dumped anywhere as long as it is away from the houses themselves.

Neither guide, guide book nor the rather dull albeit imposing entrance to the site could prepare us for the wow factor when we walked through the portal and surveyed beyond us and into the distance the ruins of this amazing Armenian capital city that is Ani.

outside the walls of the ruined city of Ani

The area covered is simply vast and the snow dusting the distant peaks added to the mystique, wonder and indeed the photogenics of this fabulous site. The whole site is protected on its western side by the Bostanlar valley and on its eastern side by the ravine of the Akhurian river, a branch of the Araks or Aras river which forms part of the current frontier with Armenia; it all makes for a very dramatic setting.

Ani, from the entrance portal

The old houses, the churches and mosques, and all the various ruins spread across this vast panorama all beckoned us and we were in no mood to listen to history lessons from our knowledgeable and long suffering guide; rather we all seemed impatient to savor everything the site had to offer us. It has to be said also that the keen photographers among us were anxious to get pictures before the rest of the group surged eagerly ahead along the well made path towards the first of the ruins.

Views of people’s backs in the foreground do not tend to enhance the interest of pictures of ancient ruins!  

It was sometimes difficult to remember on this trip that we were pilgrims first, not tourists. We were urged regularly by our long-suffering leaders that the first thing we should do at each place visited was to be quiet, reflective and prayerful. Photos could follow later.  It has to be said that we didn’t always remember this advice.

Tomorrow I'll share much more about this amazing place...

Pilgrimage to Eastern Turkey: further along the road to Kars

Kars, in Eastern Anatolia, is situated on a high volcanic plateau, where there is more animal husbandry than horticulture. We are half way there on our coach journey from Erzurum. Following the river down the hill, we pass many blue beehives neatly arranged in rows, much as I’d seen them in the South Western region of Turkey around Marmaris and Turunc many years ago. This region we are travelling through is known for its butter and honey, both some of the best in Turkey apparently.


The volcanic rock outcrops glistened with Obsidian, once used for tools as it is naturally sharp when broken. With our left turn at Karahurt, Kars is just 74 kilometres to go. We’d be there in plenty of time to explore it before checking in to the next hotel.

In the middle distance I saw some trees with cups attached to the bark, presumably the trees were being tapped for sap. I think they were birch trees and I know this sap is harvested for human consumption in some countries, such as Latvia, Estonia, Russia: Turkey also? Although it is the beginning of winter now and sap tapping would be done as it rises in spring. Perhaps this one was forgotten! The rock formations were incredible, and we came into the coniferous tree line as we climbed again. There were small stone cairns dotted over the hillsides; presumably these are simple boundary markers between farmers?

We were driving up into the clouds now. It was becoming colder and there were dustings of snow on the hillside. The soil was now much darker, colored by the opsidian in the basalt rock.
I’m no expert on Turkish birds but I saw what looked to me like a crane standing in the river. Could it have been? 
Everywhere there were the minarets. In every village we passed, high above the surrounding landscape, these fine white and slim pencil like structures stood out; even if the mosque itself was nothing more than a shack, a small basic building sometimes with only a flat roof. The herds of cattle were now becoming huge, although still free to roam anywhere, it seemed. As we approached Kars, at 1800 meters above sea level, and under a sullen wintry sky, we saw block after block of flats, with colorful walls and roofs, but many seemed to be not occupied. I wondered why? As the coach negotiated narrow roads between high stone walls through the old part of the town towards our hotel for the night, we could peer over the walls into small courtyards of simple houses.

Sometimes these were crammed with geese, and I discovered that these are a local delicacy usually made into a stew. Kars is such a mix of the old, the new, the historic ruins and the positively squalid. It is interesting for all those reasons. 
It is a shame that people tend to use Kars simply as a transit town en route to the ruins of Ani, 28 miles to the East on the Turkish – Armenian border. Because actually it is worth lingering awhile for what it has to offer in its own right.

Not only that, it is the setting for the novel Snow, by Orhan Pamuk. I have yet to read it!

Over the next couple of days I will describe all the many interesting sites we stopped to see in Kars before checking into our hotel for that night....and a short history lesson may be needed to put all this information into the context of our pilgrimage...