Cathedral of Ani

The Cathedral of Ani (Armenian: Անիի Մայր Տաճար, Anii Mayr Tačar) was completed in 1001 by the architect Trdat in the ruined ancient Armenian capital of Ani, located in what is now the extreme eastern tip of Turkey, on the border with modern Armenia. It offers an example of a domed cruciform church within a rectangular plan, though both the dome and the drum supporting it are now missing, having collapsed in an earthquake in 1319. A further earthquake in 1988 caused the collapse of the north-west corner, and weakened all the west side.

Description

The Cathedral of Ani is 100 feet (30 m) long and 65 feet (20 m) wide, unusually large by Armenian standards, which is possible by supporting the dome on four piers of clustered columns, one of the features of the architecture that was to be very common in Western architecture. The roofs are stone vaulted throughout. Tall blind arcades decorate the external walls, including the ruined drum. There is carved relief decoration around several windows. There are three entrances, for the prince (south), the patriarch (north) and the people (west); each originally had a porch. The eastern end presents on the exterior a flat wall with two tall triangular niches, but on the interior has a large central apse with two chambers on two storeys to the sides only accessible through narrow doorways on the ground floor, and stairways to the upper floor spaces. Though now light enters through the missing drum, the lower windows, including some round "porthole" ones, are few and small. Nikoli Marr, the first archaeologist to study the building, believed that it was considerably altered from its original design in the 13th century, but the evidence of the numerous inscriptions indicates this was not the case.

Ani

Ani (Armenian: Անի; Greek: Ἄνιον, Ánion;Latin: Abnicum;Georgian: ანისი, Anisi;Turkish: Ani) is a ruined medieval Armenian city situated in the Turkish province of Kars near the border with Armenia.

Between 961 and 1045, it was the capital of the Bagratid Armenian kingdom that covered much of present-day Armenia and eastern Turkey. Called the "City of 1001 Churches", Ani stood on various trade routes and its many religious buildings, palaces, and fortifications were amongst the most technically and artistically advanced structures in the world. At its height, the population of Ani probably was on the order of 100,000.

Long ago renowned for its splendor and magnificence, Ani was sacked by the Mongols in 1236 and devastated in a 1319 earthquake, after which it was reduced to a village and gradually abandoned and largely forgotten by the seventeenth century. Ani is a widely recognized cultural, religious, and national heritage symbol for Armenians. According to Razmik Panossian, Ani is one of the most visible and ‘tangible’ symbols of past Armenian greatness and hence a source of pride.