Etchmiadzin Cathedral

Interesting facts

The bell tower once held a bell inscribed with a Tibetan Buddhist mantra, noted by travellers throughout the nineteenth century; it vanished after its removal in the late 1930s.

Shah Abbas I planned to move the whole cathedral to New Julfa near Isfahan; in the end only some stones were taken, and fifteen remain in the church there.

In the 1890s the courtyard around the cathedral measured about 106 by 102 metres, larger than Trinity Great Court in Cambridge.

In 1300 Archbishop Stepanos Orbelian wrote a famous poem lamenting the ruined cathedral, portraying it as a mourning woman calling her children home.

The Etchmiadzin plan was copied in Armenian churches abroad, including those of Singapore (1835), Paris (1904) and Bucharest (1911–1912).

Some art historians have argued that its plan influenced the ninth-century church of Germigny-des-Prés in France.

Catholicos Simeon I set up a printing house beside Etchmiadzin in 1770, the first in Armenia.

The museum displays a fragment venerated as a piece of Noah's Ark alongside its other relics.

During the restoration completed in 2024, about 2,600 square metres of painted surfaces were restored and the fragile 17th-century brass cross was replaced with a bronze copy.

The cathedral appears on the Armenian 50,000-dram banknote issued in 2001.

Why it is worth it

Etchmiadzin is the mother church of the Armenian Apostolic Church and has a strong claim to being the oldest cathedral in the world. Armenian tradition places its founding between 301 and 303, just after King Tiridates III made Armenia the first state to adopt Christianity. According to the chronicler Agathangelos, Gregory the Illuminator saw a vision of a figure descending from heaven and striking the ground with a golden hammer to mark where the church should rise; later tradition identified the figure with Christ, and the name Etchmiadzin — roughly "the Only-Begotten descended" — comes from that story, though it only came into use in the 15th century. Excavations in the 1950s found an Urartian stele and traces of a pagan fire altar beneath the main altar.

The building you see is essentially the one raised in 483/4 by Vahan Mamikonian, governor of Persian Armenia, after the first church had been wrecked: a compact cruciform plan with four free-standing pillars carrying a central dome, around 33 by 30 metres and about 34 metres to the top of the dome. Later centuries layered on top of it. The grey stone core is framed by bright red tuff additions of the 17th century — a western belfry begun in 1653 and finished in 1658, then smaller turreted bell towers on the other arms in 1682 — and a sacristy was attached to the east end in 1868. On the north wall, look for two small, much-debated reliefs, one showing Saint Thecla and Paul the Apostle, the other a Greek cross ringed with Greek names; some scholars place them among the earliest Christian sculpture in Armenia.

Inside, the walls and dome are covered with Persian-influenced painting — flowers, birds, scrollwork and arabesques — much of it by the Hovnatanian family of painters; Naghash Hovnatan's work in the dome, done between 1712 and 1721, still survives. The cathedral's history is one of repeated loss and return: Shah Abbas I carried off relics and stones to New Julfa in 1604, the southern apse collapsed in 1923, and the Soviet authorities resolved in 1938 to close the see altogether. A long restoration of the dome and structure began in 2012 and was celebrated with a ceremony in September 2024. The treasury museum holds manuscripts and relics, among them the lance venerated as the Holy Lance. Together with the nearby churches of St. Hripsime and St. Gayane and the ruins of Zvartnots, Etchmiadzin forms a UNESCO World Heritage Site listed in 2000.

Getting there

The cathedral stands at the heart of the Mother See complex in Vagharshapat (also called Ejmiatsin), about 20 km west of Yerevan. Zvartnots International Airport (EVN) is roughly 9 km away, between the town and the capital. Minibuses (marshrutkas) run regularly between Yerevan and Vagharshapat through the day, and the churches of St. Hripsime and St. Gayane are within a short walk or ride of the cathedral.

From the encyclopaedia

Etchmiadzin Cathedral is the mother church of the Armenian Apostolic Church, located in the city dually known as Etchmiadzin (Ejmiatsin) and Vagharshapat, Armenia. Constructed at the turn of the fourth century, it is usually considered the first cathedral built in ancient Armenia, and often regarded as the oldest cathedral in the world.

Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Etchmiadzin Cathedral

Interesting facts

Why it is worth it

Getting there

Plan your visit

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From the encyclopaedia