Ancient Armenian church on UNESCO special list

A fourth-century Armenian church has been included in UNESCO’s 7 Most Endangered Monuments’ list pursuant to a bid submitted by the Ministry of Culture.

The church, St. Paul and Peter (Surb Poghos Petros), was registered as a special protection site by the Europa Nostra organization, of which Armenia has been a member since 2012.

After a monitoring conducted upon the Ministry’s request back in 2009, the church was included in the list of the most endangered monuments on the territory of Armenia. The monitoring was conducted by the local NGO called Research on Armenian Architecture.

The 21 participant countries had submitted a total of 40 bids for the protection of their cultural heritage. The project is aimed at uniting state and private companies around a common idea and revealing possible financial resources for the protection of cultural monuments. According to the organization’s official website, the final list will be unveiled at Europa Nostra’s 50th Anniversary Congress in Athens on 16 June.

St. Paul and Peter is a single-nave church built in the fifth century. It is one of the first constructions in the Armenian architecture to have a domed hall reconstructed from a three-nave basilica. It is believed that a pagan temple was “sanctified” in the 4th century to turn into a Christian construction. At the close of the 5th or the beginning of the 6th century, it was rebuilt as a domed hall by the demand and with the assistance of Grigor Gntununi, the ruler of Nig province.

The church’s dome has its unique place in the Armenian architecture and is thought to be a unique sample as a place of warship in general.

After the construction of a dam (1962-1967), the church remained an isolated building in a highland area and was under water for several months. It was last repaired in the late 19th century, but the cover and the southern wall collapsed later.

Speaking to Tert.am, a former lawmaker of the Prosperous Armenia party, Lyova Khachatryan, said he has no idea how the church can be renovated at all given that it often remains under water for about three months.

But he said he would support a donor assistance plan for repairing the unique construction. “There’s no construction of the kind. That’s a basilica church. It is necessary to restore them instead of building new ones,” he said.