The ruins of the Zvartnots Christian Church are located 18 kilometers west of Yerevan. Echmiadzin Cathedral is located 8 km further to the west, so Zvartnots and Echmiadzin are convenient to visit during one excursion. In 2000, Zvartnots Temple, Echmiadzin Cathedral and Geghard Monastery were included in the UNESCO Cultural Heritage List.
Translated from Armenian, "Zvartnots" means the Temple of Heavenly Angels or the Temple of the Watchful Angels. It was built in 640-650 by Armenian architects in the Byzantine architectural style. In 629, the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius annexed Armenia to the Byzantine Empire. But it is important to remember that Heraclius himself was an Armenian commander. He came to power by overthrowing Emperor Phocas. The Armenian dynasty ruled Byzantium until 711.
The huge Zvartnots Temple, built in Yerevan on the initiative of Katalikos Nerses III the Builder. He attracted Armenian craftsmen from the city of Dvin, which was the capital of Armenia in those years. The giant Zvartnots temple showed the unity of Armenian and Byzantine culture. There are records in the chronicles, when Emperor Constantine III came to Armenia to the homeland of his ancestors, he was struck by the greatness of the Zvartnots Temple. He ordered the craftsmen who built the temple to go with him to Constantinople to erect a similar one there.
Exact descriptions of the temple have not been preserved, but it is understood that it had a round shape in the form of a Babylonian ziggurat. It consisted of three levels of terraces topped with a spherical cone. Inside the circles there was a cross-domed space, and the arches were supported by 4 powerful pylons 20 meters high. All the exterior walls were decorated with ornaments that Armenian stonemasons carved on basalt facing stones.
St. Sophia Cathedral in Constantinople was built in 532, a hundred years earlier than Zvatnots. However, the Byzantine architects managed to correctly distribute the load of the dome structure, so the temple stands intact today. Armenian architects failed to solve these problems, so during the first strong earthquake in 930, the Zvartnots Temple was completely destroyed.
Until the 19th century, there was a large hill covered with earth on the site of the ruins. In 1901, excavations of the Zvartnots temple began and now we see the reconstruction of the foundation, as well as the internal colonnade of the church. A very beautiful view of Mount Ararat opens from the Zvartnots temple site.
