Amaras

Amaras Monastery is located near the village of Machkalashen in the Martuni Province of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic The monastery was founded by Grigor Lusavorich (Gregory the Illuminator) in the place of a pagan temple, at the beginning of the 4th century. The church St. Grigoris is styled as a basilica and has a rectangular layout (59x85 m.). The monastery is surrounded with high fences equipped with loopholes. One time, the monastery also served as a defensive structure - a fortress. There are houses and outbuildings in the territory of the monastery. Amaras is a famous place of worship, as, there, in the eastern part of the monastery the grandson of Grigor Lusavorich (Gregory the Illuminator), who spread Christianity in Caucasian Albania, was buried. In 489, the king Vachagan Barepasht (the Pious) built a chapel on his grave. In the 5th century Mesrop Mashtots founded here one of his first schools. The Amaras monastery was a major spiritual and cultural center. A high School used to function here and the monastery also used to be the center of creating manuscripts.