GANDZASAR: THE RESIDENCE OF THE CATHOLICOSATE OF AGHVANK

Abstract

Sources indicate that the Gandzasar Monastery was a renowned spiritual center even before the 10th century. Although there is a prevailing view that the patriarchal throne of Aghvank was transferred to Gandzasar from St. Akobavank at the end of the 14th century, historical records, including the accounts found in the “Staff Book of the Catholicoses of Aghvank”, suggest that this transfer occurred in the early 14th century from the Hamshi Monastery (in the Miapor region). Following this relocation, the Aghvan Catholicosate was frequently referred to as the “Gandzasar Catholicosate.” New materials identified in the manuscripts of the M. Mashtots Matenadaran in Yerevan, the results of the authors’ study of inscriptions preserved within the monastic complex of Gandzasar, as well as the comparison of all these data with the relevant historiographical literature, have made it possible to draw a number of scholarly conclusions. In particular, the names of the Catholicoi, the chronological framework of their reigns, and certain aspects of their ecclesiastical and socio-political activities have been clarified. For the preservation and continuation of national identity, Gandzasar, alongside being a spiritual center, gradually transformed into a hub of the national liberation movement. In 1670-1671, the first official appeal from Gandzasar was sent to the Russian Empire, requesting the Tsar to take the Christian Armenian people under his protection. Overall, beginning in the second half of the 17th century, there was a significant shift in the concept of suzerainty in the eastern part of Armenia. During that time, suzerainty largely belonged to the Catholicoi of Gandzasar. Essentially, from the second half of the 17th century until 1813, when Russian rule was established in the region, Artsakh, represented by the Gandzasar Catholicosate, functioned as a unified religious state. The Gandzasar Catholicosate oversaw the dioceses of the five principalities (melikdoms) of Karabakh, which existed within the territory of the Gandzak Khanate, governed seven episcopal dioceses: Khoranashat, Targmanchats, Parisos, Amenaprkich, Getashen, Getabak, and Gandzak, as well as the Shirvan Diocese. The Shirvan Diocese included spiritual centers located within the territories of the Shaki, Shamakhi, Guba, Baku, and Derbent khanates.