Mughni

40.31555555555644.371666666667Koordinaten: 40 ° 18 ' 56 "N, 44 ° 22' 18" O

Mughni (Armenian Մուղնի ), other transcriptions Mułni, Mugni, is a village in the northern Armenian province Aragazotn with 839 inhabitants in 2001, which now belongs to the town of Ashtarak region. In the center is the monastery founded in the 14th century Saint George ( Surb Gevorg ) of the Armenian Apostolic Church with a built in 1661-1669 three-aisled domed basilica. In Christian annual festivals, the monastery is a place of pilgrimage.

Location

Mughni is located at an altitude of 1314 meters on a plateau in the south-east of Mount Aragats at the western edge of the deep gorge of the Kassagh. The site is adjacent to Ashtarak and is separated from the north-eastern outskirts of town by a strip of open grassland and the M1. The area in this four-lane highway leading east and north of Yerevan to Ashtarak to Gyumri gone further in the northwest of the country. Mughni is accessible from the exit at the junction of the M1 with the coming of the southwest and leading to Spitak M3 or from the center of the Aschtaraks Nerses - Aschtaraketsi Street. The M3 highway bypasses Mughni in the West, while in parallel a local thoroughfare Mughni with the northern border village of Karbi and five kilometers from Mughni away with the Convent Howhannawank and further connects to the monastery Saghmosavank.

History

In historical sources Mughni is mentioned since the time of the Seljuk and the opposing Byzantine invasions in the 11th century. The place was in the 14th century, when the monastery was founded, to the Mongol Ilkhanate. 1620 Mughni was assigned in the territory division between the Ottoman Empire and the Persian Safavid Persian District ( mahal ) of Aparan. After destruction and famine caused by several wars between the two great powers for supremacy in the southern Caucasus in the previous two centuries stabilized in the 17th century, the political and economic situation. Across the country, monasteries have now been re-erected. Since the 14th century was virtually nothing built and existing buildings could hardly be maintained. The rebuilt or restored monasteries of the 17th century included, in addition Mughni the monasteries of Tatev Choir Virap, Haritschawank, Vorotnavank and Shativank. The George Monastery of Mughni was built in 1661-1669 by order of the Wardapet Hovhannes. The architects were Sahak Khizanetsi († 1666) and his successor and son- Murat.

Old Chatschkare in the cemetery near the monastery refer to the former religious significance of the place. With the Russian conquest in 1928 Mughni belonged to the district Aragazotn. As mentioned before the Soviet period the monastery is once again a place of pilgrimage.

Townscape

In the census of 2001, the official population was given as 839. In official statistics for January 2012 Mughni is no longer listed as a district of Ashtarak separately.

The long place whose traditional economy primarily based on agriculture, consisting of the Archbishop Mesrop after Ashchyan (1941-2003) named the main road, a road parallel on each side and some cross streets. The one - or two-story houses are set in large gardens planted with fruit trees, ranging east to the edge of the Hrazdan Gorge. The George monastery is situated on the main road in the town center.

George Monastery

Design

Founded in the 17th century monasteries were generally small. For cloister usually included a main church, an adjoining chapel, a bell tower and in the distance the accommodation of the monks with dining room and other ancillary buildings. They were integrated into the enclosure, which was to serve for defense, and thus were no windows on the outside walls. The Monastery of Saint George ( Surb Gevorg ) is similarly composed of a free-standing church in the center of the trees lined, approximately square monastery garden. In addition, Restored outbuildings at the entrance gate to the northeast, past which leads the way to the church. A small cottage on the northwest corner surrounding the source of the monastery.

In the third phase of the Armenian church architecture in the 17th century longitudinal cross-domed churches were often built again, a building type that had already been developed in the early Christian period and later neglected. As a distant precursor Tekor the Basilica (earliest dating 5th century end ) and the Cathedral of Odsun that probably emerged in the second half of the 6th century apply. The Church of Mughni is such a combination of a three-aisled basilica and a central building with four free -standing pillars, which are placed close to the outer walls to a central square. This results in a church hall with a wide central aisle and very narrow aisles. The so-called coated Kreuzkuppelbau the gables of the transepts do not project beyond the longitudinal walls, so that the floor plan gives an outer rectangle. As characteristic for cross-domed churches of the 7th century, the four pillars are cross- shaped and slightly displaced from the center of the nave to the west in Mughni. The pillars are interconnected by transverse arches that lead into the corners of the base circle of the cylindrical tambour by means of pendentives. This is completed by a dome, above which rises a canopy.

At the western entrance page has simultaneously grown with the Church as a special form of a Gawits one to the sides with one and the front side to the west with three arcades open vestibule, as it was similar in the obtained only as a ruin octagonal church of Zoravar east of Mughni available. The mean increased yoke of the antechamber is surmounted by a clock tower. This consists of a rotunda whose twelve columns support a pyramidal roof with cushion.

The bivalve walls are made of large gray tufa slab. Pink tuffs form a contrast of colors around windows and doors, as well as the fighters of the arcades. The outer walls of the main cylinder are highlighted by alternating layers of reddish and dark gray tuff, as well as the checkerboard pattern patterned gable.

A second site is located in the south wall. It is framed by a wide arched frieze is decorated with a series of wattle and Taustäben. A fan rosette fills the Tympanonfeld. The arch above the west portal contains lush vegetal ornaments with vases, from which grow bouquets, as they were used in this period in the Ottoman and Safavid architecture and related to the style of European Baroque. The eight arched windows at the reel are arranged at equal intervals, but outside of the main points of the compass. About four of these windows are located high relief with symbols of the Evangelists. The rectangular windows in the gables are framed with a likewise rectangular Wulstfries. In 1999 the building was extensively restored. The interior remained on the northeastern pillar and on the side walls in front of the altar wall paintings obtained from the construction that ( Ovnatan Nagash, 1661-1722 ) may have been created by the Armenian painter and poet Hovnatanjan. They show large size standing figures of saints, surrounded by floral patterns and leafy tendrils. Hovnatanjan also painted the Cathedral of Etchmiadzin and other churches to Yerevan.

Pilgrimage

Every year in April Mughni is a place of pilgrimage, when priests bring the Matenadaran in Yerevan kept in Shurishkan Gospels in procession to the monastery church. The Gospel Book was made ​​in 1498 and 1602-03 came with the flight and deportation of large parts of the Armenian population by the Persian Shah Abbas I in the location in present-day Iran Shurishkan village where it was hidden in a monastery. At the repository of the Gospels according to the local belief, a source have brought with holy water for Christians and Muslims miracle. 1971 Book of the Gospels was returned to Armenia and has since been in the Matenadaran. The conversion of the Gospels by Mughni takes place every year since 2002 on the Sunday after the feast of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. From the Gospel book shown in the church, many pilgrims hoping for a blessing effect. Another Christian festival is celebrated on the last Sunday in September on the day of St. George.

The Shurishkan Gospels is not to be confused with the art-historically more significant Mughni Gospels from the 11th century, which is archived in the Matenadaran under the number 7736 and got its name because it centuries which now houses located ends in ruinous state of the Armenian Church of Saint George of Mughni was kept in Tbilisi.