Mughni
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Mughni Մուղնի |
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| State : |
 Armenia
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| Province : | Aragazotn | ||
| Coordinates : | 40 ° 19 ′ N , 44 ° 22 ′ E | ||
| Height : | 1314 m | ||
| Residents : | 839 (2001) | ||
| Time zone : | UTC + 4 | ||
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Mughni ( Armenian Մուղնի ; other transcriptions Mułni , Mugni ) is a village in the northern Armenian province of Aragazotn with 839 inhabitants in 2001, which today belongs to the urban area of Ashtarak .
In the center of the village is the monastery of St. Georg ( Surb Geworg ) , founded in the 14th century, of the Armenian Apostolic Church with a three-aisled basilica built between 1661 and 1669 . The monastery is a pilgrimage destination at Christian annual festivals.
location
Mughni lies at an altitude of 1,314 meters on a plateau in the southeast of Mount Aragaz on the western edge of the deeply cut gorge of the Kassagh . The place borders on Ashtarak and is separated from the northeastern foothills of the city by a strip of open grassland and the M1 . The four-lane expressway in this area leads from Yerevan east and north past Ashtarak to Gyumri in the north-west of the country. Mughni can be reached from the exit at the junction of the M1 with the M3 coming from the southwest and leading to Spitak, or from the center of Ashtarak via the Nerses-Ashtaraketsi road. The M3 expressway bypasses Mughni in the west, while a parallel thoroughfare connects Mughni with the neighboring village of Karbi to the north and five kilometers from Mughni with Howhannawank monastery and further with Saghmosavank monastery .
history
In historical sources, Mughni has been mentioned since the time of the Seljuk and opposing Byzantine invasions in the 11th century. The place fell to the Mongol Ilkhan in the 14th century when the monastery was founded . 1620 Mughni was assigned to the Persian district ( mahal ) of Aparan when the territory was divided between the Ottoman Empire and the Persian Safavids . After destruction and famine in the previous two centuries, caused by several wars between the two great powers for supremacy in the southern Caucasus, the political and economic situation stabilized in the 17th century. It was now possible to build monasteries all over the country. Practically nothing has been built since the 14th century and the existing buildings could hardly be maintained. In addition to Mughni, the rebuilt or restored monasteries of the 17th century included Tatew , Chor Virap , Haritschavank , Vorotnavank and Shativank . The Georgskloster von Mughni was built between 1661 and 1669 by order of Wardapet Hovhannes. The architects were Sahak Khizanetsi († 1666) and his successor and son-in-law Murat.
Old chatschkars in the cemetery near the monastery refer to the earlier religious importance of the place. With the Russian conquest in 1928, Mughni belonged to the Aragazotn district. As it was before the Soviet era , the monastery is now a place of pilgrimage again.
Townscape
In the 2001 census, the official population was 839. In the official statistics for January 2012, Mughni is no longer listed separately as a district of Ashtarak.
The elongated place, whose traditional economy is mainly based on agriculture, consists of the main street named after Archbishop Mesrop Ashchyan (1941-2003), a parallel street on each side and a few cross streets. The one to two-storey houses are set in large gardens with fruit trees that extend in the east to the edge of the Hrasdan Gorge. The Georgskloster is located on the thoroughfare in the center of the village.
George Monastery
Design
The monasteries built in the 17th century were generally small. The monastery courtyard usually included a main church, an adjoining chapel, a bell tower and, some distance away, the monks' accommodation with a dining room and other outbuildings. They were integrated into the surrounding wall, which was supposed to serve as a defense, and therefore had no windows on the outer walls. The monastery Sankt Georg ( Surb Geworg ) accordingly consists of a free-standing church in the center of the tree-lined, almost square monastery garden. There are also restored outbuildings at the entrance gate in the northeast, which the path to the church leads past. A small house on the northwest corner surrounds the source of the monastery.
In the third phase of Armenian church architecture in the 17th century, lengthways cross-dome churches were often rebuilt, a type of construction that had been developed in early Christian times and was later neglected. The Tekor basilica (earliest dating from the end of the 5th century) and the Cathedral of Odsun , which were probably built in the second half of the 6th century, are regarded as distant forerunners . Mughni Church is such a combination of a three-aisled basilica and a central building with four free-standing pillars, which are set up close to the outer walls to form a central square. The result is a church hall with a wide central nave and very narrow aisles. In the so-called sheathed cross-dome construction, the gables of the transepts do not protrude beyond the longitudinal walls, so that the floor plan results in an outer rectangle. As is characteristic of cross-domed churches of the 7th century, the four pillars in Mughni are cross-shaped and shifted slightly from the center of the nave to the west. The pillars are connected to one another by belt arches that lead to the base circle of the cylindrical drum by means of pendentives in the corners . This is closed by a dome over which a canopy rises.
One was at the western entrance side to coincide with the Church as a special form Gawits grown one to the sides with one and to the face in the West with three arcades open vestibule, as he similarly when received in ruins octagonal church of Zoravar was present east of Mughni. The central raised yoke of the vestibule is surmounted by a bell tower. This consists of a rotunda , the twelve columns of which with cube capitals support a pyramid roof.
The double-shell walls consist of large gray tuff slabs. Pink tufa form a color contrast around the windows and doors as well as on the crossbones of the arcades. The outer walls of the drum are highlighted by alternating layers of reddish and dark gray tuff, as are the gables with a chessboard pattern.
A second portal is in the south wall. It is framed by a wide arched frieze, which is decorated with a sequence of wickerwork and dewsticks . A fan rosette fills the tympanum field . The arch above the west portal contains lush vegetal ornaments with vases from which bouquets of flowers grow, as they were common in Ottoman and Safavid architecture at this time and are related to the style of the European Baroque . The eight arched windows on the drum are equally spaced but outside the cardinal points. Above four of these windows there are high reliefs with evangelist symbols . The rectangular windows in the gables are framed with a likewise rectangular bulbous frieze. In 1999 the building was extensively restored. Inside, wall paintings from the construction period have been preserved on the northeast pillar and on the side walls in front of the altar, possibly created by the Armenian painter and poet Hovnatanjan (Ovnatan Nagash, 1661–1722). They show large-format standing figures of saints, surrounded by flower patterns and leaf tendrils. Hovnatanjan also painted the Echmiadzin Cathedral and other churches around Yerevan.
Place of pilgrimage
Every year in April, Mughni becomes a place of pilgrimage when priests bring the Shurishkan Gospels stored in Matenadaran in Yerevan in procession to the monastery church. The gospel book was made in 1498 and arrived in 1602-03 with the flight and deportation of large parts of the Armenian population by the Persian Shah Abbas I to the village of Shurishkan in what is now Iran, where it was hidden in a monastery. According to popular belief, a spring with holy water is said to have worked miracles for Christians and Muslims at the place where the Gospel was kept. In 1971 the Gospel Book was brought back to Armenia and has been in Matenadaran ever since. The transfer of the Gospel to Mughni has taken place every year since 2002 on the Sunday after the feast of the resurrection of Jesus Christ . Many pilgrims hope that the gospels shown in the church will have a blessing effect. Another Christian festival is celebrated on the last Sunday in September on the day of St. George.
The Shurishkan Gospel Book is not to be confused with the Mughni Gospel Book from the 11th century, which is archived in the Matenadaran under the number 7736 and got its name because it has been in the Armenian Church, which is in a ruinous state for centuries of Saint George of Mughni was kept in Tbilisi .
literature
- Burchard Brentjes , Stepan Mnazakanjan, Nona Stepanjan: Art of the Middle Ages in Armenia. Union Verlag (VOB), Berlin 1981
- Patrick Donabédian: Documentation of the art places . In: Jean-Michel Thierry: Armenian Art. Herder, Freiburg / B. 1988, p. 566, ISBN 3-451-21141-6
Web links
- Rick Ney: Aragatsotn March . Tour Armenia, 2008, p. 37f
- Mughni. Armeniapedia
Individual evidence
- ↑ Stepan Mnazakanjan: Architecture . In: Burchard Brentjes, p. 96
- ^ RA 2001 Population and Housing Census Results . armstat.am, p. 51
- ^ RA Aragatsotn March. armstat.am, 2012, p. 244
- ↑ Jean-Michel Thierry, p. 323
- ↑ Mughni . Armeniapedia
- ^ Patrick Donabédian: Documentation of the art places . In: Jean-Michel Thierry, p. 566
- ↑ Shurishkan Holy Gospel - in St. Gevork Church of Mughni. Youtube video (the Gospels are brought from Yerevan to Mughni and venerated there)
- ^ Mughni Church. ( Memento of the original from January 14, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. greatyerevan.com
