Dashtadem Fortress

Interesting facts about Dashtadem Fortress 1 About 2 km south-west of the village Dashtadem in the Aragatsotn Province, there is the monastery of St. Christopher. The monastery consists of a small cross-domed church of the 7th century, a three-story mausoleum, with a bell tower, a dormitory (now destroyed), a fence, built of raw stones, and a cemetery, rich with khachkars dating back to 10-14 centuries. The only western entrance of the church is decorated with typical engaged columns of the 7th century. You can see many signs carved by the workers on the walls, which were built of neatly processed black tufa stone. The church was completely renovated in 1980.

In the southern part of the village there is a large complex of Dashtadem fortress. It is believed that it was built by the Armenian noble family Kamsarakan on the site of the castle, founded in the times of the ancient Urartu Kingdom. The information about the fortress has been mentioned for the first time during the Arab conquest of Armenia (VII century). The ancient part of the fortress, built of neatly processed stone, is a rectangular tower, to which, in 1174, pyramids were added - a semi-circular and a polygonal pyramids (the Arabic inscription has remained on the southern pyramid). Later around the fortress was built a fence with fortress towers. Unfortunately, only ruins of it have survived nowadays. The northern wall adjoins the one-nave church, built of red well-processed tufa stone.