Makaravank Monastery

Makaravank is a 13th-century Armenian monastic complex 3 km southwest of Achajur village in the Tavush region, at the foot of Mount Paytatap.

The monastery is considered an important landmark of Armenian religious architecture, renowned for its unique, rich and diverse ornaments. They place it among the masterpieces of Aghtamar, Bgheno-Noravank and Gandzasar.

The complex has Old and Main Churches, a narthex, Saint Astvatsatsin (Holy Mother of God) Church, a reliquary, a chapel, a spring, fortification walls, a cemetery and residential and auxiliary buildings. The second church in the northeast dates to the 10th–11th centuries, Saint Astvatsatsin Church to 1198, the Main Church to 1205 (according to a khachkar inscription nearby), the narthex to 1207 and the reliquary to the 13th century.

Legend says that in the 8th century only a small church stood here, and Master Makar and his son began building a monastery around it: the son carved and decorated the stones, while the father laid the walls and even lived on them. Years later Makar noticed that the stones no longer fitted and the carvings looked different, and he realized that his son had died. Overcome with grief, Makar completed the monastery, threw himself from the church and was buried beneath its walls, and the monastery was named in his honor.

Below the window on the south wall of the Main Church is a relief of an eagle clutching a bull in its talons, the coat of arms of the Vachutyan noble family. The relief sculptures on the altar façade of the Main Church, with mythical creatures with human heads, serpentine fish and a figure of a man holding tools inscribed “Youth”, are among the finest masterpieces of medieval Armenian art.