Privat tour in Khor VirapGEGHARDAVANK GARNI TEMPLE SYMPHONY OF STONES

Privat tour in Khor VirapGEGHARDAVANK GARNI TEMPLE SYMPHONY OF STONES

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Itinerary
This is a typical itinerary for this product

Stop At: Khor Virap, Artashat, Lusarat Armenia

When King Tiridates III ruled over Armenia, his assistant was the Christian Grigor Lusavorich who preached the Christian religion. Tiridates, a follower of pagan religion, was not pleased with having an advisor with a different religion. So the king ordered that Gregorys hands and legs be tied and that he be thrown into the Khor Virap to die in the dark dungeon located in Artashat. However, Gregory did not die during his 13 years of imprisonment. His survival was attributed to a Christian widow from the local town who, under the influence of strange dream vision, regularly fed Gregory by dropping a loaf of freshly baked bread into the pit. When Tiridates went mad his sister, Khosrovidhukt, had a vision in the night, where an angel told her about the prisoner Gregory who could end the torments with the words "when he comes he will teach you the remedies for all your ills". Gregory was brought out in a miserable state. He was taken to the king, who had gone mad "foraging among the pigs at Valarshapar", tearing his own skin. Gregory cured the king and brought him back to his senses King Tiridates, who had embraced Christianity as his religion following the miraculous cure effected by Gregorys divine intervention, proclaimed Christianity as the state religion of Armenia in 301 AD. Gregory became the Bishop of Caesarea and remained in service of the King until about 314 AD.

Duration: 1 hour

Stop At: Garni Temple, Geghard Monastery Road H3, Garni Armenia

The Temple of Garni is the best-known structure and symbol of pre-Christian Armenia. The structure was built by king Tiridates I in the first century AD as a temple to the sun god Mihir. The exterior of the temple is richly decorated. The stones in the front cornice have projecting sculptures of lion heads. A fragment of the architrave bearing a lion head was removed by Captain J Buchan Telfer in the late nineteenth century and bequeathed by him to the British Museum in 1907. The staircase has nine unusually high steps—30 centimetres high, about twice as high as the average height of stairs. It’s said that the unusually high stairs compel a person ascending the staircase to feel humbled and make physical effort to reach the altar. In the early fourth century, when Armenian King Tiridates III adopted Christianity as a state religion, virtually all known pagan places of worship were destroyed. The Temple of Garni is the only pagan to have survived the widespread destruction. It remains unknown why the temple was exempted from destruction, but one of the philosophers argues that its status as a "masterpiece of art" possibly saved it from destruction.

Duration: 1 hour

Stop At: The Monastery of Geghard, Geghard Armenia

Geghard is a medieval monastery in the Kotayk province of Armenia, being partially carved out of the adjacent mountain, surrounded by cliffs. The monastery was founded in the 4th century by Gregory the Illuminator. The site is that of a spring arising in a cave which had been sacred in pre-Christian times. The name commonly used for the monastery today, Geghard, or more fully Geghardavank that means "the Monastery of the Spear", originates from the spear which had wounded Jesus at the Crucifixion, allegedly brought to Armenia by Apostle Jude, called here Thaddeus, and stored amongst many other relics.

Duration: 1 hour