Amaras Monastery is an Early Medieval Monastery located in south-eastern part of Nagorno-Karabakh. The monastery is a well-known religious and cultural center of medieval Armenia. Amaras, as well as the entire eastern part, was subordinate to the Armenian Apostolic Church. According to administrative divisions of the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh, which controls the monastery, it is located in the Martuni region of Nagorno-Karabakh.
According to an Armenian historian of the IV-V centuries, Favstos Buzand, the church of Amaras monastery was founded at the beginning of the IV. By St. Grigor the Illuminator.
Amaras became especially famous in the middle of the IV century, after a grandson St. Gregory the Illuminator Grigoris was buried here. Grigoris died in southern Dagestan and was buried on the east side of the church, founded by Grigor the Illuminator. At the beginning of the V century the creator of the Armenian alphabet, St. Mesrop Mashtots founded the first Armenian school in Amaras.
In V-VIII centuries Amaras was located in the Armenian part of the multi-ethnic Caucasian Albania. Starting from the V century, Amaras became one of the largest religious centers of medieval Armenia.
In 821, the monastery of Amaras, as well as the whole region, was conquered by Arabs. In the XIII century it was robbed by the Mongols, and was destroyed in 1387, during the invasion of Tamerlane. However, the monastery with its school has always been a religious and cultural center of the region.
In the XVII century monastery was thoroughly rebuilt. Catholicos Petros of Gandzasar has restored Amaras and has built the church of St. Grigoris here in the second quarter of the XVII century.
In May 1991, the monasrtery has undergone severe destruction by Azerbaijani troops. In 1992, when Amaras was captured by Azerbaijani forces during the Karabakh war, the tomb of the grandson of Grigor the Illuminator, St. Gregoris, was destroyed. Currently, the monastery is being restored.
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