Armenia - Geghard Monastery & Matenadaran Museum

 

Geghard Monastery was our 2nd stop after Garni Temple.  It's a representation of Armenian Medieval architecture, remaining building dating back to the 13th century, carved into the side of the mountain.

It no longer functions as a monastery, but has a functioning church.  Geghard is the Armenian name for "spear" representing one of the spears associated with the crucifixion of Jesus.  Here again I had to take photos with my phone, so the images do not justify the beauty of the location.

After Geghard Monastery, we went to Matenadaran Ancient Manuscript Museum.  This is when we all realized that we had two tour guides.  Suzi, the official tour guide, and Baron Khosrov, the unofficial tour guide.  He's originally from Armenia but now lives in L.A.  He's 75 years old, and he has lots and lots of stories about each site we've visited and is not shy about telling these stories to fill in the blanks.  He has incredible memory.  He's the main most interesting character in the tour, with his knowledge and interest, and energy level.

The manuscript museum was so interesting for me.  There were so many manuscripts and bibles from the 5th century, handwritten in Armenian.  The history on the development of our language and how the manuscripts were created, from the smallest (about 2 inches) to the largest ones (an arms length or so) was incredible to see.  Unfortunately I wasn't able to take any photos inside.  The below photo is taken outside the museum with Mesrop Mashdotz, the creator of the Armenian alphabet.