Horomos

The Monastery of Horomos
Horomos in the early 20th century
Shown within Turkey
Basic information
Location	near Ani
Geographic coordinates
Affiliation	Armenian Apostolic Church
Status	ruined
Architectural description
Architect(s)	Hovhannes
Architectural style	Armenian
Completed	10th century

Horomos (Armenian: Հոռոմոս; also known as Horomosivank or Ghoshavank) is a tenth or eleventh-century Armenian monastic complex, about 15 kilometers northeast of the medieval ruins in Ani in present-day eastern Turkey. The collection of churches and chapels made Horomos one of the most important religious and cultural centuries of Armenia during the medieval period.

Horomos was founded by a group of Armenian monks around 931-36, during the reign of King Abas I Bagratuni (r. ca. 929-953). The monastic complex over time came to include the individual churches of Sts. John, Minas, and George, a triumphal arch, and mausolea.

Some time after 1965, the Monastery of Horomos was partly destroyed, most likely as part of the Turkish government's policy of cultural genocide. A tomb purported to belong to King Ashot III (953-977) which had survived at least up to 1920 is now nowhere to be found. Some buildings have entirely vanished, and most of the surviving walls have been stripped of their facing masonry. The dome of the Church of the St. John collapsed in the 1970s. The site lies next to the Armenian border and gaining permission to access the monastery is all but impossible.

Further reading

• (French) Baladian, Ani and Jean Michel Thierry (eds.) with a contribution by J. P. Mahé (2002), Le couvent de Horomos d'après les archives de Toros Toramanian. Paris: Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres.
• Manuk-Khaloyan, Armen (2013), "In the Cemetery of their Ancestors: The Royal Burial Tombs of the Bagratuni Kings of Greater Armenia (890-1073/79)," Revue des Études Arméniennes 35, pp. 131-202.
• Sinclair, Thomas A. (1987). Eastern Turkey: An Architectural and Archaeological Survey. London: Pindar Press, vol. 1.
• (French) Thierry, Jean Michel (1980). Le couvent armenien d'Horomos. Leuven: Peeters.

External links

• The Monastery of Horomos at VirtualAni.org
• Contemporary images of Horomos at the Rensselaer Digital Collections