Saint Hripsime Church

Saint Hripsime Church is located in the eastern part of Vagharshapat city, Armavir Region of Armenia. According to tradition, Hripsimes and the Christian virgins, avoiding the persecution of Emperor Diocletian (284-305), fled to Armenia and preached Christianity, where they were also persecuted and killed by the Armenian king Trdatus G the Great, together with 32 virgins of his faith. At the site of the martyrdom of the virgins, later King Trdat and Grigor Lusavorich built a hermitage, a semi-underground resting place, on top of which was an amphitheater with four stone pillars. Gr. The Illuminator places Hripsime and other virgins among the ranks of saints, and on the day of their martyrdom, they are included in the ten of the church. Later, in 618, on the certificate Komitas A. The Catholicos of Aghetsi builds the church of Hripsime, about which the two construction inscriptions of the Catholicos Komitas have been preserved.

The temple belongs to the most advanced type of medieval Armenian church structures. It is internally cruciform, created by four niches attached to the dome-covered volume and corner niches of the circle section. The interior space is complete, spacious, compact and slim. It is enclosed in a rectangular volume from the outside, four rooms have been obtained in the corners, which are connected to the prayer hall by corner niches. The structural system of the temple of Hripsime, with four altars, niches and the curved surfaces of the dome resting on them, is the main means of expressing its artistic image. It is distinguished from the structures of its type by a wide-sided (10.1 m) high drum, towers attached to the drum in the quadrangular corners of the dome, harmonious transitions of volumes from the low rectangular volumes to the top of the dome.

In the 17th century, the monument was partially destroyed. In 1653 Philip the Catholicos repaired it and built an open vestibule in front of the western entrance. In 1776 the church was surrounded by a brick wall and pyramids, and in 1880 the eastern and southern hewn stone walls were built, in 1894 - the residential house, the auxiliary structures of the yard. Significant repairs were made in 1898. In 1958 the plaster that marred the interior of the temple was cleaned. Fragments of the sculpted cornice of the Hellenistic temple uncovered during renovations testify that there was a pagan temple on the site of the Hripsime temple. 50m east of the church is the cemetery dating back to IV-XIX centuries.