Kotayk

Kotayk is a province in central Armenia, east of Yerevan. Its administrative center is Hrazdan.¹

The monastery of Geghard stands at the entrance to the Azat Valley, near the village of Goght. Its churches and tombs are cut largely into the rock. The monuments date from the fourth to the thirteenth century, and the monastery is traditionally linked to the adoption of Christianity in the early fourth century. The main complex was finished in the thirteenth century. UNESCO placed it on the World Heritage List in 2000.²

The temple of Garni stands on a triangular plateau above the canyon of the Azat River. A Greek inscription found in 1945 records that King Tiridates I built the temple in 77 AD. An earthquake in 1679 brought it down, and the architect Alexander Sahinyan rebuilt it between 1969 and 1975, reusing nearly all of the fallen stones.³