8/23: More of Yerevan: The Smallest Cathedral, The Horrors of the Genocide & Armenian Art

Just a couple of blocks from our apartment in Yerevan was the tiny 13th century Katoghhike Cathedral nestled beside the much larger and newer Surp Anna Church. We had passed both several times but hadn't taken the time before to stop in at either and wanted to make sure we did that before leaving Yerevan and Armenia. Since this was the smallest cathedral we'd likely ever visit, we knew it wouldn't take much time!

The church had an interesting history: it was the only Yerevan church that survived the huge 1679 earthquake; it became part of a new basilica in the 17th century; and, thanks to a highly unusual public outcry at the time, it narrowly escaped being demolished when the Soviets pulled down the basilica in 1936 and was preserved.

How sad there had to be a sign telling people not to climb on the elevated altar.

The entrance to the cathedral was through sliding glass doors, something we'd never seen at a place of worship before.

A view from the adjacent church entrance toward the cathedral:

Yerevan is a pretty small city so it only had one metro line that was built during the Soviet rule of the country. Nelli, our tour guide the previous day, had told us the funny story the metro only came about when people from all over Armenia were encouraged to come to Yerevan prior to transportation officials coming from Moscow so they would think there was a dire need for a metro system in Yerevan! Apparently the ruse worked as Yerevan got the metro constructed. BTW: AEB are my initials as well as an abbreviation for a bank in Yerevan and the bank's advertising was everywhere in the metro.

It's impossible to spend any time in Armenia without recognizing the horrific events that transpired from 1915-1923 when the Ottoman Empire massacred 1.5 million Armenians. To learn more about that sad chapter in the country's history, we headed by metro and then a long walk to the Armenian Genocide Memorial and Museum located on the Hill of Swallows across a gorge from central Yerevan. Unfortunately, the signs to the museum were abysmally poor which we found surprising considering the museum commemorated a pivotal part of the country's history. As at Yad Vashem, Israel's Holocaust Museum, row upon row of trees had been planted at the entrance, each marked with the foreign dignitary's name who planted the tree in memory of the victims of the genocide.

It was ironic that the memorial was built on a high hilltop in Yerevan within sight of the Armenian symbol of Mount Ararat located just across the Turkish border and also of the Turkish frontier. The memorial's construction could only be seen in direct defiance of Turkey who has officially denied the genocide ever took place. 

A wide path led from what we later found out to be the underground museum past a 100 meter-long wall engraved with the names of massacred communities to the memorial which was built in 1967. 

The memorial consisted of a 40 meter high spire next to a circle of twelve basalt tilted slabs. The slabs represented the lost provinces of western Armenia that were ceded to Turkey in a post WWI peace deal between the leaders of Turkey and the Tsarist Russia.

There was a fine split in the spire which divided it into larger and smaller needles; the latter represented western Armenia.

It was hard not to feel very moved by the sorrowful music playing on the PA system and the sight of the eternal flame visible between the slabs at the memorial.

The genocide of the Armenians can be traced to 1908 when the Young Turk Party leadership stated the belief that the "salvation of the Turkish homeland" could only be achieved through the liquidation of the empire's Christian population. 

That was later enforced in the fall of 1911 when the party Congress confirmed the necessity of Islamizing the population which meant the forced 'Turkification' and, failing that, extermination of the Christians. Based on the Congress decision, the party's central committee developed a plan of action for the annihilation of the Armenians, followed by other Christians in the empire. 

The genocide of the Armenian population in the Ottoman Empire was carried out in several stages by the Young Turk government: national leaders were annihilated so defenseless people could more easily be deported or exterminated; when the Turkish army suffered a huge loss against Russia in the winter of 1914-15, its 50,000 drafted Armenians were blamed for the defeat and were subsequently isolated, disarmed and forced into hard labor. When the Turks no longer needed them, they were either shot or starved to death.

The photo showed the Young Turk leaders of the Ottoman Empire. 

Armenian men of military age were exterminated during the first stage of the genocide; in the second, the Western Armenian elite were arrested and massacred; deportation to the deserts of Syria and Mesopotamia was the third phase of exterminating the Ottoman Empire's Armenian population.  

When the deportations began in 1915, the men were first separated from the others and stabbed to death. Women, children and the elderly were usually spared only to be normally killed by armed local Turkish and Kurdish bands who knew ahead of time the exact arrival time of the caravans. 

The escort's police and soldiers encouraged and even got actively involved in the killing of the helpless Armenians rather than preventing the attacks. Thousands of Armenians deported from the tows of Erzanka, Karin and elsewhere were slaughtered in the Kemakh Gorge on the left bank of the Euphrates River. 

These photos showed a column of Armenian deportees and what was left of the caravan after being attacked by the Kurds. 

Mass Killings: Methods of torture and mass killings against the Christian population were worked out in secret meetings by party officials. Torture techniques widely used included mutilation, horseshoeing human feet, bayoneting children and mass burials of live people. Thousands of women and children, forced to flee to the Arabian deserts, were drowned in the Euphrates. Throwing people off bridges and cliffs was also one of the methods of mass murder. The cruelest way of killing was target practice on the wombs of pregnant women or burying children alive, both common practices.

Medical Experiments: During the genocide, Armenians were subject to experiments as there were a considerable number of medical doctors among the Young Turk leaders who described the policy of exterminating Armenians as medically necessary.

A panel titled as Hidden Complicity: Germany and the Armenian Genocide described how some German officers who served in the Ottoman Empire during the Armenian Genocide subsequently influenced the formation of Hitler's Nazi ideology, helping him come to power. 

However, Armin Wegner, known as the photographer of the Genocide, was a German officer serving in Mesopotamia in WW I, who witnessed firsthand the horrible events taking place and  made efforts to stop the massacres. He photographed scenes of the massacres, the deportees and the concentration camps while ignoring restrictions set by Turkish authorities. Wegner, hoping to expose German society to the Armenian tragedy, sent some of his photos to the German press and public figures. However, the German government vetoed their publication.

 He was a true hero to the Armenians, giving speeches about the horror of what transpired, being a witness at trials, writing to world leaders and visiting Armenia and the memorial several times.  In 1933, after the Nazis came to power, Wegner wrote an open letter to Hitler condemning Jewish persecution. He was soon arrested and was forced to leave the country the next year. How tragic there were not many more people like Wegner during the Armenian tragedy and later during the rise of Adolf Hitler.

The panel called The World Reacts described how the heads of foreign missions and other diplomats accredited to the Ottoman Empire called the acts by the Turkish government against Armenians as a planned, premeditated and a coordinated extermination of an entire nation. Political, religious and social figures spoke up against the unprecedented massacres and in support of the survivors. Hearings were held in several parliaments, demonstrations and rallies took place in various cities to demand their governments to take measures to help Armenians.

In April and May of 1915, following the first news of Armenian massacres, the governments of Britain, France and Russia issued a joint declaration referring to Armenian deportation and massacres in the Ottoman Empire. The three allied states declared the Turkish government was responsible for crimes against Armenians. For the first time, the term "crimes against humanity and civilization" was used in international policy and diplomacy. Based on the joint declaration of May 1915, Young Turk criminals were imprisoned and brought to trial after the end of the war. This provided a precedent for punishing Nazi criminals and holding the Nuremberg trial after WWII. 

Sadly, the Armenian Genocide is not something that we are taught a lot about in Canada and the US. In fact, I only began reading about that horrific period when visiting genocide museums in other countries. To learn that nearly one half of the population of Armenia was tortured, starved and murdered is incomprehensible. To discover such unspeakable evil that is in people is unfathomable. We all say "Let us never forget" and yet massacres are taking place still today. Will they never end? Will we never forget?

Zachary: We thought of you when we passed by the Marriott property in Republic Square!

We were both emotionally drained after visiting the memorial and museum so we returned to the pretty Republic Square in downtown Yerevan. Ice cream was a perfect pick-me-up at one of many ice-cream stands that dot the downtown area, especially since a cone was only .40!

You can see why I thought Yerevan should be called the City of Fountains as there were drinking fountains and 'real' fountains in so many spots!

Too bad this photo is so dark as it doesn't do justice to the beautiful Republic Square. 

I felt particularly sapped or drained after touring the memorial and museum so was very content to relax in the park across the street for a good hour. Steven was curious to see the National Gallery of Armenia located in the same building in the square as the History Museum of Armenia we'd visited a couple of days ago. This would be our last chance to see it as we were leaving the country the next day. We knew nothing about Armenian art so let Lonely Planet be our guide as we walked through the few floors. According to the travel guide, the major draw was its collection of Armenian art as opposed to its 'large but somewhat underwhelming collection of Russian and European art!'

Highlights included paintings by Hakob Hovnatanian

and those by Vardges Surrenyants. This one was of St. Hripsme Church that we had toured the previous day and was painted in 1897.

Surenyants painted Salome in 1907 when e was 47.

Soldiers' Wives was sculpted in 1931 by another artist.

I was drawn to this painting called Young Birch Wood as I grew up on Birch Ave. in Ottawa, Canada, even though the birch trees were long gone when homes were built there in the early 1950s.

Steven and I have always been partial to medieval art so when we saw the massive canvases in the Armenian Old and Medieval Art Gallery we oohed and aahed.

The museum must hold huge galas in the connecting galleries judging by the presence of the pianos!

After closing down the museum, we decided to return to our apartment by walking along the city's gorgeous pedestrian mall. There, you would think you were strolling along the streets in any European capital with stores like Ralph Lauren, Burberry, etc and topnotch architecture, attractive cafes and even entertainment, too!

In the almost week we were in and around Yerevan, we discovered it was a city full of contrasts - more top of the range Mercedes jeeps than I've seen anywhere else shared the road with Ladas so old they should be in museums; young, chic women in the latest fashions next to babushkas; a modern metro up against some of the oldest buses we've ridden; stolid Soviet architecture against the backdrop of a charming central square. 

I grew to be very fond of Yerevan with its wealth of public gardens and parks, its many fountains, ice cream stands everywhere, the huge variety of attractive designs on the sidewalks instead of just plain pavement, the feeling of total safety even with the almost total absence of police anywhere, the lack of any dogs roaming the streets, rarely being asked for handouts from those less fortunate, and, of course, its plentiful monuments and statues!

Next post: On to Tbilisi in Georgia via seeing the sights in northern Armenia.

Posted from Tbilisi on August 28th, 2018.

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