Home > Catalogue > Venezia Arti > 27 | 2018 > Krikor (Grigor) Balakian’s Ruins of Ani

Venezia Arti | Vol. 27 | December 2018

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Research Article

Krikor (Grigor) Balakian’s Ruins of Ani

A Surprising Source for Armenian Architecture

Christina Maranci    Tuft University, Medford, MA    

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abstract

KKrikor (Grigor) Balakian’s 1910 work, The Ruins of Ani (Ngarakrut‘iwn Anii Aweragnerun Badgerazart), documents the visit of the Armenian Catholicos Matt‘ēos Izmirlean (1845-1910) to Ani in 1909. Largely neglected by historians of architecture, The Ruins of Ani nevertheless offers an extraordinary account of the city and its monuments. After considering Balakian’s sources and scholarly perspectives, this paper explores his report on the buildings and the archaeological museum of Ani, highlighting discrepancies from the known record. Balakian’s often surprising remarks require careful scrutiny and cross-checking; at the same time, they highlight the value of any eyewitness source on Ani composed during the period of Russian control. .

Published
Dec. 13, 2018
Submitted
July 4, 2018
Language
EN

Keywords: Archaeology • Armenian • Krikor (Grigor) Balakian • Ani • Historiography

permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/VA/2385-2720/2018/27/004

Copyright: © 2018 Christina Maranci. This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction is permitted, provided that the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. The license allows for commercial use. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.