Sunday, January 13, 2013

St Stepanos Monastery - Iran

St. Stepanos Monastery is one of the three Armenian Monastic Ensembles of Iran, in the north-west of the country. The other two are St Thaddeus and the Chapel of Dzordzor. They are classified by UNESCO as World Heritage Sites and this is a new site in my collection. The card was sent by Marcel.
These edifices are examples of outstanding universal value of the Armenian architectural and decorative traditions. They bear testimony to very important interchanges with the other regional cultures, in particular the Byzantine, Orthodox and Persian. Situated on the south-eastern fringe of the main zone of the Armenian cultural space, the monasteries constituted a major centre for the dissemination of that culture in the region. They are the last regional remains of this culture that are still in a satisfactory state of integrity and authenticity. Furthermore, as places of pilgrimage, the monastic ensembles are living witnesses of Armenian religious traditions through the centuries. - in: http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1262

Photo by Maghsoud Same Sardroudi
The St. Stepanos Monastery is an Armenian monastery about 15 km northwest of Jolfa city, East Azarbaijan Province northeast Iran. It is situated in a deep canyon along the Arax river on the Iranian side of the border between Azerbaijan and Iran. It was built in the 9th century and rebuilt in the Safavid era after several earthquakes damaged it.- in: wikipedia

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