By Prof. Mania Khazaryan

rom time immemorial the Armenian people have created cultural artifacts of lasting value embodying popular artistic concepts. These objects reveal the innate talents of anonymous masters, as well as their sense of beauty. This cultural heritage is anchored on a coherent national base, and the functional value of the objects themselves is always integrated with the esthetic philosophy of the people. 

Since ancient times, Armenian artifacts have been created, not only in Armenia itself, but also in many other parts of the world. Arts and crafts have always occupied a prominent place in Armenian life. Wars, deportations, the collapse of various Armenian states frequently disrupted the development of Armenian arts and crafts. Despite such reversals, under new conditions and often in new locations, Armenian artists and artisans continued to create works endowed with new qualities and shapes, which nevertheless were based on principles of the traditional national art. 

At different periods in history, cities such as Ani (the bustling capital of medieval Armenia), Dvin (the "grand capital"), the cities of the Cilician Kingdom and Vaspurakan, Garin, Erzinga, Sebastia, Gesaria (Caesaria), Kemakh, Evtogia, Marash, Aintab, Madras, New Julfa, Constantinople and others within Anatolia were centers of Armenian craft production. The creations of Armenian artisans found their way into European and Eastern markets via the great trade routes. The ornamental use of these articles in royal courts set standards of beauty and became a mark of wealth. 

Throughout the centuries, visitors and pilgrims to Holy Etchmiadzin who sought the salvation of their souls, or to commemorate love ones, donated beautiful, appropriately inscribed artifacts to the Mother See. Numerous such objects arrived at Holy Etchmiadzin during deportations and massacres. After finding refuge at the monastery, many of the exiles delivered to the Holy See relics rescued at the expense of their untold sufferings. The collection of art objects at the Mother See has also been enriched through donations received by the various Catholicoses and other members of the Brotherhood. Acquired over the centuries, these objects are preserved in the old and new Catholical residential buildings and in the museum of the Mother Cathedral. 

Recently, a new museum known as the Alex and Marie Manoogian Treasury has been added to the aforementioned; it was officially dedicated on October I 1 , 1982. The Manoogian Treasury occupies a very special place among museums that display Armenian artifacts. The Treasury building (B. Arzumanian, architect), with its colonnaded hall and portico, blends in with the architectural style of the rest of the complex, and especially with the new Catholical palace. It is specially designed as a museum structure, and is equipped with a unique lighting system and spacious galleries. 

Displayed there are representative examples of Armenian art objects, paintings, manuscripts and ancient coins. Prominent among these are religious objects such as gold and silver-encased relics, chalices, crosses, staffs, fans, reliquaries, communion pyxes, censers, processional banners, carpets, embroidered drapes and vestments. All these have esthetically significant designs and express specific features of Armenian national culture. 

Reliquaries are presented in the established classical forms. The most prominent among these is the "Holy Cross of Khotakerats" commissioned by Prince Eatchi Proshian in the year 1300, which is significant not only because of its age but also for its artistic embellishments and delicate engravings. Equally delicate decorations are found on the chalices and the reliquaries which are sometimes studded with precious gems. Gems add a unique richness to the art on crosses, manuscript covers and stafls. All of these were created in centers of the Armenian goldsmith's art, such as Sis, Adana, Vaspurakan (especially Van and Ardzgh), Constantinople, Smyrna, Garin, Gesaria, Yerevan, Tiflis and New Julfa. The Garin tradition was later carried on by the masters who moved to Akhaltzkha (presently in Soviet Georgia) during the nineteenth century. Armenian goldsmiths were masters of the techiniques of engraving, shaping, meshing, threading and granulation. Belt buckles made at the same centers are predominantly in silver, sometimes gilded and adorned with pearls. 

Armenian, Greek, Roman, Parthian, Iranian, Byzantine, and other gold, silver and copper ancient coins, exhibited of the first floor of the museum, testify to the wide scope of international ties maintained by the Mother See throughout history. 

Among the most beautiful artifacts displayed are the embroideries. These consist basically of delicate and exquisite patterns, peculiar to the art of Armenian needlework. 

The religious vestments, such as chasubles, palliums, stoles, mitres, infulae, amices and cuffs, have embroideries depicting dominical scenes such as the pictures of the Mother of God, Christ, the evangelists, the apostles and saints. The judicious selection of colorful threads, the gold and silver additions, the hues of precious and semiprecious gems, and the strings of beautiful pearls elevate these works to the level of true art. The inscriptions embroidered upon them indicate that they were crafted both in Armenia and the Armenian communities of the Diaspora (such as Marash, Aintab, Sunik, Cilicia, Cappadocia, Astrakhan, Constantinople, and others). 

The processional banner of St. Gregory the Illuminator, dating from 1448, is prominently displayed in the Treasury, and is a masterpiece of Armenian embroidery. The banner, which depicts the first Catholicos, as well as King Trdat, and St. Hripsime, is an exquisite sample of creative portraiture. 

Among the woven artifacts, the curtains are especially noteworthy. Prominent among them is a main-altar curtain designed by Grigor Marzvanetsi, the famous publisher-painter from Constantinople. Begun in 1705 and completed in 1714, this is one of the important decorative items of the Treasury. The so-called "eagle rugs" are of great artistic value. A salient example of this category is the embroidered eagle rug of Catholicos Philipos (1751). 

Each of these art objects has its specific style, embellishments and canonical form, developed over the centuries. Yet the crosses on chasubles, the portraits of evangelists embroidered on palliums, the dominical scenes on mitres are also the results of the unique artistic talents and vivid imagination of the creative masters. Embroideries executed by anonymous talents in convents and orphanages are also represented among the artifacts in the Treasury. The superb samples of im printed curtains are of special value. Worldrenowned Armenian rugs and runners of Karabagh, woven during the eighteenth century, are also displayed. 

Armenian miniature art attained its glorious culmination during the sixteenth century; thereafter it was replaced by the new art forms, particularly painting, which developed under European influences. The Treasury also features a valuable collection of illuminated manuscripts, bearing popular and classical motifs, originating from dif ferent periods and regions. 

The Holy See of Etchmiadzin has sponsored Armenian artists throughout the centuries. Naghash Hovnatan; his sons Hakob and Harutune; his grandson Hovnatan Hovnatanian; the latter's son Mkrtum and grandson Hakob were among these artists, as were many other anonymous masters. Hovnatan Hovnatanian (1730-1801) distinguished himself by remodeling and embellishing the Cathedral of Etchmiadzin (1765-1786). His portraits of historic figures and his thematic paintings add a special luster to the Treasury. Hovnatan Hovnatanian founded yet another distinctive artistic tradition in Armenia. 
 

More pictures of treasure can be found 
in other pages throughout this site.