Echmiadzin

Echmiadzin — officially Vagharshapat — is the spiritual centre of the Armenian Apostolic Church and the seat of its Catholicos. The Mother Cathedral, founded at the beginning of the fourth century, is widely regarded as the oldest cathedral in the world.

The complex and the nearby churches of Saint Hripsime and Saint Gayane are inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage list. Hripsime, completed in 618, is one of the purest surviving examples of the Armenian domed cross plan and influenced church architecture across the region for centuries.

On the road back to Yerevan stand the ruins of Zvartnots, a vast circular cathedral raised in the seventh century and brought down by an earthquake three hundred years later. Its carved capitals and eagle motifs are among the finest stonework in Armenia.