Sanctuary of the Ancient Armenian Gods in Kappadokia

In Kappadokia, on the slope of Mount Nemrut (height 2150m) which is on the right bank of river Euphrates, near old town Sammosat (near present Adiyaman, now in Turkey) there is the stone big old Monument, the Sanctuary of old Armenian Gods with big, 9m Sculptures (sitting on thrones).

They were the Sculptures of Gods:

AR (SUN) – the Main God of Armenians,
KESAR – the Image of Armennian Kings (Kesars), similar to the AR,
ANNAIDT – the Daughter of the AR,
VAHAGN – the young God, Fighter of evil,
TIR – the young God, “Secretary” of the AR, and also (sitting on smaller thrones) the Symbols of the AR: the Lion and the Eagle.

There are also the stone bar-relieves. Unfortunately this unique Monument now is terribly destroyed: all Heads of Sculptures are picked up, their faces damaged, etc. Some Heads are put separately and were shown in Fig. 64.

More information about the present condition of the Monument we have taken from the Internet [lOO]. The scheme of the Monument is shown in Fig. 69. There are three parts of the Monument placed on three big artificial terraces on slope of Mount Nemrut: the East, the West and the North ones.

The East and West parts (terraces) of the Monument are almost similar. They consist of 5 big and 4 smaller thrones each for the sitting big Sculptures. Five thrones for the Gods and four thrones for the Symbols of AR, Lions and Eagles.

Unfortunately the process of the Sculptures damaging continues also at present time. For example, in Fig. 70 it is presented the photo (made in 1883) of the East terrace where the Sculptures of the Gods are damaged, but the Sculpture of the Annahit Goddess still had the Head. In Fig. 71 another photo is presented (made in 1995) of the same East terrace where the Sculpture of the Annahit Goddess with Her Head is already absent.

In Fig. 72 the West terrace with empty thrones and damaged Heads of the AR, Vahagn and Tir are shown. In Fig. 73 the bar-relief of the Lion on the West terrace (photo 1883) is shown and in Fig. 74 the same Lion bas-relief with damaged face and body (photo 1996) is shown.

All historical material about the Monument on Mount Nemrut (Fig. 64-69) is also distorted. The names of Armenian old Gods are changed into the Greek old Gods names. It is said about the Kesar Sculpture, that it is Antioch I (king of Kappadokia), and that all the Monument was built as if
by Antioch in I century BC.

AU these are wrong, because:

1. Kappadokia was the part of the Great Armenia from the very old time (see Item 3.10). As a region of Roman Empire Kappadokia was for a short time, in n century BC, but in I century BC it was taken back into the Great Armenia by the Armenian King Tigran 11 the Great.

2. Antioch I would never dare to make his statue and face almost identical with AR (or Zeus, as it is in above said information from Turkey). To be similar with AR could be only Armenian Kesars of the Great Armenia who were the Kings and in the same time the Main Priests. The word “kes·ar” -s in Armenian means “Half-God”, or “Half-Sun”, or “equal to the Sun”.

3. The Lion and the Eagle were the Symbols of the AR in old Armenia only. Later, supposedly, during the Great Deluge, one more Symbol was added – the Aries (at the same time the name of the first Zodiacal constellation). So we can suppose that the Monument on Mt. Nemrut was built before the Great Deluge and, of course, by Armenians.

4. To make this unique and huge labour-consuming Monument it was necessary to do very big earthwork which at that time could be done only by powerful King of a big country, as Armenia.

An extract from the book “Armenians and Ancient Armenia” by Paris Herouni