In 911 Vahan, the youngest son of a wealthy duke Gagik, ordered to build a beautiful temple. According to him, this temple was intended to become a family vault which could glorify the ancestral merits and victories. One more reason to build a complex that big, pointed out in the old legends, was the fact that Vahan'd had serious health issues. Only the monks of the neighbor orthodox monastery managed to heal him. So, erecting the temple was also Vahan’s way to express his gratitude to the God for the marvelous recovery.

But does it really matter what the reason was? The fact is that at Vahan’s time, just a few kilometres away from the city Kapan, a splendid monastery, Vahanavank, appeared. This Armenian architectural pearl took the art of construction to the whole new level.

After the temple had been built, Vahan invited monks from other monasteries to visit it. Within a year, more than a hundred people settled down there. One more year after, a school appeared. Gradually, the temple turned into a big monastery, which, later on, grew into a town, not very large, but quite crowded. The monastery itself gained significant importance: it became a burial vault for local feudal lords and czars.

Only the main temple has stood the test of time: the elegant austere church of Gregory the Illuminator is now in a good state. The column hall, which used to be the burial vault, has been restored. Right next to it you can find some pieces of the walls that belonged to the refectory and the church of the Holy Mother of God. The archeologists found basements of dwelling houses and remains of public facilities around the temple.

They also located tombs of noble people, but couldn’t identify many of them as a lot of gravestones had been lost.

Nowadays tourists come here to enjoy the picturesque landscapes and get acquainted with Armenian history, to see with their own eyes the extraordinary temples built by skillful architects whose names, unfortunately, remain unknown.