Jvari Monastery
Sixth-century tetraconch church on a ridge above Mtskheta, a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Jvari stands on a rocky spur above the confluence of the Mtkvari and Aragvi rivers, looking down on the old Georgian capital of Mtskheta. Tradition holds that Saint Nino raised a wooden cross on the hill in the fourth century, when Iberia adopted Christianity, and a small church was built beside it around 545. The surviving domed church was erected between about 586 and 605 under Stepanoz I, the erismtavari of Kartli, whose name appears in inscriptions on the facades.
The building is a tetraconch: four apses of equal depth open from a central square, with narrow niches in the angles carrying the transition to an octagonal drum and dome. The design proved enormously influential and was copied across Georgia and Armenia for centuries. Carved relief panels above the doorways show donor figures and the Exaltation of the Cross. Jvari was inscribed by UNESCO in 1994 as part of the Historical Monuments of Mtskheta and was later placed on the list of World Heritage in Danger before conservation work improved its condition.
Highlights
- Tetraconch plan that set a pattern for Georgian church design
- Carved donor reliefs and inscriptions naming Stepanoz I
- Wooden cross base at the centre of the church, the site's founding relic
- Views over Mtskheta and the meeting of the Mtkvari and Aragvi
![Afrique occidentale française : Cathédrale à St Louis / [photogr. Eugène] Gallois ; [photogr. reprod. par Radiguet et Massiot pour la conférence donnée par] Gallois](https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/0a/Afrique_occidentale_fran%C3%A7aise_-_Cath%C3%A9drale_%C3%A0_St_Louis_-_%28photogr._Eug%C3%A8ne%29_Gallois_%3B_%28photogr._reprod._par_Radiguet_et_Massiot_pour_la_conf%C3%A9rence_donn%C3%A9e_par%29_Gallois_-_btv1b532798828.jpg/500px-thumbnail.jpg)
![[Golestan, Le Salon et Fete de l'equinode, Teheran, Iran (le Pavillion du Trone)]](https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/33/-Golestan%2C_Le_Salon_et_Fete_de_l%27equinode%2C_Teheran%2C_Iran_%28le_Pavillion_du_Trone%29-_MET_DP202918.jpg/500px--Golestan%2C_Le_Salon_et_Fete_de_l%27equinode%2C_Teheran%2C_Iran_%28le_Pavillion_du_Trone%29-_MET_DP202918.jpg)
![Théâtre de la guerre dans l'Inde sur la coste de Coromandel / par M.B.C.T. [Monsieur Bourcet Capitaine ?] ; gravé par Croisey](https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/99/Fort_de_Calicuta_-_btv1b59706294.jpg/500px-Fort_de_Calicuta_-_btv1b59706294.jpg)
