Ancha ( ka, ანჩის მონასტერი, ''anchis monasteri'') was a medieval

Georgian Georgian may refer to: Common meanings * Anything related to, or originating from Georgia (country) ** Georgians, an indigenous Caucasian ethnic group ** Georgian language, a Kartvelian language spoken by Georgians **Georgian scripts, three scrip ...

monastery and cathedral church of the Bishopric of Ancha, located near what is now the village of Anaçlı,

Artvin Province Artvin Province ( tr, ; ka, , ''Artvinis p’rovincia''; Laz: ართვინიშ დობადონა ''Artviniş dobadona'') is a province in Turkey, on the Black Sea coast in the northeastern corner of the country, on the border w ...

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in ...

. Purportedly once a

cross-in-square A cross-in-square or crossed-dome plan was the dominant architectural form of middle- and late-period Byzantine churches. It featured a square centre with an internal structure shaped like a cross, topped by a dome. The first cross-in-square chu ...

design, the church now lies almost completely in ruins.Анчийская епархия
(''Ancha Eparchy''), in: «Православная энциклопедия» (2001), Т. 3, С. 14-15 (''

Orthodox Encyclopedia The ''Orthodox Encyclopedia'' (russian: Православная энциклопедия, translit=Pravoslavnaya entsiklopediya) is a specialized encyclopedia, published by the Church Research Center "Orthodox Encyclopedia" under the general edito ...

'', 2001, Vol. 3, pp. 14-15) nline version/ref> Djobadze, Wachtang Z. (1992), ''Early Medieval Georgian Monasteries in Historic Tao, Klarjet'i, and Šavšet'i'', pp. 54-56. F. Steiner, The earliest recorded information about the monastery of Ancha is found in c. 951 ''Vitae of

Gregory of Khandzta Gregory of Khandzta ( Georgian: გრიგოლ ხანძთელი, ''Grigol Khandzteli''; 759 – 5 October 861) was a Georgian ecclesiastic figure and a founder and leader of numerous monastic communities in Tao-Klarjeti, a historic ...

'' by

Giorgi Merchule Giorgi Merchule ( ka, გიორგი მერჩულე) was a 10th-century Georgian monk, calligrapher and writer who authored "The Vita of Grigol Khandzteli", a hagiographic novel dealing with the life of the prominent Georgian churchman S ...

, which dates the church roughly to the early 9th century. It functioned as one of the principal religious and cultural centers of the principality of

Klarjeti Klarjeti ( ka, კლარჯეთი ) was a province of ancient and medieval Georgia, which is now part of Turkey's Artvin Province. Klarjeti, the neighboring province of Tao and several other smaller districts, constituted a larger region wi ...

, which was wrested of the Georgian control by the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...

in the 1550s. By the middle of the 17th century, the church had been completely abandoned. Its surviving Christian relics, such as the venerated icon of the Savior, were transferred to the Georgian capital of

Tbilisi Tbilisi ( ; ka, თბილისი ), in some languages still known by its pre-1936 name Tiflis ( ), is the capital and the largest city of Georgia, lying on the banks of the Kura River with a population of approximately 1.5 million p ...

. Shortly after the

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

takeover of the Artvin province, the historical Georgian churches and monasteries of the area were visited, in 1879, by the Georgian scholar Dimitri Bakradze, who reported severe damage to Ancha. In 1904,

Nicholas Marr Nikolai Yakovlevich Marr (, ''Nikolay Yakovlevich Marr''; , ''Nikoloz Iak'obis dze Mari''; — 20 December 1934) was a Georgian-born historian and linguist who gained a reputation as a scholar of the Caucasus during the 1910s before embarking ...

reported that only a portion of the monastery’s north-western and northern walls and an altar apse with a fragment of the cupola had been survived. Nowadays, the building is almost completely ruined.

References

{{coord missing, Turkey Georgian churches in Turkey Christian monasteries established in the 9th century Ruined churches in Turkey Tao-Klarjeti 9th century in the Byzantine Empire Eastern Orthodox monasteries in Turkey