#jugha

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The Archaeology of Power and Politics in Eurasia: Regimes and Revolutions (2012, Page 6): "Any political engagement with the past entails some kind of appropriation of the archaeological record as material evidence to legitimize an ideological claim... [P]olitical salience of archeological sites has made them targets for destruction (e.g., the Buddhas of Bamyan that were destroyed by the Taliban in 2001, or the medieval Armenian cemetery at Djulfa dismantled by the Azerbaijani army in 2005). Thus the physicality of the archaeological record lends itself to appropriation not only by modern techniques of memorialization but also by technologies of erasure and forgetting."

Via Facebook page for Djulfa.com (x)

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Armenian cross-stone ornaments from Julfa cemetery 

The Armenian cemetery in Julfa was a medieval-era cemetery near the town of Julfa, Nakhchivan, an exclave of the Republic of Azerbaijan that originally housed around 10,000 funerary monuments. The tombstones consisted mainly of thousands of khachkars, uniquely decorated cross-stones characteristic of medieval Christian Armenian art. The cemetery was still standing in the late 1990s, when the government of Azerbaijan began a systematic campaign to destroy the monuments. In the spring of 2006, a journalist from the Institute for War and Peace Reporting who visited the area reported that no visible traces of the cemetery remained. In the same year, photographs taken from Iran showed that the cemetery site had been turned into a military firing range. After studying and comparing satellite photos of Julfa taken in 2003 and 2009, in December 2010 the American Association for the Advancement of Science came to the conclusion that the cemetery was demolished and leveled.

Via Religious Tourism: The Ancient Land of Armenia

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хачкар, ст. Джуга Один из хачкаров в св. Эчмиадзине. 1602г. СТАРАЯ ДЖУГА [Photo by Tigran Amiryan]

Detail of a Jugha Khachkar (Cross Stone) carved in 1602, which had been transported from its original home in Jugha, Nakhichevn, present day Azerbaijan, and so preserved at Etchmiadzin Cathedral in Vagharshapat (more commonly known as Etchmiadzin). The Jugha khachkars housed at Etchmiadzin Cathedral are all that remains of the an original 10,000 khachkars that existed in the Jugha cemetery on the banks of the Araxes river in Nakhichevan. The rest of the Jugha khachkars had been gradually destroyed since the early 17th century, by various occupiers and vandals, but eventually was completely and deliberately destroyed and leveled out of existence in the years 2005 and 2006, when the Azerbaijani military bulldozed some 7,000 remaining khachkars into the Araxes river. 

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Two Djulfa khachkars photographed in the beginning of the 20th century in the “Museum of the Caucasus.” Their current whereabouts are unknown. (x)

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The Armenians in their emigration from Old Ciulfa

From Armenian popular songs by Alishan, Ghewond M., 1820-1901, Published 1888

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Armenian church of Jugha (Photo 1986 the year) 

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The image above shows what no longer exists—the pre-destruction site of Old Julfa cemetery.

The largest khachkar cemetary in the world was located in Jugha (or Julfa, located today in Nakhichevan, Azerbaijan). The numbers were vastly reduced from the approximately 20,000 (monasteries, churches, tombstones, khatchkars, other cultural artifacts) that once stood during Soviet times to a mere few thousand, and after independence, Azerbaijan began to systematically destroy them. After an international outcry, the destruction was halted a few years, until 2005 when the entire cemetery was bulldozed completely clear.

IWPR: Famous Medieval Cemetery Vanishes

Artist Lusik Aguletsi, a Nakhichevan-born Armenian, also last visited the cemetery in 1987, although she was under escort.

“There is nothing like it in Armenia,” she said. “It was a thrilling sight. Two hills completely covered in khachkars. We weren’t allowed to draw or photograph them.”

Armenian experts now accuse Azerbaijan of a deliberate act of cultural vandalism.

“The destruction of the khachkars of Old Jugha means the destruction of an entire phenomenon in the history of humanity, because they are not only proof of the culture of the people who created them, they are also symbols that tell us about a particular cultural epoch,” said Hranush Kharatian, head of the Armenian government’s department for national and religious minorities.

“On the entire territory of Nakhichevan there existed 27,000 monasteries, churches, khachkars, tombstones and other Armenian monuments,” said Aivazian. “Today they have all been destroyed.”

Although the historical provenance of the cemetery is disputed in Azerbaijan, its cultural importance is confirmed by the 1986 Azerbaijani book “The Architecture of Ancient and Early Medieval Azerbaijan” by Davud Akhundov, which contains several photographs of the cross-stones of Jugha.

Between 1998 and 2006 the entire cemetery was destroyed. The various stages of the destruction process have been documented by photographic and video evidence taken from the Iranian side of the border. Government and state officials of Azerbaijan have denied that any destruction has taken place, stating that an Armenian cemetery never existed on the site and that Armenians have never lived in Julfa. Azerbaijan has, to date, refused neutral observers access to the site. (Gee, you think they're hiding something?) The European Parliament has formally called on Azerbaijan to stop the demolition as a breach of the UNESCO World Heritage Convention. According to its resolution regarding cultural monuments in the South Caucasus, the European Parliament "condemns strongly the destruction of the Julfa cemetery as well as the destruction of all sites of historical importance that has taken place on Armenian or Azerbaijani territory, and condemns any such action that seeks to destroy cultural heritage." (Yet they did absolutely nothing to stop the destruction). In 2006, Azerbaijan barred the European Parliament from inspecting and examining the ancient site, stating that by passing the previously-mentioned resolution the Parliament had committed a hostile act against Azerbaijan. The Institute for War and Peace Reporting reported on April 19, 2006 that "there is nothing left of the celebrated stone crosses of Jugha." Image: 517design, view rest of set (taken from 1903-1987) More: Video: New Tears of Araxes