The German school partnered with archaeologists from the National Academy of Sciences of Armenia to find the ruins which were located at the Artaxata site in the Ararat Plain in modern-day Armenia, Fox News reports.
"The find consists of an octagonal building with cruciform extensions,” the statement from the school read. “The team excavated parts of the church and studied it using geophysical methods. Typologically, the find corresponds to early Christian memorial buildings. In the cross-shaped extensions, the researchers discovered the remains of wooden platforms, which were radiocarbon dated to the mid-4th century AD."
The school also explained that Armenia was the first Christian state ever established and the discovery of one of the oldest churches in the world being there would make sense. The oldest known Christian church sites date back to the 3rd and 4th centuries.
"According to legend, Gregory the Illuminator converted the Armenian king Tiridates III to Christianity in Artaxata in 301 AD, making Armenia the first Christian state in the world,” the school explained. "The medieval monastery of Khor Virap, just a stone’s throw from the now-discovered church, is a reminder of this tradition. Artaxata served as the capital of the Kingdom of Armenia, ruled by the Artaxiad and Arsacid dynasties. The city developed into an important metropolis in the Hellenistic period and was the capital of the Kingdom of Armenia for almost six centuries."
“The 4th century building is the oldest archaeologically documented church in the country – sensational evidence for early Christianity in Armenia,” University of Münster Professor Achim Lichtenberger said in a statement.
The Artaxada church was octagonal in shape and was "lavishly decorated," according to experts due to the fact that fragments of marble imported from the Mediterranean were found at the site. Excavators had been digging around the Ararat Plain since 2018 but hadn't found anything until recently.
