NEW DATA ON THE CUPOLAS OF ANI'S CHURCHES. PART THREE. STRATIGRAPHY OF THE THOLOBATE OF THE REDEEMER CHURCH
The paper from the series of publications on issues related to the cupolas of the churches of Ani, the medieval capital of Armenia, is dedicated to the study of the tholobate of the Redeemer (Surb P'rkich) Church. Dated in two constructive inscriptions by Prince Ablgharip Pahlavuni to 1035 and 1036, the time of Shahanshah Hovhannes-Smbat Bagratuni, this building has been destroyed and renovated several times. For the most part, this involved the cupola, which is above the octagonal central space of the eight-foil structure of the church. These are as follows: - the destruction of 1131; - the restoration of 1192 by priest Trdat and his wife Khushush; - the collapse of 1319; - the second rebuilding of the dome in 1342 by the Atabek Vahram. As opposed to the existing interpretation that only one repair of the church took place in 1342, totally rebuilding its cupola, the investigation of the masonry of the preserved part of the tholobate discovers the stratigraphy of three layers of constructive periods: 1) the initial, which organically linked to the masonry of the main volume of the church; 2) the masonry rows classified as a result of the restoration of 1192; 3) the highest rows including the existing dome, attributed to the works of 1342. The comparative analysis of architectural details and the ornamentation, preserved on each of these zones, confirm this version. Moreover, the study of specific ornaments of the drum, makes it possible to check their place in the architectural history of Western Asia, and improve on the investigations of the interaction of different traditions of monumental architecture of the 11th-14th centuries. The other result coming out of this article is the representation of a new reconstruction of the original structure of the cupola, which was completely different from the figure suggested by Nikolay Tokarski, on the basis of the forms of the church Surb Sargis of the Khtskonk Monastery, and which obviously was oriented in its main shapes - the blind arcade, the frieze and the horizontal cornice - towards the cupola of Ani Cathedral. Talking about the cupola of the Redeemer Church, we are pointed toward the preservation of the original idea during each of restorations of the church. Finally, the paper, following the previous studies in the series, confirms the point that the method of reconstruction by analogies has weak substantiations. The study again unleashes the power of conjunction of the archeological and art history methods with the formal architectural analysis.