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Historic site · Argavand, Masis community, Ararat

Mausoleum of the Kara Koyunlu Emirs, Argavand

Կարա-Կոյունլուների դամբարան · Argavand Funerary Tower · Argavand Turkmen Mausoleum

A domed funerary tower of 1413 in the village of Argavand on the outskirts of Yerevan, raised by Emir Pir Husayn of the Kara Koyunlu period and carrying an Arabic dedicatory inscription.

Where it is

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40.1563, 44.4398

Why go

The tower is a very different building from the churches around Yerevan, and one of a handful of significant Islamic monuments still intact in Armenia. Its ten-sided body is of tuff under a dome of fired brick, and Armenian masons built it. The inscription names Emir Saad as the builder's late father; Saad's followers gave the region around Yerevan the name Chukhur-Saad. The tomb was restored with Turkmen support in the early 2000s and again under a Ministry of Culture project begun in 2015. It makes a short stop for travellers interested in the Turkmen-ruled centuries of Armenian history.

Base yourself nearby

City

Yerevan

Yerevan is Armenia's capital and the base for almost every trip to the country: a low-rise city built largely from pink volcanic tuff, with a dense cafe and dining culture, serious museums and manuscript collections, Soviet-modernist architecture, and monasteries, wine country and Lake Sevan all within a day's return drive.

Near Mausoleum of the Kara Koyunlu Emirs, Argavand