Gundagsaz tombstone monuments

Monument date:
X-XIII c.
Placement /
Previous toponym:

In the village of Gundagsaz in the present day Alagoz (Ara­gadz) district, Ale­xan­dropol uezd, Iravan go­vernorate.

Placement /
Current toponym:

Iravan - from 1936 Yerevan, was a part of Abaran district until 15.03.1972, when Alagoz (Aragadz) dist­rict was formed. The village of Gundagsaz has been called Rya taza (Taza Ha­yat) since 25.01.1978.

Classification:

Architec­ture

Current situation

The ancient mo­numents in the old cemetery lo­ca­ted close to vil­lage houses we­re destroyed by Armenians af­ter the mass deportation of Azerbaijanis in 1988, haystacks of the villagers were collected in the cemetery. At the present time, some sto­ne frag­ments be­longing to the graves and only one grave horse statue and two tombs re­main. Arme­nians present 2 tombs and chests belon­ging to Azer­­baijanis to the international community as Ye­­zid temp­les.

Information:

There are Albanian-Oghuz monuments from the ancient period in the area called the old cemetery in Gundagsaz village. Most of the graves in the ancient cemetery, which is located in the countryside and is located 50-60 meters from the houses in the village, have horse and ram sculptures and a knight holding a sword on a horse in a patterned frame on large tombstones, on the horse, there are images of a boy holding the bow of an arrow in a weighted position to hunt a gazelle (deer) in front of him, and images of a horse, a ram, a deer, and a gazelle.

The toponym is derived from the combination of the Turkish word kondak, which means "gun barrel" and the Turkish word saz, which means "swamp, soil where wa­ter comes out,clay". In the Tur­kish lan­guage, the word "kondak" is also used in the sen­se of "burning sulfur box and bucket opened during a fire", "a collection of combustible subs­tances thrown into the yard or under the stairs". It is a toponym with a complex struc­ture based on relief.

Photos:
Videos: