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Photo: SUZANNE KHARDALIAN HOLMQUIST · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Former Armenian monastery on an island in Lake Van, Turkey
Ktuts monastery is an abandoned 15th century Armenian monastery on the small island of Ktuts (Çarpanak) in Lake Van, Vaspurakan which fell into ruins after the Armenian genocide beginning in 1915. According to tradition, the monastery was founded in the 4th century by Saint Gregory the Illuminator, after his return from Rome. It contained a hand of John the Baptist, which was kept in a reliquary now held at the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem.
