Armenian chroniclers such as Yeghishe and Ghazar Parpetsi first mentioned Ani in the 5th century.[1] They described it as a strong fortress built on a hilltop and a possession of the Armenian Kamsarakan dynasty.

 

The Bagratuni Kingdom of Armenia, c. 1000

By the early 9th century, the former territories of the Kamsarakans in Arsharunik and Shirak (including Ani) had been incorporated into the territories of the Armenian Bagratuni dynasty.[2] The Bagratuni dynasty was the second notable dynasty in the Armenian kingdom.[3] They secured their independence from the Arabs near the end of the 9th century after being controlled by the Persians and Umayyad Arabs for many years at this point.[3] The king of Bagratid Armenia that led to this independence was Ashot I.[3] He had a short-lived position as the king of the Bagratid dynasty, however, the impact of securing the freedom of the dynasty would last for many years.[3] His son, Smbat I, ruled directly after he did.[3] The Bagratid dynasty consisted of many sub-kingdoms, the most notable of which were the Kingdom of Kars, Lori, Syunik, Artsakh, and Vaspurakan.[3] The Bagratuni dynasty led to some of the most notable works of art and architecture in Armenia's history, one of which being the Cathedral of Ani.[3] The leader of the Bagratid dynasty, Ashot Msaker (Ashot the Meateater) (806–827) was given the title of ishkhan (prince) of Armenia by the Caliphate in 804.[4] The Bagratunis had their first capital at Bagaran, some 40 km (25 mi) south of Ani, before moving it to Shirakavan, some 25 km (16 mi) northeast of Ani, and then transferring it to Kars in the year 929. In 961, king Ashot III (953–77) transferred the capital from Kars to Ani.[5] Ani expanded rapidly during the reign of King Smbat II (977–89). In 992 the Armenian Catholicosate moved its seat to Ani. In the 10th century the population was perhaps 50,000–100,000.[6] By the start of the eleventh century the population of Ani was well over 100,000,[citation needed] and its renown was such that it was known as the "city of forty gates" and the "city of a thousand and one churches." Ani also became the site of the royal mausoleum of Bagratuni kings.[7]

Ani attained the peak of its power during the long reign of King Gagik I (989–1020). After his death his two sons quarreled over the succession. The eldest son, Hovhannes-Smbat (1020–41), gained control of Ani while his younger brother, Ashot IV (1020–40), controlled other parts of the Bagratuni kingdom. Hovhannes-Smbat, fearing that the Byzantine Empire would attack his now-weakened kingdom, made the Byzantine Emperor Basil II his heir.[8] When Hovhannes-Smbat died in 1041, Emperor Michael IV the Paphlagonian, claimed sovereignty over Ani. The new king of Ani, Gagik II (1042–45), opposed this and several Byzantine armies sent to capture Ani were repulsed. However, in 1046 Ani surrendered to the Byzantines,[5] after Gagik was invited to Constantinople and detained there, and at the instigation of pro-Byzantine elements among its population. A Byzantine governor was installed in the city.[1]

 

Plan of the city

Ani lied along any previously important trade routes, but because of its size, power, and wealth it became an important trading hub. Its primary trading partners were the Byzantine Empire, the Persian Empire, the Arabs, as well as smaller nations in southern Russia and Central Asia.[1]

In 1064, a large Seljuk army under Alp Arslan attacked Ani; after a siege of 25 days, they captured the city and slaughtered its population.[9] An account of the sack and massacres in Ani is given by the Turkish historian Sibt ibn al-Jawzi, who quotes an eyewitness saying:

Putting the Persian sword to work, they spared no one... One could see there the grief and calamity of every age of human kind. For children were ravished from the embraces of their mothers and mercilessly hurled against rocks, while the mothers drenched them with tears and blood... The city became filled from one end to the other with bodies of the slain and [the bodies of the slain] became a road. [...] The army entered the city, massacred its inhabitants, pillaged and burned it, leaving it in ruins and taking prisoner all those who remained alive...The dead bodies were so many that they blocked the streets; one could not go anywhere without stepping over them. And the number of prisoners was not less than 50,000 souls. I was determined to enter the city and see the destruction with my own eyes. I tried to find a street in which I would not have to walk over the corpses; but that was impossible.[10]

In 1072, the Seljuks sold Ani to the Shaddadids, a Muslim Kurdish dynasty.[9] The Shaddadids generally pursued a conciliatory policy towards the city's overwhelmingly Armenian and Christian population and actually married several members of the Bagratid nobility. Whenever the Shaddadid governance became too intolerant, however, the population would appeal to the Christian Kingdom of Georgia for help. The Georgians captured Ani five times between 1124 and 1209:[5] in 1124, 1161, 1174, 1199, and 1209.[11] The first three times, it was recaptured by the Shaddadids. In the year 1199, Georgia's Queen Tamar captured Ani and in 1201 gave the governorship of the city to the generals Zakare and Ivane.[12] Zakare was succeeded by his son Shanshe (Shahnshah). Zakare's new dynasty — the Zakarids — considered themselves to be the successors to the Bagratids. Prosperity quickly returned to Ani; its defences were strengthened and many new churches were constructed. The Mongols unsuccessfully besieged Ani in 1226, but in 1236 they captured and sacked the city, massacring large numbers of its population. Under the Mongols the Zakarids continued to rule Ani, as the vassals of the Georgian monarch.[13]

By the 14th century, the city was ruled by a succession of local Turkish dynasties, including the Jalayrids and the Kara Koyunlu (Black Sheep clan) who made Ani their capital. It was ruined by an earthquake in 1319.[9][5] Tamerlane captured Ani in the 1380s. On his death the Kara Koyunlu regained control but transferred their capital to Yerevan. In 1441 the Armenian Catholicosate did the same. The Persian Safavids then ruled Ani until it became part of the Turkish Ottoman Empire in 1579. A small town remained within its walls at least until the middle of the seventeenth century, but the site was entirely abandoned by 1735 when the last monks left the monastery in the Virgin's Fortress or Kizkale.

 

In 1905–06, archaeological excavations of the church of Saint Gregory of King Gagik were undertaken, headed by Nikolai Marr.

In the first half of the 19th century, European travelers discovered Ani for the outside world, publishing their descriptions in academic journals and travel accounts. The private buildings were little more than heaps of stones but grand public buildings and the city's double wall were preserved and reckoned to present "many points of great architectural beauty".[9] Ohannes Kurkdjian produced a stereoscopic image of Ani in the second half of the 19th century.

In 1878, the Ottoman Empire's Kars region—including Ani—was incorporated into the Russian Empire's Transcaucasian region.[5] In 1892 the first archaeological excavations were conducted at Ani, sponsored by the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences and supervised by the Georgian archaeologist and orientalist Nicholas Marr (1864–1934). Marr's excavations at Ani resumed in 1904 and continued yearly until 1917. Large sectors of the city were professionally excavated, numerous buildings were uncovered and measured, the finds were studied and published in academic journals, guidebooks for the monuments and the museum were written, and the whole site was surveyed for the first time.[15] Emergency repairs were also undertaken on those buildings that were most at risk of collapse. A museum was established to house the tens of thousands of items found during the excavations. This museum was housed in two buildings: the Minuchihr mosque, and a purpose-built stone building.[16] Armenians from neighboring villages and towns also began to visit the city on a regular basis,[17] and there was even talk by Marr's team of building a school for educating the local Armenian children, building parks, and planting trees to beautify the site.[18]

In 1918, during the latter stages of World War I, the armies of the Ottoman Empire were fighting their way across the territory of the newly declared Republic of Armenia, capturing Kars in April 1918. At Ani, attempts were made to evacuate the artifacts contained in the museum as Turkish soldiers were approaching the site. About 6,000 of the most portable items were removed by archaeologist Ashkharbek Kalantar, a participant of Marr's excavation campaigns. At the behest of Joseph Orbeli, the saved items were consolidated into a museum collection; they are currently part of the collection of Yerevan's State Museum of Armenian History.[19] Everything that was left behind was later looted or destroyed.[20] Turkey's surrender at the end of World War I led to the restoration of Ani to Armenian control, but a resumed offensive against the Armenian Republic in 1920 resulted in Turkey's recapture of Ani. In 1921 the signing of the Treaty of Kars formalized the incorporation of the territory containing Ani into the Republic of Turkey.[21]

In May 1921, the government minister Rıza Nur ordered the commander of the Eastern Front, Kazım Karabekir, for the monuments of Ani to "be wiped off the face of the earth."[22] Karabekir records in his memoirs that he has vigorously rejected this command and never carried it out.[23] Some destruction did take place, including most of Marr's excavations and building repairs.[24] In October of the same year, a separate treaty was signed between Turkey and the RSFSR, confirming the border between Turkey and the soviet republic of Armenia as it is today. The Russian negotiator Ganeckij of this treaty tried to include Ani into the soviet republic of Armenia, but Karabekir did not agree.[25]

During the Cold War, Ani lay on the Turkish-Soviet border, a segment of the Iron Curtain.[26] In the 1950s Ani was part of the USSR's territorial claims on Turkey. In 1968 there were negotiations between the Soviet Union and Turkey, in which Ani would be transferred to Soviet Armenia in exchange for two Kurdish villages being transferred to Turkey, however nothing resulted from the talks.[27]