Caucasian Albania is one of the oldest state formations in the South Caucasus, and Albanian Church is one of the oldest Christian churches.

Caucasian Albania is a modern exonym for a former state located in ancient times in the Caucasus: mostly in what is now Azerbaijan (where both of its capitals were located), Nagorno Karabakh and southern Dagestan (Russia).

The name Albania is derived from the Ancient Greek name Ἀλβανία and Latin Albanía. The prefix “Caucasian” is used purely to avoid confusion with modern Albania of the Balkans, which has no known geographical or historical connections to Caucasian Albania. Little is known of the region’s prehistory, including the origins of Caucasian Albania as a geographical and/or ethnolinguistic concept. In the 1st century BC and the 1st century AD, the area south of the Greater Caucasus and north of the Lesser Caucasus was divided between Caucasian Albania in the east, Caucasian Iberia in the center, Kolchis in the west, Armenia in the southwest and Atropatene to the southeast.

The Armenian historian of the region, Movses Kaghankatvatsi (XI century), who left the only more or less complete historical account about the region, explains the name Aghvank as a derivation from the word ału (Armenian for sweet, soft, tender), which, he said, was the nickname of Caucasian Albania’s first governor Arran and referred to his lenient personality. Movses Kaghankatvatsi and other ancient sources explain Arran or Arhan as the name of the legendary founder of Caucasian Albania (Aghvan) or even of the Iranian tribe known as Alans (Alani), who in some versions was a son of Noah’s son Yafet. James Darmesteter, translator of the Avesta, compared Arran with Airyana Vaego which he also considered to have been in the Araxes-Ararat region, although modern theories tend to place this in the east of Iran.

From the 5th the territory of Aghvank province of Sasanian Iran began to be referred to as Caucasian Albania, which already included the Artsakh-Utik provinces of Great Armenia on the right bank of the Kur,a in addition to the territory of Albania itself.  Movses Kagankatvatsi’s book “History of Aghvank” written in the 10th century by “Aghvank” meant the area from Araks to Derbent, which was under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Catholicos of Aghvank.  The descendants of this ecclesiastical-political unit were the Caucasian Albanians themselves, as well as other peoples of the area (Armenians living on the right bank of the Kura, Georgians in the north-western regions).

The legend connects the spread of Christianity in Caucasian Albania with St. Yeghishe, a disciple of Thaddeus.  The second conversion of Caucasian Albania is connected with the grandson of Gregory the Illuminator, Bishop Grigoris of Amaras. Gregory the Illuminator is the patron saint and first official head of the Armenian Apostolic Church. He was a religious leader who is credited with converting Armenia from paganism to Christianity in 301. He “renovated” the churches, preached to the local peoples and in 338 he was martyred by the order of King Sanesan of Arshakun of Mazktats.  Georgians and Assyrians also preached in C.

The next wave of Christian propaganda among the peoples of Caucasian Albania is connected with the names of Mesrop Mashtots and Daniel, whom the creation of the Aghvan / Gargar alphabet in 420 AD is attributed to by various sources. Mesrop Mashtots was an early medieval Armenian linguist, composer, theologian, statesman and hymnologist. He is best known for inventing the Armenian alphabet c. 405 AD. He is also considered to be the creator of the Caucasian Albanian alphabets by some scholars.

Judging by the materials of the First Congregation of the Armenian Church in Dvin (506), the ritual language of the Albanian Church was Caucasian Albanian.

A number of scholars have confirmed the existence of ritual monuments in the Caucasian Albanian language.  Recently, more than a hundred pages of Caucasian Albanian ritual texts were found in the Georgian palimpsest in Sinai.

From the 7th century the process of Armenianization of the Caucasian Albanian Church intensified, and later the church services were performed in Armenian.  Nevertheless, the Caucasian Albanian script continues to be used on the left bank of the Kura (excavations of a complex near Mingechaur have uncovered both Caucasian Albanian and Armenian inscriptions written in the mid-7th century).

The first ruler of Caucasian Albania to convert to Christianity was King Urnayr, who was baptized in Armenia around 370.  However, Christianity was finally established in the region of Caucasian Albania at the end of the 5th century, during the reign of King Vachagan III the Pious, when the church rules and regulations, the rights and responsibilities of the leaders were established in the Caucasian Albania’s assembly.  However, before the 10th century, especially in Caucasian Albania proper, paganism and Zoroastrianism also remained widespread.

The Arab conquests (from the mid 7th century) instigated the persistent struggle between Islam and Christianity, which ended in the 11th century with the Islamization of most of the population of the Caspian region.  After establishing their rule in the South Caucasus, the caliphs subordinated the Catholicosate of Caucasian Albania to the Armenian Church (from the 20s of the VIII century).  The reason for this is clear: the Arabs were competing with Byzantium; the local Christians had to be cut off from the Byzantine church.

During the period of political division (IX-XII centuries) the single Catholicosate of Caucasian Albania experienced a decline.  The Catholicos was established in IX-X centuries in Khamsh Monastery (Miapor province).  Later, the centers of church life were Artsakh (11th century) and Kakhi-Zakatala (12th century).  Since 1240, the bishops of Gandzasar, descended from the Hasan-Jalalyan Armenian dynasty, have occupied a prominent position in the Caucasian Albania’s Church.  At the end of the 14th century, Gandzasar Monastery, which was the political and spiritual center of the Artsakh principalities, became the residence of the Catholicos of Caucasian Albania.

From the middle of the 17th century until the end of the 18th century, the Catholicos of Gandzasar had his anti-throne (in Khachen Yeritsmankants Monastery). At the end of the  XVIII century the last Catholicosate had 1736 churches and monasteries, but at the beginning of the XIX century it had only 1311 of them.

In 1815, by the order of the tsarist government, the Catholicosate of Gandzasar was abolished and turned into a metropolis. Two dioceses under the Catholicosate of Ejmiatsin were established in Karabakh and Shamakh.

During the Soviet years, due to religious persecution, in 1930 the diocese of Nagorno Karabakh (which continued to be historically called Caucasian Albania) ceased to function.  The canonical life could be restored only in 1989, when the Artsakh Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church was founded.  The diocese played a significant role in the national-conscious awakening of the Artsakh Armenians, in the liberation of the Nagorno-Karabakh and in the strengthening of the statehood.

The abolition of the Gandzasar Catholicosate has become a source of speculation, especially in Azerbaijan.  For comparison, there were four Catholicosates in Georgia at the same time, who first united in one Catholicosate, then joined the Russian Orthodox Church as an exarchate.

The tsarist government forcibly interrupted the traditions of the Caucasian Albania’s Church, and Islamic Azerbaijan regularly tries to establish the Caucasian Albanian Church in order to privatize the Christian heritage in order to establish its right to those territories.  From the above, it is obvious that the only legal heir of the Caucasian Albanian Church is the Catholicosate of historical Gandzasar, which is now the Diocese of the Armenian Church in Artsakh.