The Armenian Apostolical Church, The Holy Mother of God (1803–1804)

After the annexation of Bessarabia to the Russian Empire in 1812, the Armenian Archbishop (1809-1828) of Moldo-Vlachia, Grigor Zakarian, had to move to Chișinău, his title being limited to that of Archbishop of the Armenians of Bessarabia, although the Armenians across the Prut continued to subordinate themselves to him. The 400 parishes and five churches (Akkerman, Ismail, Tighina, Chisinau, Hotin) of the Armenian community in the region came under the jurisdiction of the Armenian community in Bessarabia.
The Armenian Apostolic Church “Holy Mother of God” in Chisinau dates back to 1803 and was built on the foundation of an old damaged Moldovan church. Built in 1645, during the reign of Vasile Lupu (1634-1653), it was dedicated to “St. Nicholas” and was also known as the “Domnească Church”. Frequent invasions by the Tatars, several earthquakes and destruction caused by the Russo-Turkish wars destroyed it to such an extent that by 1741 it was in total ruin.
At the beginning of the 19th century, the land, and what remained of the church once founded by Vasile Lupu, was bought by an Armenian from the local authorities. This one was Baron Oganes, who contributed to the creation of the church in memory of his parents in 1803.
During the Soviet period, according to the Armenian community, the church was used as a warehouse. From archival documents, we know that its conversion into a storage facility took place in the summer of 1944.
Despite the fact that the building had its religious activity suspended, it continued to gather all the Armenians of the Moldovan SSR, becoming a symbol of the preservation of their spiritual unity and identity – “the Armenian community always gathered around the church, even when it was closed”.
The Armenian community took possession of the Armenian Church again in 1992. The church resumed its activities on 19 June 1993, when it was inaugurated by the head of the Moscow and Nahicevan Eparchy in the presence of high dignitaries, and was served by a priest assigned by the Armenian Patriarchate of Etchimiadzin.

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Who was Manuc Bey?
Armenian, Emanuel Mârzaian was born in 1769 in Rusciuc to a wealthy merchant family. After the death of his parents and his marriage to a wealthy Armenian woman, he took over the family business and established trade links with Constantinople. Thanks to his talent for cultivating relationships, bribing and sensing opportunities, he soon became the richest man in the Balkans. One of the first people he corrupted was the governor of Rusciucco, who offered him a large sum of money in exchange for guaranteeing his import and export business.

He also turned his business to the Romanian Country and got in the good graces of the ruler Constantine Ipsilanti from whom he obtained the dignities of serdar and paharnic. With a remarkable political intuition he sensed the approach of the Russo-Turkish war and in 1806, through high intermediaries such as the ruler of Muntenia and the Russian consul in Iasi, he requested and obtained Russian citizenship.

During the Russo-Turkish war of 1806-1812, Manuc turned his main business to Wallachia where he began to build the inn that bears his name in Bucharest. He also bought large estates in Wallachia.

Enjoying the trust of the Ottomans, Manuc was commissioned by Pasha to supply the army, maintain the Danubian fortresses and negotiate with the Russians.

He also gained the trust of the Montagnards (Muntenians) by offering the Romanian Country a loan of 160,000 talers without interest and by paying (non-refundable) a debt to the Turks of 60,000. In the meantime the Turks also granted him the title of bei or prince of Moldavia.

Manuc bei, a trusted Turkish agent of the Russian Empire, took part in and hosted in his inn the negotiations at the end of the Russo-Turkish war in 1812, negotiations which for us resulted in the loss of Bessarabia. For this Tsar Alexander I decorated him with the medal of Knight of the Order of Saint Vladimir.

After a short journey to Sibiu, the prudent Manuc Bei moved to Chișinău, where in 1816 he bought a 10-hectare estate in Hâncești for 300,000 lei-gold. He did not get to see the finished palace because he died in suspicious circumstances on June 20, 1817 at only 48 years old in a hunting accident, in which Russian generals were taking part, or, according to other anonymous sources, he was killed by the Ottomans for high treason.

He was buried in the courtyard of the Armenian Church in Chisinau.

Manuc Bey – Armenian Prince

Historians have found that one of the less developed actors in the events of the Russo-Turkish War of 1806-1812, involved in political-diplomatic actions, who had influence over the Russo-Ottoman negotiations was the influential and wealthy Manuc (Emanuel) Mirzaianț (there are different spellings of his name: Mirzaian, Mârzaian, Manuc bey etc.), of Armenian origin, known in his time as Manuc Bey.

Manuc Bey (son of Mardiros Mirzaian and Mamila Hamum Oglu: 1769-1817), who began his career as a merchant south of the Danube, ended up as a knight of the Order of St. Vladimir (3rd degree), Russian state councillor (equivalent to the rank of general), informer for Russian diplomacy, banker and landowner with ambitious economic plans in Bessarabia and beyond… For his activity in Wallachia he was awarded the rank of serdar (1802) and paharnic (1803).

For his services to the Ottoman Empire, in 1807 he was granted the rank of Grand Dragoman of the Porte (for the first time this position was entrusted to a non-Franco-Katarite), in 1808 – the title of bei (prince) of Moldavia, which turned out to be, de facto, an honorary one (he did not hold any dominion in the Principalities). Subsequently, the title of “bei” i.e. “prince” was not confirmed in Russia. Only the descendants of Manuc Bei in Bessarabia were “ennobled” by marrying descendants of aristocratic descent.

The merchant, merchant and polyglot diplomat (he knew about 12 languages) Manuc Bey benefited from a rich historical-literary bibliography from which it is easy to see that he exercised, often from the shadows, political-economic actions with an impact on the events in the Romanian Principalities, Russia and the Ottoman Empire. At the same time, there are still many less researched aspects and many unexplored documents that would add to the knowledge of this complex and controversial figure. The diplomatic activity of the famous Manuc Bey is primarily linked to the signing of the Russian-Turkish peace treaty of 16/28 May 1812, in the context of influence peddling, after which part of the Moldavian territory was annexed by the Russian Empire and for more than 100 years would bear the name of Bessarabia.

Manuc Bey played an active role as an intermediary in the secret peace negotiations between the Russian and Ottoman authorities, and was a useful agent of Russia, promoting its geopolitical interests and using influence peddling. It should be recalled that, for his services to the Russian crown and at his repeated requests in 1805-1806, just before the outbreak of war with the Turks, he was issued a passport as a subject of the Russian Empire on 22 May 1806. From this point of view, it was also “natural” for a new citizen of Russia, who counted on her political support and material sustenance, to collaborate by all means with the protector state, including those of the intelligence services of the time. Of his many political and economic activities, more or less enlightening, for us he remained, after all, the man who built the famous inn in Bucharest that still bears his name today – where the Peace of 1812 was signed and whose secret (behind-the-scenes) protagonist he was at certain stages of the diplomatic negotiations.

On 18 October 1812 Manuc Bey and Galib Efendi left Bucharest, having been invited by the aian (governor) of Rusk. And already in December he returned to the capital of the Romanian Country, where he was warned of the danger to his life, which led him to take refuge in April 1813 in Sibiu. In June 1813 Manuc Bey’s family reunited in Brasov. After his refuge in Transylvania, he went to Vienna, where, on 3 October 1814, he had an audience with Emperor Alexander I, who gave him the title of titular state councillor (“действительный статский советник”).

In April 1815 the Russian Foreign Minister informed the administration in Chisinau that Alexander I had allowed Manuc Bey, “known for his loyalty to Russia”, to settle in Bessarabia. He settled with his family on his estate in the village of Hancesti, where he died suddenly on 20 June 1817. Legend has it that he fell off his horse because his saddle straps were cut. The evil gurus say that he was thus punished by the Ottomans for treason.

The legendary Armenian leader was buried in the porch of the Armenian church in the old centre of Chisinau.

Armenian streets

The Armenian community has left a serious mark on the history and geography of Chisinau. In fact, the Armenian community feels honored that there is a street here that marks their identity and claims that the Armenian Apostolic Church “Holy Mother of God” in Chisinau, together with the Armenian street, is the place where all Armenians belonging to this area and who left their homes are reunited.  And some curious moments will be described below:

1. Historical sources speak about the existence of two Armenian streets. The first one (unofficial) was on the right side of the Bîc river (the old part of the town). The second, which was established in the new part of the city in 1835, when the new urban plan of Chisinau was being finalised, can still be easily found today on the street map of the capital of the Republic of Moldova.

2. On 4 January 1817, describing the city of Chisinau, the English traveller William Mac-Michael wrote: “Among the strange crowd you could distinguish here (…) many Armenians, so numerous that they occupied a whole street. In the midst of the crowd (…) the carriage of an elegant and beautiful child, the daughter of the Armenian vicar, drove slowly along the narrow and sinful street (…) Such was the state of things … in the lower quarter of the bazaar (…)”.

3. The lack of official street names in the old part of the city was due to the fact that most of them were inhabited by ethnic groups, being named after their inhabitants, and looked more like ethnic neighbourhoods. Ștefan Ciobanu’s claim that Armenians in the early 20th century were “ethnic groups” is not true. The Armenians lived on their street in the early 19th century – leads us to conclude that this could only be the street “covered in dust in summer, mud in spring and autumn, and darkness at night”, on which the Armenian Church “St. Mother of God” was built, which was also called the Old Church.

4. The name ‘Old’ was later extended both to the church and to the street, which made the difference between the Armenian street in the old and the new part of the town, one longitudinal and the other transversal.

5. The beginning of the second Armenian street is linked to the transfer to Chisinau, after 1812, of the Armenian Archdiocese, established in 1809, by an ucaz of Tsar Alexander I, on the territory of the Principalities of Moldavia and Muntenia.

6. In 1813, for the Armenian Episcopal House in Chișinău, but also for the construction of parish houses, the governor of Basarabia assigned to the Armenian Archdiocese a territory with an area of about 25 thousand desetine of land (about 27 ha – n.n.), later included between the current streets bd. Stephen the Great and Holy, 31 August 1989, Tighina and Armenian Streets. The area of land made available constituted the “neighbourhood” occupied by the Armenian Archbishop Grigor Zakarian (1809-1828) in Chisinau. It was also called the Armenian Metropolitanate, and the archbishop had the status of metropolitan. According to the location project, the area of land given to the Archbishopric was called “Armenian courtyard” and was enclosed by a fence as the Russian denominations – Aрмянское подворье and Aрмянская ограда – tell us. The territory of the Archdiocese belonged to the monastery of Echmiadzin, the location of the Supreme Patriarch and All Armenian Catholic. The Bishop’s house inside the courtyard was located somewhere in the middle, now Bulgarian Street.

7. In 1813, the first project of the city began to be drawn up, entrusted by the civil governor of Basarabia, Scarlat Sturza, to the governmental architect Mihail Ozmidov. The works for the formation of Chișinău as the capital of the province of Basarabia lasted until August 9, 1834, when the final plan of the city, with an orthogonal street layout, different from the local tradition, was approved by Nicholas I. The streets were named in 1818, when A. N. Bahmetiev, the military governor of Podolia, made a sketch of the city with the location of the streets up to the present M. Kogalniceanu Street. The name was given to the Armenian street in the “upper part” of the town, which was named after the immediate location of the Armenian Archdiocese. Near it, in 1825, the New Square (today Central) was opened, with movable and quite beautiful commercial spaces for that period. It was here that all merchants in Chisinau were obliged to sell their goods, and they were forbidden to trade near their houses in the old part of the city. Attached to the position of their own shops, 2000 Armenian, Bulgarian, Greek and Jewish owners expressed their dissatisfaction in a letter of 18 July 1826 to the civil governor of Bessarabia, V. F. Tishkovsky. However, things did not change, and the old market gradually lost its significance, as did the “lower part” of the town.

8. In 1902, portions of the new and old Armenian Street were paved with granite brought from Podolia between 1888 and 1889. After the construction of the aqueduct by the engineer Haris on 15 December 1892, the Armenian street in the “upper part” of the town was supplied with water from the springs of the Great Fountain and the Artesian. Residents of the street who used the water had to pay for it. For example, those who drank up to 300 buckets of water a day were charged 25 kopecks, and those who drank more than 1,000 buckets a day only 12 kopecks. If the water was used for watering animals, only 1 kopeck per day was charged.

9. A report of 29 December 1921 stated that the ‘foul-smelling’ dirt ‘reaches below all limits’. Stefan Ciobanu himself, by stating that “the most beautiful part of the city starts from Armenească Street”, seems to draw a line in this direction, showing us the existence of two worlds.

10. On 29 February 1924, all the streets of Chisinau were renamed. The “upper” Armenian street was named the White Fortress, later in honour of Marshal Pietro Badoglio, and the “lower” one – Gh. Asachi. However, by inertia, both the population and the Romanian administration referred to them as Armenească and Veche Armenească. After June 28, 1940, the Soviet authorities restored the names of the streets existing until 1924. On 12 April 1941, when the city of Chisinau was divided into three urban districts: Stalinski, Krasnoarmeiski and Leninski, Armenian Street was part of the last one. That was also when the plan to rebuild Chisinau in Soviet style began to be implemented. As far as Armenian Street is concerned, after the decision of 7 December 1949, taken by the Soviet authorities regarding the nationalisation of building No. 47, i.e. the Armenian Diocesan House, there was nothing in this perimeter that reminded of the Armenian element once perpetuated in this territory. Today, with a length of 1.8 km, the Armenian street in Chisinau is one of the symbols that ‘tell’ not only the relationship between time and history, but also the history of the development of a socio-identity space in which the Armenian community was inscribed.

(From the work of Lidia PRISAC, PhD in history and
Ion Valer XENOFONTOV, PhD in History)

Central Cemetery (Armenian)

The Central Cemetery in Chisinau was founded in 1811. In 1818 the Church of All Saints was built on its territory.

Nowadays the cemetery is located in the triangle of Alexei Mateevici (former Sadovaia), Vasile Alecsandri (former Kotovski) and Panteleimon Halippa streets.

The only entrance/exit is from the street. A. Mateevici, and from its gate starts Armenian Street. That is why the cemetery is called Armenian Cemetery.

Today the Central Cemetery is the most honorable and official cemetery in the city. In the special places of the Central Cemetery within the limits of availability, at the proposal of some public institutions, the mayor general approves the distribution or concession of plots for the burial of outstanding personalities of the Republic of Moldova. The right to reserve plots in the Central Cemetery shall also be granted to the first-degree relatives of persons who have died and are buried there, on the basis of documents confirming the degree of kinship. Where appropriate, the burial of relatives in the same graves is allowed.

Here we find destined names, buried for eternity – Maria Biesu, Ion and Doina Aldea-Teodorovici, Grigore Vieru, Alexe Mateevici, Nicolae Sulac, Ion Vatamanu, Leonida Lari, Natalia Dadiani, Alexandru Plămădeală, Grigore Grigoriu, Timofei Moșneaga, Vladimir Herța, as well as other famous names of our glorious past …

The Chapel of the Resurrection of the Savior

The Chapel of the Resurrection of the Savior is an Armenian Apostolic place of worship and an architectural monument of national importance, listed in the Register of Historical and Cultural Monuments of Chișinău. Since 2025, it has also been a historical, artistic, and architectural monument of national importance included in the Register of State-Protected Monuments of the Republic of Moldova, together with the cemetery.

It is the chapel of the Armenian-Gregorian cemetery, built in 1916 by architect A. Hacikeanț. It is also a memorial building, with the tomb of B. Bogdasarov located under its western wing.

Modest in size, the chapel is decorated with decorative plastic elements that reduce its volume. The plan is cruciform, obtained by widening the square nave with narrow side projections. Through the side projections, a polygonal apse and a small porch to the west were added. The entire appearance of the building refers to the places of worship from the heyday of ecclesiastical architecture in the 12th-13th centuries in historical Armenia.

The Armenian cemetery contains funerary monuments dating from the 18th to 20th centuries, belonging to eminent historical figures.