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Khachkars in Dhaka – Armenian Graves in the subcontinent

Mr Syed Faizan Raza, a BACSA Area Representative and longstanding contributor to Chowkidar, has sent us an interesting report about the Armenian Church and cemetery in Dhaka, Bangladesh:

‘The Armenian Church (1781) along with its cemetery in Dhaka is a well-maintained structure. The recent photographs provided by a friend have come as a pleasant surprise to me. The inscriptions and the figurines engraved on the graves are readable. Some of the graves have inscriptions in the Armenian script while the others bear bilingual ones in Armenian and English scripts’.

‘The prominent graves include that of Senekerim T. M. Highcazony, born in Alexandrapole in Russo-Armenia and died in Dhaka on 12th June 1897, aged 51 years; his wife Catherine S. T. M. Highcazony, died in Dhaka on 30th June 1897; and Catchick Avietick Thomas, who died on 24th September 1877, aged 56 years. One of the monuments here displays a fine specimen of Khachkar (Cross-stone) which is an Armenian art for the memorial stones’.

Armenian Church, Dhaka

Armenian Apostolic Church of the Holy Resurrection, Dhaka
(Photo: Hasan Nahiyan Nobel, 2019)

Situated in the Armanitola area of Old Dhaka, the Armenian Apostolic Church of the Holy Resurrection was built in 1781, when the thriving Armenian community included jute, leather and silk traders drawn towards the booming textile centre of Dhaka.

Part of a widespread mercantile network, they maintained links with Armenian communities in Surat, Bombay, Hyderabad, Chinsurah, Calcutta, Canton, Jakarta, Lhasa and Singapore.

10 Jan 2025: Christmas Mass, celebrated by Rev Adhikari and Brother Guillaume
(Photo: www.armenianchurchbangladesh.com)

The well-maintained, white and yellow-trimmed church building is 75’ long, and can accommodate about 80 people in the main hall and around 30 on the upstairs balcony.

Services are not currently held at the church on a regular basis, but are organized, and usually open to all, on special occasions such as Christmas and Easter.

16 May 2024: Free Medical Camp (held in conjunction with St Paul Coptic Medical Service, an Egyptian NGO)
(Photo: www.armenianchurchbangladesh.com)

In addition to providing a focus for research into the history of Armenians in Dhaka, the church members are active in the local community, running a food assistance programme and hosting ‘free medical camp’ days.

The well-maintained graveyard surrounding the church contains about 300 burials. Some of the gravestone inscriptions are in Armenian, some in English; others in a mixture of the two.

Tomb of Mr Catchik Avietick Thomas, 1877
(Photo: Mr Mahdi Chowdhury)

One particularly striking grave is that of Catchick Avietick Thomas, who died on 24th September 1877, aged 56 years. Deeply mourned, and described as the ‘best of husbands’ by his fond wife Vardine (also known as Diana), Thomas, one of the earliest Armenian jute merchants in Dhaka, became a ‘shellac and lac-dye manufacturer’.

On 12 June 1897 the ‘Great Indian earthquake’ (magnitude: 8.5; epicentre: Shillong Plateau), wreaked havoc with several buildings in Dhaka, where the Englishman’s Overland Mail reported that ‘Half the old tower of the Armenian Church, from top to bottom, has come down’.

The church, after the earthquake
(www.armenianchurchbangladesh.com)

In his comprehensive (but sadly not indexed) 1937 book ‘Armenians in India from the earliest times to the present day’, Mesrovb Jacob Seth mentions that Mr Senecherim Highcazony, a jute merchant, and his wife Catherine, both of whom came from Alexandrapole, ‘lost their lives under tragic circumstances’ caused by the earthquake, and are buried in the churchyard.

Seth’s chapter on the Armenian community at Dhaka also mentions the grave of William Harney, ‘an Indian Mutiny veteran’, who found ‘a last resting place in that ancient cemetery’. According to the inscription on his tombstone, William was born in Belfast, Ireland, on 23rd March 1830; married an Armenian woman, and died at Dhaka on 16th July 1901. The memorial was erected by his granddaughter Zenobia, the ‘wife of Mr V T Stephen of Dacca’.

Khachkar tombstone
(Photo: Mr Mahdi Chowdhury)

Some gravestones incorporate Armenian features, such as a khachkar (‘խաչքար’, lit. ‘Cross-stone’), traditionally carved out of local stone with a chisel, die, sharp pens and hammers.

Inscribed on the Unesco Cultural Heritage List in 2010, khachkars, which are individually designed, are generally around 1.5m high, and feature an ornamentally carved cross with flared arms, resting on the symbol of a sun or wheel of eternity, with a border of carvings of saints, animals and vegetative-geometric motifs.

Ed. Notes:

Grave of Mr Hovhannes Stepannosean

The inscription on another gravestone reads:‘Dedicated to the memory of Mister Hovhannes Stepannosean, who passed away from this life on 11 February 1843 at the age of 53 years. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be renewed’.

Mr Stepannosean (whose family name was later anglicised to Stephen) had originally left New Julfa, the Armenian quarter in Isfahan, for Calcutta. He then moved north to Dhaka, where he married his second wife, Sultana Athanes at the Greek church in 1838. He died about five years later, and was buried in the Armenian Cemetery at Dhaka. For more details about his life, and family, see Chowkidar Vol 13 No. 2, Autumn 2012, p.30.

Armenian Cemeteries in India

Liz Chater, the Dhaka Armenian Church’s ‘Heritage, Press and Social Media Manager’, has spent over 20 years researching the history of Armenian communities throughout the subcontinent. Her work includes photographing, transcribing and translating Armenian epitaphs in India:

‘Probably the biggest ongoing project I have is the translation and transcription of Armenian graves and tombstones in India. Over the years I have photographed all the tombstones in the major Armenian cemeteries and church compounds.

In Kolkata Armenians are buried in Holy Nazareth Armenian Church, St Gregory’s Church, Armenian Church, Tangra. A handful of graves exist in Tollygunge Cemetery, and in the Lower Circular Road Cemetery. There are Armenian Cemeteries at Agra, Chinsurah, Saidabad, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Chennai, Surat, Gwalior and Nawar. A few stones still exist in Delhi, Ranchi, Asansol and Yangon, and of course there are a couple of hundred tombstones in the Armenian Church compound in Dhaka’.

For further information about Liz’s research, see the ‘Meet the Team’ page on the Dhaka Armenian Church’s website (‘www.armenianchurchbangladesh.com’)

Armenian Church, Chinsurah

For a brief report on the Armenian church at Chinsurah, which was built in 1695, see Chowkidar Vol 4 No. 4, Autumn 1986, p.60.

Syed Faizan Raza (BACSA Area Representative for Bihar and Jharkhand) and Rachel Magowan

(Suggestions for BACSA website news items are always welcome – please send them to ‘comms@bacsa.org.uk’.)