Temple in the village of Veliagali

In the village of Veli-Agaly, in the Qaranlig district of the Goycha district

Garanlig district–Martuni, Veli-Agali village – Since 03.01.1935 Dzoragyug

Architecture

The Albanian temple in the village of Veliagali has not been repaired because it is not an "Armenian monument." Currently, only one of the side walls of the temple remains in its current location, and it is presented as an "Armenian monument."

The ancient Albanian temple in the village of Veliagali is located in an ancient cemetery on a hilly area on the outskirts of the village. The temple was built in the 8th-9th centuries. Brown-colored square tuff stones were used in the construction of the temple. Since the temple was not an Armenian monument, it was destroyed by the Armenians, and its stones were used in the construction of houses. At present, one of the side walls of the temple, which was 5-6 meters high, has survived. The tombstones around it have also been destroyed.
The remains of the temple are a testament to the at least 1,500-year history of the construction of Veliagali by the Oghuz Turks.
The village where the temple is located is located 8 km northeast of the regional center, near Lake Goycha. It is marked on the 5-verst map of the Caucasus.
Until 1828, only Azerbaijanis lived here. After the Turkmenchay Treaty, Armenians who were resettled from Turkey in 1828–1829 were settled here.
Starting from that same year, the first group of Armenians brought from Turkey was settled in the village, and already in the documents of 1831, Veliagali was characterized as a mixed village. At that time, 184 Turks and 37 Armenians lived in the village. Since the settlement of Armenians was carried out with particular intensity over the next 60 years, in 1897 the demographic balance (in terms of the ethnic composition of the population) changed sharply in favor of Armenians: while the number of Turks decreased to 47 people, the number of Armenians increased and exceeded 300 people.
In 1918, Armenians committed another historical crime in the village of Veliaghali: on the direct order of Andronikos, the Armenians who had settled in Veliaghali brutally murdered all 63 people, the last representatives of the Turks, the original owners of the village, who had been their neighbors for 90 years.

The toponym Veliaga was formed by adding the suffix "-lı" to the personal name. It is an anthropotoponym. It is a structural toponym. The toponym also confirms the settlement of the village of Veliagaly by the Oghuz Turks.