An Armenian sundial

The photograph shows a round stone slab: in its upper half a cross and an Armenian inscription are carved, and in its lower half a sundial with lines radiating from the centre and round marks. Armenian letters are carved along the edges.

The sundial is an ancient scientific instrument. According to the source, more than several thousand sundials have survived in present-day Armenia, the oldest of them with a history of three millennia. In medieval Armenia they were placed on the southern walls of monasteries. A distinctive feature of Armenian sundials was that the units of time were marked not with numerals but with letters of the Armenian alphabet. Today they are still depicted on church walls, khachkars and doors.