This large settlement (plate Vc) is located 0.54km north of Sahakaberd fortress, 0.80km southeast of Gekhadzor village along the eastern road (map quad B3k/o).
Sk Settlement 1 sits atop a broad alluvial fan where three major mountain drainages spill onto the flatland of the Tsaghkahovit plain. The settlement has been encroached upon on the west by several agricultural fields and in the east by construction activities related to the adjacent military base. The latter work appears to have had a particularly devastating impact on the eastern flank of the site. The central area of the settlement appears to be in better, but precarious, condition. Some evidence of small pits was found and the standing architecture was much reduced between our initial recording of the site in 1998 and a subsequent follow-up visit in 2004. A narrow vehicle path runs east-west across the site.
With an estimated area of 30 hectares, Sk Settlement 1 is the third largest archaeological settlement in the Tsaghkahovit plain, behind Tsaghkahovit and Hnaberd fortresses, respectively. This now-abandoned village appears to have been built around free-standing buildings set irregularly along winding pathways (not much different from modern Gekhadzor or Hnaberd just to the west). The individual buildings range widely in size and appear to include as few as two and as many as eight distinct rooms. The walls in some places do stand above the ground surface, indicating construction using medium to large worked basalt and tuff blocks set in irregular, yet clearly definable courses. The exterior faces of the walls surround a core of dry rubble with no evidence of mortar. There were also no signs of other architectural devices for securing the walls, such as metal clamps.
Despite the size of the site and the evidence for some disturbance in the area, there were very few surface materials recovered from Sk Settlement 1. A small collection of 26 ceramics collected by intensive (5m interval) transect walking across the site, along with the condition and style of masonry, suggest that the primary occupation dates to the Medieval period. However, the materials were highly eroded and only 6 sherds (photo X) proved to be diagnostic. Thus, a more refined chronology must await excavations.
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