creative zeal, which neither the countless disasters brought by foreign invaders, nor the difficult and torturous migration routes were able to extinguish. With its originality, mastery of performance, extraordinary color, richness and variety of jewelry, it occupies a unique and honorable place not only in the treasury of national art, but also in the world art. The Gospels were the most illustrated, followed by the Bible and other religious collections. The first miniatures that have reached us are samples of the 6th-7th centuries. The types of characters and painting in them are reminiscent of the frescoes of Lmbat and Aruch from the 7th century. The "Gospel of Queen Mlke", "The Gospel of Kars", "The Gospel of Trabzon" have survived from the period of the kingdoms of Bagratuni and Artsruni. These manuscripts contain the main features of the further development of Armenian miniature painting: • columnar tabernacles, • gold leaflets with capital letters, • Lord's pictures, that is the events of Christ's life, which are mentioned in the church holidays, • miniatures attached to the text. An organic combination of Byzantine and all-Christian art can be found in them, in the depictions of arches of the tabernacles of the "Gospel of Queen Mlke", Egyptian motifs, architectural decor of evangelical paintings, and elements of Hellenistic art. Larger miniatures of the Gospels of Lesser Armenia related to Early Christian miniature art in 1038 (Matenadaran after Mesrop Mashtots, Yerevan, manuscript N 6201), preserving old stylistic and pictorial rules, contain novelties that formed the basis of all subsequent Armenian iconography, for example, the depiction of the naked Christ on the cross. The graphic development of the style of the group of manuscripts is obvious in Vaspurakan School of Miniature Painting. A group of manuscripts from the late 11th century, led by the Gospel of Moghni, formed the school of Ani the stylistic forms of which bear similarities with the pre-Gothic miniatures, which show the eastern origins of the latter. The miniatures of that group stand out in the monumental-fresco style. In the manuscripts of the 12th century, the traditions of miniature art of the 10th-11th centuries were developed, endowed with tragic-emotional accents, and a great importance was paid to plant-animal motifs. In the first half of the 13th century, before the Mongol invasions, miniature painting flourished in Greater Armenia ("Gospel of Haghpat", "Gospel of Translators"). Miniature painting received an unprecedented new quality in Cilician Armenia.