Berdkunk fortress, also known as Spitak Berd (White Fortress) and Ishkhanats Berd (Princes' Fortress), is located in the settlement of Berdkunk, Gegharkunik province, on the shore of Lake Sevan. It is a multi-layered archaeological site.
Here there first existed a cyclopean fortress-settlement of the 2nd–1st millennia BC, on whose ruins a new fortress was built in the Middle Ages. The western fortification wall of the medieval fortress, with semicircular towers, has survived comparatively well. The surviving height of the southern tower reaches about 8 meters. In the eastern section, adjoining the lake, the foundations and walls of numerous structures have survived. Excavations in 2024 uncovered structures adjoining the wall, and study of the northern tower showed that it was hollow inside and probably also had an upper floor.
During the same excavations, 12th–14th-century iron arrowheads, oven-tonirs, and fragments of plain pottery were found. Based on current archaeological findings, the fortress's surviving medieval construction phase is linked especially to the 9th–13th centuries.
