Twenty-six kilometers east of the capital city of Yerevan stands the reconstructed pagan temple of Garni. The area around Garni has been settled since Neolithic times and archaeologists have found Urartian inscriptions dating back to the 8th century BC. Dedicated to Helios, the Roman god of the sun, the Garni temple was built by the Armenian King Trdates I in the 1st century AD (with funding from the Roman Emperor Nero in exchange for military support against the Parthian empire).
