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THE ARMENIAD.
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  In 1621, the Italian explorer Pietro della Valle crossed Mesopotamia and reached Persia. To the South-East of the town of Shiraz, Pietro saw vast ruins, of which he had never heard. Filled with curiosity, he wandered through the ruins and inspected the bas-reliefs, portals and broken capitals. The strange characters...

The Armenian tribute-bearers. Persepolis.  6th – 5th centuries B.C.
 
  Pietro della Valle brought back to Italy the first copies of the characters which he had copied from Persepolis. He presented several clay tablets, showing the same cuneiform characters to one of the Roman museums. However, there was no-one in all Europe at that time, who could read these characters…



Statue of a bull’s head on the gates in Persepolis.  5th century B.C.
 
  At the beginning of the 19th Century, when archaeologists had yet to set their shovels to the sandy hills of Mesopotamia, which were still hiding the ruins of ancient civilizations, the French scholar Jean-Antoine St. Martin began to show an interest in the history of Khorenatsi, which told of the war between Armenia and Assyria and the construction of a city on the shores of Lake Van by Queen Semiramis
Acropolis of Van. 10th – 9th centuries B.C.
                            

 
  Captivated by the description in Khorenatsi's work of the ancient civilization at Van, St. Martin persuaded the French government to send a scientific expedition to Armenia and to invite a young German professor, Friedrich Eduard Schultz, to take part in it. In 1827, after a long journey over the Armenian highlands, Schultz arrived at the city of Van...

A gryphon. Bronze statuette. Van kingdom, 8th – 7th centuries B.C.
 
  On 3rd December, 1872, George Smith gave a public lecture on his discovery and became famous overnight. His announcement caused a complete sensation. God-fearing Britain discovered that there was a story of the Flood which was older than the Bible itself...


Layard's excavations on Mount Nimrud.  Sketch. 
 
  In the Akhdznik province of Greater Armenia, not far from Diarbakyr (in modern-day Turkey), the campaign of Naram-Sin in the 3rd Millennium B.C. against the King of Armani is depicted on a cliff-face. This relief bears witness to the fact that Naram-Sin travelled to the Southern regions of Greater Armenia, engaged in fighting there and mentioned the name of this country in his inscription, “the conqueror of Armani”… Naram-Sin’s inscriptions are one of the most ancient records of the existence of Armenia (“Armani”) in the 3rd Millennium B.C. 

Bronze head of Sargon I of Akkadia (2316 - 2261 B.C.), the grandfather of Naram-Sin, found in the ruins of the temple of Ishtar in Nineveh.
 
 
  In 1931, the Swiss Hittologist, Emile Forrer, published a short work entitled “Hayasa-Azzi” in Leipzig. In this work, Forrer turned the attention of historians to the data in the Hittite archives, which led him to the ineluctable conclusion that along with the Hittite Empire in Asia Minor in the 2nd Millennium B.C., there was also a second forgotten great kingdom, that of Hayasa-Azzi...

Hittite reliefs from Karkemish.  9th century B.C. 
 
  However, for 20 centuries, the word “Babylon” was just a name and a symbol of a vague legend, whose roots go back to the time of the Biblical prophet Jeremiah (6th Century B.C.)... One of the cuneiform tablets, found in Mesopotamia by archaeologists, sheds light on the later history of the tower...

The Tower of Babel. Painting by artist Peter Breughel the Elder.
 
  In 311 B.C. when the Achaemenid Empire was defeated in the battle of Gavgameli, the troops of Alexander the Great approached Babylon. The Babylonians met them with garlands of flowers and silver altars, burning incense...


Statue of Alexander the Great.  3rd century B.C. copy of a sculpture made in the 4th century B.C. by Lisippus.   
 
  In approximately 162 B.C., Commagene, to which representatives of the Armenian dynasty of the Eruandids had returned also obtained its independence . Antiochus’ temple on Mount Nimrud is an important historical monument, which proves the existence of the Eruandids as an actual dynasty, which ruled Armenia after the ancient Hayasa and Van kings, up to the Arsacid dynasty...


Stone head of King Antiochus on the Mount Nimrud. 1st century B.C.
 
  In the 2nd Century B.C., the Greek Empire was defeated by the Romans. Miletus was destroyed, Carthage razed to the ground and Hannibal, the scourge of ancient Rome, fled to Greater Armenia. The war-like Roman Empire posed a huge threat for all the states of Asia Minor: Pergamum, Pontus, Cappadocia, Lesser Armenia, Greater Armenia, Commagene...


Ruins of the temple of Trajan in Pergamum.
 
  Soon Artashat, lying at the foot of the magnificent Mount Ararat, amongst the pastures and wines of the fertile valley, became an important trading centre on the caravan route, linking East and West. Strabo wrote: “These are the cities of Armenia: Artaxata, which is also called Artaxiasata, which was founded by Hannibal for King Artaxias, and also Arxata; both cities lie on the Araxes...”

A coin of the Armenian King Artavazd  II (54 - 34 B.C.)  
 
  Taking into account details given in the writings of Strabo, Tacitus and Pliny, the German scientists came to the conclusion that what lay before them were the ruins of Tigranakert, the ancient Armenian capital, built in the 1st Century B.C., by King Tigran the Great (95–55 B.C.)…

A coin of the Armenian King Tigran II the Great (95 - 55 B.C.). 
 
  In starting construction on Tigranakert, Tigran the Great intended to create a new political centre and thereby bring order to the management of his nation, which at that time stretched from the Caspian to the Mediterranean and from the mountains of Media to the Cilician Taurus Mountains...

Detail of the fortress wall of the citadel of Tigranakert. 1st century B.C. 

Cicero, who would be beheaded 25 years later by Mark Antony for his love of the Roman Empire, evidently thought it more sensible to “pass over” what he knew about this disgrace to the Roman army. In fact, the tactics chosen by Tigran and his father-in-law Mithridates led to the Roman legions, exhausted by extended campaigns, weighed down by large numbers of wounded and short of supplies simply rising up in revolt and turning back.
 
  The famous German historian Theodor Mommsen, author of “The History of Ancient Rome”, calls King of Pontus Mithridates “a sly and immoral, low-born son of the East.” However, the Romans – Mithridates’ enemies – clearly thought differently. The Roman historian Marcus Justinus states that Mithridates was a great ruler and that his greatness outshone all the other kings of his time. The King of Pontus was not only a great military commander, as Cicero bears witness to, but also a remarkably multi-faceted and talented man...

A coin of the Pontian King Mithridates VI Eupator (111 - 63 B.C.).  Silver.  1st century B.C.   
 
  Pompey, who was not only a general, but the largest usurer in ancient Rome, having plundered the kingdom of Pontus and Tigran’s nation, was himself defeated in 48 B.C. in a power struggle which arose between him and Caesar. Pompey fled to Egypt with his family where in his 59th year he was treacherously killed by the servants of King Ptolemy. Plutarch writes…

Ruins of the fortress wall of Sinope, the capital of the Pontian kingdom.  5th - 2nd centuries B.C. 
 

 		   The Parthian cavalry formed a ring around the Roman legions, who had regrouped into a square, and hailed arrows down upon them. As he was incurring huge losses, Crassus ordered his son Publius to attack the enemy. The Parthians started to retreat hurriedly under the Roman attack, but as soon as Publius’ cohort was separated from the main force, Suren’s cavalry turned around and surrounded the Romans...

A tetradrachma with the image of the Parthian King Mithridates II (123 - 88 B.C.).  Silver. 
 
  In 62 A.D. military action resumed in Armenia and during the battle at the River Aratsani (close to modern-day Kharberd) the enemy, according to Tacitus, “overthrew the Roman cavalry, crushed the legionaries”... The Armenians marked their victory by imposing on the Roman army the greatest military humiliation. They constructed a “hill from the weapons and bodies of the slain” and the “invincible” Roman legions who had laid down their arms, were force to bend over and walk under an archway of spears...

Ruins of Hatra.  1st century B.C. Iraq. The fortress city of Hatra defended the Southern borders of the state of Tigran the Great during the period of its greatest power (93 - 66 B.C.)
 

 		  
In 63 A.D. on the very spot where in the previous year the forces of Roman Empire had met with this humiliating defeat, a peace treaty was signed, according to which all Roman soldiers were to leave Armenia and King Trdat I agreed to go to Rome to accept a wreath from the hands of the ancient Rome Emperor Nero...

The pagan temple of Garni. 1st century B.C. 
  From Edessa, the apostle Thaddeus’ travels took him to Greater Armenia...

The Armenian Monastery of the Apostle Thaddeus.  4th - 14th centuries.  Eastern Armenia (now Iran). 
 
  The Holy See of Etchmiadzin is the historical centre of the Armenian Apostolic Church. It is surrounded by high fortress walls and resembles an ancient citadel, whose stones date back to the end of the Roman Empire...

The Cathedral Church of Holy Etchmiadzin. 4th centuary,  Armenia

  The majestic ruins of Ani lie in the historical Armenian region of Shirak on a triangular mountain plateau formed at the confluence of the rivers Ani and Akhurean...

The Smbat walls.  10th century.  Ani, Western Armenia
 
  The Church in Aghtamar is particularly significant for its reliefs, which cover the external walls. They cover all the façades of the church and include a wide range of subjects: Biblical scenes, figures of leaders from the Artsruni family, fantastical animals and ornament...
 
Reliefs on the South wall of the Aghtamar Church of the Holy Cross, showing the saints, a winged lion, a mythical bird and an eagle attacking a partridge. 10th century, Western Armenia
 
  On leaving the Cathedral of Hagia Sophia, restored by the Armenian architect Trdat and decorated with mosaics depicting the Byzantine rulers of Armenian descent (Leo VI, Alexander I, Zoë, Constantine Monomachus and John II Comnenus), visitors go out through the bronze doors…


The Virgin with the baby Jesus, accepting the gifts of the two Emperors of Byzantium.  10th century mosaic over the imperial entrance to the Cathedral of Hagia Sophia.
 
  The foundation of the new Armenian kingdom coincided with the time of the First Crusade (1096–1099)... Four hundred and eighty years would pass before Pope Gregory XIII, in assessing the role which the Cilician Armenians had played in the Crusades would say: “I would particularly like to note that in the past, when Christian princes came with their armies to win back the Holy Land, no other nation, no other people did so much to help them and so readily as did the Armenians"...

The acropolis of Anazarba is graced with the magnificent three-storey castle of the Armenian kings.  
 
  In 1187, in the Battle of Hattin, between Nazareth and the Sea of Tiberias, the Sultan Saladin crushed the Crusader armies in Palestine. The King of Jerusalem, Guy Lusignan, Gerard de Ridford, the Grand Master of the Templars, the Constable Amaury Lusignan and many noble barons fell into the Muslims’ hands. The Sultan preserved the lives of the majority of captives, including the King and the Grand Master. However, nearly 200 Templars were killed on his orders and with his own sword, Saladin personally cut of the head the Frankish Baron Renaud de Chatigny, who was famous for robbing the trading caravans...

The battle of Prince Levon II with the armies of the Sultan of Egypt Salah ad-Din.  Carved wood.  19th Century. 
  The leader of the Crusaders, the German Emperor Friedrich I, who was nicknamed Barba Rossa ('Red Beard' in Italian), saw himself as the heir of the Roman Emperors and nursed plans to conquer all the Eastern provinces which had once been taken by the slave-state of Rome. In 1190, Barba Rossa broke down the military might of the Seljuk Sultan of Iconium and approached the "Cilician Gates", the pass through the Taurus Mountains which led to the heart of Cilician Armenia…

The Cilician gates in the Taurus Mountains formed one of the historical routes of all times.  This mountainous, steep corridor was described by Heroditus and Xenophon.  The first Crusaders passed through this pass on their way to Tarsus, under the leadership of Baldwin and Tancred.
 
  In 1204, during the Fourth Crusade, by a mistake which some Western historians have called "crusading", the European barons and princes, having sworn to "free the Holy Sepulchre from the Saracens", stormed not Jerusalem but Constantinople, the capital of Christian Byzantium...  Nicetas Choniates, an eye-witness to the events, describing the taking of Constantinople by the Crusaders states that from the Cathedral of Santa Sophia they took "all the holy vessels, items of the finest art... 

Mosaics from the Great Imperial Palace in Constantinople.
 
 
  The English architectural historians, R. Fredden and J. Thomson in their work "The Crusader Castles", published in London in 1957, wrote: "During the times of the Crusaders, the most accomplished military architects of the Levant [the Levant being the whole of Western Asia, Greece and Egypt] were the Armenians. It can be stated that their buildings and arts were one of the reasons why the military architecture of the Levant was the leading architecture of its time"...

The fortress of Tumlu.  13th century,  Western Armenia.
 
  "You have already been informed that on Djemiet’s orders it was decided utterly to destroy the Armenians living in Turkey. Those who refuse to comply with this decision may not continue to work in official positions. However harsh the measures employed, an end must be put to the existence of the Armenians. Pay no attention to women, children, or invalids nor to any pangs of conscience you may experience."

Sunset on Lake Van, Western Armenia.

 



 		   This secret order from the Turkish Minister of the Interior, Talaat, sent on 15th September, 1915 to the prefecture of Aleppo is one of the original documents witnessing to the Genocide of the Armenian people in the Ottoman Empire (1915–1923). Talaat's order was published in Heinrich Vierbücher's book "Armenia, 1915", published in Germany in 1930...
"...The reader has only to look at this map: it shows how the "Five Great Nations" have deceived the hopes of the Armenian people. After the peace accord of Sevres, the Armenians should have received a sovereign state, a homeland, which would have included the cities of Yerevan, Alexandropol, Kars, Erzerum, Van, Bitlis, Mush, Diarbekir and also the port city of Trapezund, giving them access to the Black Sea. But that did not happen. Instead of a wide-ranging autonomous state, the politicians of the Entente promised the Armenians "a place of residence" in Upper Armenia or in Cilicia. But the conference in Lausanne (1923) refused to decide the fate of the long-suffering Armenian people and left it to "the goodwill of Turkey". To this day 700,000 robbed people travel the world, having lost their nearest and dearest, not counting more than 100,000 Armenian orphans. Of the area marked out with a thick line and promised to the Armenians at Sevres, all that has actually been given to them is a small area around Yerevan in the North-Eastern part of Armenia. Thus the Armenian people was deceived and left in isolation..."

The Apostles Thaddeus and Bartholomew. Reliefs from the eastern wall of the Aghtamar Church of the Holy Cross. 10th century.
Church of St. Gregory, built in Ani by Prince Tigran Onents
 

 		   Several months have already passed since my wife and I set off on our journey through the towns and villages of Western Armenia, in order to get to know more about that part of ancient Armenia about which we had read and heard so much, which we had come to love, but had never actually seen. We had visited many ancient Armenian centres, but we longed to see the famous Armenian monastery of Surb Arakelots (the Holy Apostles) in Mush….

The small church of the Monastery of the Holy Apostles of Mush, 8th - 14th centuries.  Western Armenia.

 
  Six thousand years ago, to the East of the Euphrates on a mountain plateau, a race of people appeared, who knew how to tame wild horses, found ore hidden in the soil of the mountains, unclosed the secret of processing metals, developed a plough with metal ploughshares, made chariots and learned the most important of the branches of knowledge – the science of letters and numbers. Having discovered the art of architecture, this people built temples to their majestic gods on the tops of mountains and began to look into the depths of the heavens from the steps of their temple observatories...

Ziggurat observatory.  4th - 3rd Millennia B.C.  Metsamor, Armenia.  In 1963, Armenian archaeologists uncovered the ruins of a city in the Ararat valley.  Some of the buildings dated back to the 4th - 3rd Millennia B.C.  The oldest metal foundries in the Near East, dating back to the 3rd - 2nd Millennia B.C. were unearthed in the citadel of the city
  

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Tuesday, May 09, 2006     History of Armenia Copyright © 2005 Linguist Publishers