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THE POLICY OF TURKIFICATION OF THE ARMENIAN TOPONYMS IN THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE AND THE REPUBLIC OF TURKEY – 2010-1

The decree issued by Enver Pasha, the Minister of War, January 5, 1916 

Summary

Lusineh S. Sahakyan
Toponyms represent linguistic characteristicsw with important historical and political significance. The Young Turk rulers in 1916 Ottoman Empire and those in the Republic of Turkey realized the strategic importance of the toponyms and persistently implemented policies of distortion and appropriation. With the aim of assimilating the toponyms of the newly conquered territories, the Ottoman authorities translated them into Turkish from their original languages or transformed the local dialectal place-names by way of distortion to make them sound like Turkish wordforms. Yet another method of appropriation was that of the etymological misinterpretation of the toponyms in question. A widespread method was also renaming the places and discarding the former place-names altogether. The focus of the present article is the place-name transformation policy of the Ottoman Empire as well as the Republic of Turkey; the Ottoman (Latin-transcript)-Armenian translation of the decree, dating January 5, 1916, issued by Enver Pasha, the Minister of War, is presented in this article for the first time in English, Armenian and Russian translations. It concerns the transformation of “non-Muslim” place-names. The article also deals with the artificial term of “Eastern Anatolia”that was coined to replace Western Armenia, the political objectives of the pro-Turkish circle, as well as the aftermath of putting the mentioned ersatz term into circulation.

THE MEMORY OF THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE IN VAHAGN DAVTYAN’S POETRY – 2010-1

Summary

Seyran Z.Grigoryan
The author of this article analyses works of Vahagn Davtyan that deal with the Armenian Genocide. He brings to light their historical and biographical background, artistic value, and relations to the poet’s time. The author uses Davtian’s poetic creations, as well as his memoirs, articles, and interviews to conclude that the poet’s creative works are important contributions to the legacy of the literary representations of the Armenian Genocide.

Vahagn Davtyan’s creative works with new motifs and interesting, specific solutions added to the poetic traditions created by Hovhannes Shiraz, Paruyr Sevak, Silva Kaputikyan and others.

THE PROBLEM OF CIVILIZATION HOMEOSTASIS IN GREAT ARMENIA – 2010-1

Part 2. The Extra-Social Civilization Homeostasis of Great Armenia: Tigran II.

Summary

Albert A. Stepanyan
The paper looks at the problems of extra-social homeostasis incorporated by the empire of Tigran the Great (80-60-s B.C.). Scholars define it as global civilization (Pax armenica) consisted of three basic elements. The first was Great Armenia, the core state. The second was “the visible empire” from Caucasian mountains to Egypt. The third represented “the charismatic empire” up to the borders of India.

The empie fell under pressure of Rome, and Great Armenia changed her status into the centre of the region “from Caucasus to North Mesopotamia”.The central issue of the metamorphosus the treaty of Artaxata has been detalized in the paper from the point of view of international right of the time.

THE QUESTION OF THE TURKEY’S INTERNATIONAL-LEGAL RESPONSIBILITY – 2010-1

(Conclusion and proposals)

Summary

Armen Ts. Marukyan
The Armenian Genocide is a historical reality awaiting today its internationalpolitical and international-legal resolution. Armenian historians have done a great job studying and presenting that crime of genocide committed against the Armenian people. Now it is high time to transfer the issue onto the international legal ground and, based on irrefutable facts, present well founded demands from the Republic of Turkey, the legal successor of the Ottoman Empire.

There are, of course, problems and complications of international-legal, as well as of political character involved; however, with the formulation of “a pan-Armenian conception concerning the elimination of the aftereffects of the Armenian Genocide,” it is possible to overcome these difficulties and achieve the restoration of the rights and interests of the Armenian people, and the elimination of the aftereffects of the Armenian Genocide.

ON THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF “HISTORY OF ARMENIA” BY MOVSES KHORENATSI: PROBLEMS OF EQUIVALENCE – 2009-3

Seda Q. Gasparyan, Luiza A. Gasparyan
The paper deals with the study of the English translation of “History of Armenia” by Movses Khorenatsi – a unique monument of the 5th century historical literature the adequate translation of which is of crucial importance as far as the interpretation of Armenian historical, national, cultural and linguistic identities are concerned at the international arena.

The object of our research is the English translation by R. W. Thomson. Its overall study has revealed cases of inadequate translation especially on the lexical level: inaccurate calques of lexical elements, phraseological units among them, obscure transpositions of stylistically connoted words, as well as cases of non-motivated transliteration of elements indicating historical realias.

The research has shown that “History of Armenia” being a real entity of Armenian national historical records is a masterpiece, presenting a skillful intertwinement of the historical, the scientific and the literary – a fact that should have been taken into consideration by the translator.

HISTORICAL SOURCES OF THE GARABAGIAN CAUSES – 2009-3

The legend of “late albains”

Henrik S. Svazyan
The state of «Azerbaijan» appeared on the historic arena only on 1918. During existence of the USSR the heirs of the Caucasian Tatars got artificial name «Azerbaijanin» on that «basis». As a result of the illegal decision (July 5, 1921) of the Caucasian Bureau RC(B)P, Mountainous Karabakh was forcibly annexed to Soviet Azerbaijan. It was a political pretext of treating the ancient and medieval history of the Great Armenia’s regions of Artsakh and Utik as a target for attacks by the «Azerbaijani» falsificators of history. As far as it had been impossible to find a «historic justification» for the annexation of the Armenian territories by comparison with Armenia and Armenian centuriesold history, thus the historians of Soviet Azerbaijan, following the «experience» of Cemalist Turkey, started to appropriate the history of proper Aluank and the Albanian tribes which disappeared from the historic arena after the 8th century.

After Azerbaijan became independent, notoriuos Azerbaijani falsificator F.Mamedova published a monography «Caucasian Albania and Albanians» (Baku, 2005, in Russian) where she continued and deepened this falsifying shrewdness. F.Mamedova, through absolute falsification of historic data, called the Armenian population of Utik and Artsakh, which ethnically had no relation to the Albanian tribes, by the artificial term «late Albanians» and tried to prolong the latter’s history up to 19th century. Such an approach is besically contrudictory not only to the data of the Armenian, but also Arabic (Ibn al-Asir, al-Dinavari, Yakubi, Tabari and others), Byzantine (Constantine Porphyrogenitus) and other sources.

TREASURES OF CILICIAN BOOK ILLUMINATION – 2009-3

The Illustrations of The Gospel No. 9422 of Mashtots Matenadaran

Satenik L. Chookaszian
The 13th century miniature of the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia is representing the most splendid period. The artistic phenomena that Toros Roslin brought to Armenian miniature were revealed in the oeuvre of his pupils and successors. This article is dedicated to the ornamentations of the Gospel No. 9422 of Mashtots Matenadaran. The manuscript was illustrated by the joint efforts of his successors. The manuscript’s story is not a simple one. The colophons have been lost but judging by the splendour of miniatures the donator was a rich person. The manuscript includes two canon tables of the Epistle of Eusebius to Carpianus, the ten canon tables concordance, four portraits of the Evangelists, corresponding title pages and six miniatures from Christ’s life.

Complex and graceful structure is typical for the miniatures of this manuscript. It is evident that they were painted by a mature artist. Any of the canon tables is a fine and wonderful work of art. The decoration of the canons reveals the scrupulous drafting of details, and we can see the artist’s amazing play of imagination in creation of the decorative texture. Stylized features of prophets, saints and the Virgin appear in the capitals and pedestals of canon columns. In the frontal decoration of canon tables we can see a combination of animal and human heads with twisted stalks, turning into a flowery ornament.

Undoubtedly, this wonderful manuscript is one of the masterpieces of Cilician miniature of the post-Roslin period, and illustration of the Gospel No 9422 is one of the splendid pages of Armenian medieval art.

ARARAT AND ANI IN THE IDEOLOGICAL SPHERES OF ABOVYAN – 2009-3

Summary

Vardan G. Devrikyan
In 1829 the ascent to summit of Mount Ararat with Professor Parrot had a radical impact upon the national-public and literary thinking of Khachatur Abovyan, because since the medieval times there had been a traditional prohibition of the ascent to summit of Mount Ararat upon which rested Noah’s Ark.

Similarly, since the Middle Ages Ani had been considered to be destroyed because of the curse and there was a superstition that it was impossible to live in Ani. Contrary to such a mood Abovyan in “The Wounds of Armenia” settled his principal hero Aghasi together with his friends in Ani putting forward the restoration plan of Ani as the Armenian statehood.

The article deals with the national-political and spiritual-cultural role attributed by Abovyan to Ani. This plan of Abovyan is considered parallel to the works and expressed ideas in the Armenian literature and public thought in his time and during next decades.

THE PROBLEM OF CIVILIZATION HOMEOSTASIS IN GREAT ARMENIA – 2009-3

Part 1. The Intracommunal Homeostasis. Artaxias I

Summary

Albert A. Stepanyan
The paper looks at the civilizational interpretation of one of the crucial epoques of ancient Armenia. It begins with a brief survey of the term “civilization” in modern humanities. Among the main features of this approach the homeostasis has been taken into consideration.

Two varieties of homeostasis are basic for my discussion – intra/ and extra-social. The first of them made the meaning of reforms of Artaxias I – the founder of the Artaxiad dynasty in Armenia. They embraced a large scope of social stratum including cadastre and administrative system, trade and religious beliefs, culture and army etc. All of them looked at the end of rationalization of social stratum of Great Armenia by overpowering traditional (tribal and dynastic) structures. King Artaxias was successful in his innovation program. Owing to them Armenia could keep step with the developed states of the time.