As is known, the oldest information about the Armenians was borrowed by Horenatsi from Mar Aba Katina. It is possible that Mar Aba Katina drew his information about the Armenians and their eponyms—Aramaneak, Aramais, Aram, Haik, etc.—from the writings of Berossus, as well as from oral traditions.
In any case, we read in M. Horenatsi: “By whose name (i.e., Aram), all nations call our country, like the Greeks call it ‘Armen’, and the Persians and Syrians call it ‘Armenik-k'” (Horenatsi M., Book 1, Chapter 12). Horenatsi speaks at length about Aram, attributing numerous deeds to him, which he performed in the name of his people and homeland.
However, it is known that Aram is considered the ancestor not only by Armenians but also by the seemingly vanished Aramean people. From this name Aram, the ethnic term “Arama” or “Arameans” is derived, which is, of course, clearly personified.
The Aramaic language was spoken by the inhabitants of the Middle East and Mesopotamia. In this language, as is known, several books of the Bible are written (from the Old Testament—Daniel, Nehemiah, Ezra, and several books of the New Testament).
Could Berossus or Mar Aba Katina have meant Arameans when speaking of Armenians, and passed their history on to M. Horenatsi? After all, in certain historical periods, Armenians did not distinguish themselves from Arameans, even though Arameans are seemingly Semites, while Armenians identify themselves as an Indo-European people.
So, whose history are we continuing—Armenians, the first mentions of whom date back to the 34th-33rd century BCE (see the articles here about the earliest mention of the country Armana), or the Arameans, whose appearance in history is dated to the 12th century BCE and is associated with Aram?
Or, did Semitic Arameans never exist, nor did the Semites themselves? Are Arameans the same as Armenians, who lived in Syria, speaking one of the dialects of the Armenian language?
According to the historian Koriun and historian Drasxanakertci, the Armenian people are called “Ashkenazeans,” i.e., from the lineage of Ashkenaz. It has been established by experts that the name Ashkenaz is a response to the Cimmerian invasions when Ashkenazi tribes appeared in Armenia and then settled in the Armenian Highlands. This implies that all modern Ashkenazim could also be considered Armenians. Or were considered Armenians at that time. But they are in no way Semites. So, where are the Semites?
Let’s Elaborate Our Hypothesis on the Misleading Term “Semitic-Arameans,” Basing It on Facts Borrowed from N. Mkrtchyan’s Book “Semitic Languages and Armenian,” Yerevan, 2005.
This book is an example of commissioned falsification of the true state of affairs. The facts presented by the author point to one thing, but the author insistently argues the opposite of what can be inferred from these facts.
Many such books were produced during Soviet times, when scholars were forced to downplay their Armenian dignity under the pressure of official ideology. But, having been published in 2005, it should be considered as an example of betrayal of national history.
Khorenatsi pays a lot of attention to Aram, glorifying his name and calling Armenians the sons of Aram. It’s not by chance that Aram, Khorenatsi’s beloved epic hero, appears in the epic tales of the gusans not only as the leader of the Armenian people but also as an eponym. Therefore, the epithet “Aramaznean” (= from the lineage of Aram) becomes synonymous with the epithet “Haikaznean” (= from the lineage of Haik). When defining the Armenian ethnos, M. Horenatsi uses both of these epithets.
Aram is also a generalized image of the Arameans in the epic tales of the gusans. However, in modern literature, the name Aram typically refers to the Aramean tribes, who, it is believed, played a significant role in the formation of the Armenian people and their language. Furthermore, it is believed that the Arameans are Semites. How could it be that Aram, a descendant of Haik, suddenly becomes a Semite?
It is absurd, as pointed out by N. Mkrtchyan (p.66), to justify his thesis about the Semitic origin of the Aramean language, that all characters in the epic tales (including the medieval epic “David of Sasun”) have Semitic names, or their names contain Semitic components. That is, either the Armenians had no culture of their own, or they were all Semites!
But from our previous articles, the opposite conclusion is clear: that all the so-called Semites are those who believed in Moses, who were either representatives of Armenian tribes living in Palestine before the Hyksos invasion, or the Hyksos themselves along with the related tribe of Abraham.
Therefore, attributing Semitic names to Armenian characters is an inversion of real history. If today in the Russian language we find words of Armenian origin, should we then declare that Russian tribes once lived in the Armenian Highlands, and their language became an integral part of the Armenian language? This is what so-called Russian “historians” do today. But why does N. Mkrtchyan follow such logic?
Let’s consider the distribution area of the pseudo-Arameans.
According to cuneiform sources, Aramean tribes (aramaia) spread across northern Mesopotamia and the Armenian Highlands around the middle of the 14th century BCE. One of the Aramean tribes, Ahlamu, settled firmly in the region south of Alalakh.
The Ahlamu tribes, along with the Sutu and Yauri tribes, formed an alliance to fight against the Assyrian king Arikdenlu (1307-1296 BCE). These tribes, by the end of the 14th century BCE, lived on the southwestern borders of the Armenian Highlands, in Kadmuhi, according to the annals of Ashshur-bel-kala – in one of the cities of the land of Shubri in the region of the Sasun Mountains.
Apparently, the appearance of so-called Semitic toponyms in the basin of the Euphrates, Aracani, and Tigris rivers begins around this time, although the appearance of Semitic toponyms in this region of the Armenian Highlands could have occurred earlier, even during the Akkadian factories. By the early 12th century BCE, the Hittite state exits the political scene, and the decline of the Assyrian state also begins.
The area occupied by the Arameans seems to fall out of their oversight: a political vacuum forms between Assyria and Carchemish. According to the texts of Tiglath-Pileser I (1115-1077) and his successors, as well as Babylonian texts from the 12th century, it can be assumed that the Arameans (aramia) have firmly surrounded Assyria on three sides.
Their penetration occurs not by military force, but by peaceful infiltration. They lived in the steppes of Syria, southwest of the middle course of the Euphrates.
In subsequent centuries, Arameans are mentioned as having their own land, with the determinative KUR “land” or beyt “house.” For example, Ashshurdan II (in 934-932) mentions KUR Aramu, Ashshur-bel-kala mentions KUR Agate, and the Urartian king Sarduri (755-730) mentions Arime.
But all these territories are densely populated by Armenians. Toponyms, hydronyms, names of localities are irrefutable evidence of the people living in these areas, who have given the surrounding world names in their own language.
Moreover, this very region is related to migration routes connecting the Armenian Highlands and Egypt. Let’s remember the difficult situation the Hyksos found themselves in, who would have had to cross Assyrian territory to return to their homeland.
In the Bible, the land of the Arameans (i.e., Aram) extended from the Arabian deserts to the Taurian mountains in the north. The former territory of the Mitanni state is referred to in the Bible as Aram Naharaim, referring to the land along the middle course of the Euphrates River. (Incidentally, a possible translation from Armenian: “Aram was the first to occupy this place”).
“During the 6th-7th centuries BCE, Assyrian kings, having conquered all of Western Asia, pursued a policy of forced resettlement of subjugated peoples with the aim to repopulate areas of Mesopotamia and the western slopes of the Iranian mountains that had been devastated by their predecessors, as well as to hinder mutual understanding among their subjects and thereby prevent rebellions.
The result was the widespread use of Aramaic as a second spoken language (lingua franca) throughout Western Asia. Already from the end of the 8th – beginning of the 7th centuries BCE, Old Aramaic began to be used in the Assyrian chancelleries themselves” (Dyakonov, JAWA).
From this quote by Dyakonov, it follows that Armenians were so widespread throughout Western Asia that the surrounding population was compelled to adopt the language of the majority even in their official correspondence.
If there existed some separate tribe of Arameans, then given the identical living areas, they could only be a minority, and thus would have had far fewer chances of having their language adopted as the “second spoken language (lingua franca) throughout Western Asia.”
If we assume that Armenians were in the minority, then it is unclear how they could have strengthened so quickly over a short period to be able to resist Assyria?
Gradually, colloquial Armenian-Aramaic (as a dialect of the Armenian language, also called Syriac) began to displace the Akkadian language and became the main means of communication in the southern and southwestern regions of the Armenian Highlands as well.
As experts note, by the beginning of the 1st millennium BCE, Aramean-Armenians had almost entirely absorbed the older Hurrian population of Syria and Northern Mesopotamia. This process intensified especially after the fall of the Assyrian kingdom in 616-605 BCE and the Babylonian kingdom in 539-538 BCE.
Thus, non-existent Aramean-Semites could not have absorbed the population of the Armenian Highlands, which at that time dominated this territory. Therefore, speaking of Semites is to blatantly falsify the stated facts. One can only accept the name Arameans as another name for Armenians.
In this light, many historical processes falsely stated in the work of N. Mkrtchyan as “Arameanization” become clear. Indeed, if we accept the prevalence of Armenians speaking the Aramaic dialect, it becomes understandable why the Arameanization of Mesopotamia and the countries adjacent to it continued at a rapid pace, especially after the fall of Assyria.
However, since there was no strong unified Armenian-Aramean state in these territories, in subsequent years the Aramaic language did not have the status of an official state language and was gradually replaced by local territorial Koine (similar to Syro-Arabic). Aramaic influence also spread to Armenia, and this too is understandable in light of our hypothesis. Official and court correspondence was conducted in Aramaic. Over 100 inscriptions in the Aramaic language have been found in Armenia.
The use of “state Aramaic” as the official (or chancery) language of Mesopotamia, the Transcaucasus (Armenia, Georgia), and Anatolia continued for several centuries. In the Achaemenid era (6th-4th centuries BCE), the Aramaic language served as the official language of the Persian state (empire), especially in its western part, in Anatolia, in the Caucasus, and in the Middle East.
Arameans and other Arameanized peoples moved north along the valleys of the Euphrates and Tigris (Purattu-Idiglat), and along the valley of the Aratsani (Arsania). They lived alongside Armenians for a very long time. With such close contacts over several centuries, “Arameanisms” infiltrated Armenian daily life; apart from chancery and administrative terms, everyday words of daily life also entered the Armenian language, replacing Armenian equivalents. It is not surprising that the merging of the Aramaic-speaking population with the Armenians led to the formation of a strong Aramaic layer in the Armenian lexicon.
That is, the dialect began to dominate in daily life, which is not surprising if we consider the same phenomenon among modern Artsakh residents. The convergence of Armenians and Arameans reached such a degree that all barriers between them were erased. The Arameans merged with the Armenians.
Armenians began to call themselves either “aramaznean” – “of the lineage of Aram, of the generation of Aram,” or “Haikaznean” – “of the lineage of Haik.” In other words, both the Armenian language and the Armenian nation could encompass and assimilate many peoples and languages without losing their deep-rooted identity.
This indicates that the term “Arameanization of Armenians,” used by N. Mkrtchyan, is false and artificial. There was not only linguistic but also ethnic unity between them.
Armenian classics often emphasize the origin of Armenians from the lineages of Haik and Aram. Vkayaser’s disciple, Kirakos, in the monument translation of “Chrysostom’s Interpretation” (12th century), states: “Since the Syriac language is distorted, it does not correspond to our language – Aramaic and Haikian…” (“Chrysostom’s Interpretation,” p. 965).
N. Adontz, discussing the history of the formation of the Armenian people, emphasizes the importance of Armenia’s geographical location, which facilitated the assimilation of many tribes and races: “Being at the crossroads of great population movements, it (Armenia) held and absorbed many racial currents and tribal streams into its soil” (Adontz, AEW, p. 392).
Regarding the issue of the ethnic layers of ancient Armenia, N. Adontz emphasizes the scarcity of available materials, which does not allow for definitive conclusions on this matter: “There is no possibility to excavate ethnic layers back to the first settlements of Armenia yet. Limiting ourselves to the available field of historical vision, we find that Armenian nationality was formed from various, not only tribal but also racial elements,” he concludes (Adontz, AEW, 293).
The population of the Armenian Highlands could not yet be homogeneous in both ethnic composition and language at this period, as claimed by Strabo. Citing Strabo, N. Adontz concludes: “From the plains of Mesopotamia to the Black Sea, thus stretched a once-related zone, according to Strabo’s testimony that the ancient name of the Syrians extended to Babylon, up to the Euxine Sea” (Strabo, IV I, 737-1027; Adontz, AEW, 396).
That is, thanks to the expansion of the area of the Aramaic dialect, even the name of Armenians was identified with the Syrians. The fact that Russian-speaking Armenians are sometimes called Russians does not erase their ethnic identity.
In the absence of reliable data to prove his theory, N. Adontz pins all his hopes on the Armenian language, emphasizing the important, invaluable role of analyzing the Armenian language: “The truth of both positions (about the origin of Armenians – author) can only be proven through the analysis of the Armenian language, this remarkable monument in its complexity” (Adontz, AEW, 397).
N. Mkrtchyan’s statement about the Semitic essence of well-known Aryan Indo-European states such as Mitanni and others becomes entirely outrageous. Under the malicious influence of a known falsifier of Armenian history, he writes:
“It is known that in the south of Armenia, during the reign of Tukulti-Ninurta II (889-884), the Arameans established a series of small states traditionally called Khanigalbat (i.e., Mitanni) (Diakonov I., PAN, 138-139).”
Yes, there were many of these states, and they were called Aram: Aram Naharaim, Aram Damascus, Aram Soba, Aram Beth-Rehob, etc. This period coincides with the domination of Urartu (Biainili), which could not hinder the spread of the Armenian-Aramean influence over the entire Armenian Highlands.
Therefore, Strabo’s report “about the development of a unified language under Zariadres and Artaxias” (Strabo, XI, 528-743) must be accepted as a reflection of the Armenian domination. It’s possible that he and other historians did not have reliable information; otherwise, Herodotus would not have considered the Armenians to be descendants of the Phrygians (see our brief note later in the collection), and Strabo would not have included them in the Semitic world, following Poseidon:
“For the Armenian, Syrian, and Arab nations exhibit great tribal kinship in language, lifestyle, and facial features, especially in places where they live side by side.
It is well-known that Mesopotamia is made up of these three nationalities and it is here that their similarities are most evident. If there are some differences due to climatic conditions, especially between the northerners and southerners, as well as those who live in between, the general traits still predominate.
Assyrians and Aryans are also close to the named nations and to each other. It seems that even the names of these nations are similar: whom we call Syrians, among the Syrians themselves are called Armenians and Arameans: this name resembles the name of the Armenians, Arabs, and Arameans” (Strabo, I, I, 53 = Thei. 41), (see p. 81 Arabic in 784-1094, also see p. 81).
Sometimes under the term “Arabs,” they understood the inhabitants of the bordering countries with Syria and Mesopotamia, who did not differ in proper names from the synchronous Aramean names. In Babylonian texts of the Achaemenid period, the Arabs are mentioned by Aramean names. On this basis, there is an opinion that, in reality, the “Arabs” of the early period were Arameans or Armenians who spoke Aramean.
In modern-day Syria, alongside Armenian Uniates, there are Armenians who call themselves Syriacs. They belong, like the actual Syriacs (Aramean Christians), to the Syriac Orthodox Church (Jacobite). That is, within contemporary Armenian ethnicity, there is a sub-ethnic group through which one can directly trace the kinship between Armenians and Arameans (Aramean Christians, Syrians).
At the same time, the important role of the Armenian language is emphasized not only in studying the ethnogenesis of the Armenian people but also in the history of neighboring nations: “After all, the Armenian language, with its vast accumulation from various ethno-linguistic sources, as a living offspring of the cultural substrate of the aboriginal peoples of the ancient Near East and its Asiatic world, holds within itself hundreds and thousands of such lexical etymologies and influences…” (Kapantsyan G., ILR, 2, 304).
Author: A. Torosyan Excerpt from the book “Fragments of Armenian Civilization”
Translation of text underlined in red
The Arameans gradually spread throughout the land, having originated from Kura, which some identify as the area of the Kura River (in the Caucasus). Arameans are considered to be the ancestors of the Armenians. The country was called Aram.
From the Aramean language, the Chaldean language later evolved. After the Babylonian captivity, the Aramean language spread. Jesus Christ and the apostles spoke in this language.
Source: Russian State Library
Translated by Vigen Avetisyan
