As we all know Armenians are native people of Armenian Highland and this fact is proven many times over by numerous archaeological and linguistic investigations. There are also theories connecting Armenians with Sumer (current Iraq). During last few decades very important new discoveries were made in Armenia. These include many paleolithic images of goats and people dating past many thousands of years and those images  show that goat was a god-like creature for ancient Armenians. Also, very recently discoveries of pottery and wine making in Armenia were made and these pre-date all known similar discoveries from other regions. All these and other numerous discoveries (oldest lether shoe, oldest skirt, oldest mumiified goat) point in direction that modern civilization originated in Armenian Highland and Armenians are native people of that civilization.    

Please take a look at following pictures from Urartu, Assyria and Mesopotamian region. These artifacts are from “The ancient world” collection presented at Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA, May 2011.

Some of the images have related textual material. Click on textual images to get better resolution if you are unable to read from the thumbnail image.    

Musical instruments.    

Kamanche-zurna-kanon

Kamanche-zurna-kanon-text

    

Goat figurines.    

Goat

Goat_Iraq

Goat_Iraq_text

Two_goats

    

Horse and chariot ornaments, Urartu.    

Horse_blinkers_Urartu

Horse_blinkers_text

Horse_collar_Urartu

Horse_chariot_ornament_Urartu

Horse_collar_Urartu_text

 

    

 Helmet, Urartu.

Helmet_Urartu

    

Helmet_Urartu_text

     

Pottery.    

    

Ritual_pitcher_Phrygia

    

Ritual_pitcher_Phrygia_text

Ancient coins.   

Artavardes_monet

Artavardes_monet_text

 Seated man.   

Seated_man-Hittite

Seated_man_text

Pottery.

Pottery

Pottery1

Pottery_text

Jar, Iraq.   

Jar_Iraq

Jar_Iraq_text

Assyrian soldier.   

Assyrian_soldier

 Lion attacking bull. 

Lion_attacking_bull

Area floor map.

Urartu_floor_map

 

 

The pages below are from “Patmutjun Hayoc” of Movses Khorenaci. They contain the text of the letter written by King Abgar to Jesus. Click on the pages to get them full size. First title page of the book is also included. The manuscript was written in 5th century but this is from a book published in 1752. If you can not read Armenian you can learn more about the letter from the Wikipedia article (link here Movses of Khoren).

These pages are from “Armenian rare books” online digital library.

This is the title page of the book.

"Patmutjun Hajoc" Title Page

 On this page Movses Khorenaci tells us that King Abgar was son of Arsham and his name was Avagayr (Armenian for Senior Man – Avag Ayr) but assyrians and greeks could not pronounce his name and called him Abgar instead. On the second year of his kingdom the Armenian land was put under levy by the Roman empire. On this same page at the very bottom Movses Khorenaci tells us that at that same time the Savior was born in Judea.

King Abgar - Avagayr

And now the pages with the letter. If you can not read Armenian you can still clearly see the start of the letter in the lower right corner of the graphic with ”Jesus Savior” written in capital letters. 

King Abgar Letter to Jesus First Page

 Then most of the letter is on the left side of this second page from the book. If you can read Armenian click on the pages to get full size images so that font is large enough to read. And the right side of this page contains reply to King Abgar. As the title on the right hand side says – the letter was dictated by the Savior and written by Apostol Thomas. Here is my translation from old Armenian:

“Blessed you are that believe in me without seeing me as it is written: those that seen me shall not believe in me but those that not seen me shall believe and blessed they are. And about what you written to me – me coming to see you – after completing what i was sent for to Jerusalem and after ascending i will send my disciple to heal you and give life to you and those that are with you.”

And the rest of the text on this page states that the letter was delivered by Enan (or Anan) along with the image of Savior.

King Abgar Letter to Jesus Second Page

More on the history of this letter in the upcoming posts…

 This blog already referred to the book of Movses Khorenaci in the entry about Smbat Bagratuni (Smbat Bagratuni).

Interesting article in “Human genetics” about Armenian Y chromosome and its link to Atlantic types. The abstarct is below, full article can be found here and here.

Some facts from the full article:

1. analysis of the Armenian sample yields a mean estimate for the start of population growth of 4.8 thousand years ago
2. The more isolated southern and eastern regions… one step removed from the Atlantic Modal Haplotype, the centre of a cluster found at high frequencies in England, Friesland and Atlantic populations, and which may represent a remnant paternal signal of a Paleolithic migration event.
3. Atlantic Modal Haplotype was found in the separate isolated regional samples of Syunik (7.9%) and Karabakh (2.8%)
4. The frequencies of the Atlantic Modal Cluster (defined as the Atlantic Modal Haplotype plus its one-step neighbours) are 24.3% in Syunik, 14.0% in Karabakh, and less than 10.0% in all other regions and data sets in our study apart from England (41.0%) and Friesland (36.2%).
5. Tests for population differentiation reveal significant differences for Syunik vs. all other regions, and also for Karabakh vs. all other regions.

These relationships with Atlantic Type and with Atlantic Cluster are quite interesting considering that Anglo-Saxon Chronicle mentions that first inhabitants of England came from Armenia (Armenian People and Anglo-Saxon Chronicle).

Armenian Y chromosome haplotypes reveal strong regional structure within a single ethno-national group
Michael E. Weale, Levon Yepiskoposyan, Rolf F. Jager, Nelli Hovhannisyan, Armine Khudoyan, Oliver Burbage-Hall, Neil Bradman and Mark G. Thomas
Abstract

Armenia has been little-studied genetically, even though it is situated in an important area with respect to theories of ancient Middle Eastern population expansion and the spread of Indo-European languages. We screened 734 Armenian males for 11 biallelic and 6 microsatellite Y chromosome markers, segregated them according to paternal grandparental region of birth within or close to Armenia, and compared them with data from other population samples. We found significant regional stratification, on a level greater than that found in some comparisons between different ethno-national identities. A diasporan Armenian sub-sample (collected in London) was not sufficient to describe this stratified haplotype distribution adequately, warning against the use of such samples as surrogates for the non-diasporan population in future studies. The haplotype distribution and pattern of genetic distances suggest a high degree of genetic isolation in the mountainous southern and eastern regions, while in the northern, central and western regions there has been greater admixture with populations from neighbouring Middle Eastern countries. Georgia, to the north of Armenia, also appears genetically more distinct, suggesting that in the past Trans-Caucasia may have acted as a genetic barrier. A Bayesian full-likelihood analysis of the Armenian sample yields a mean estimate for the start of population growth of 4.8 thousand years ago (95% credible interval: 2.0-11.1), consistent with the onset of Neolithic farming. The more isolated southern and eastern regions have high frequencies of a microsatellite defined cluster within haplogroup 1 that is centred on a modal haplotype one step removed from the Atlantic Modal Haplotype, the centre of a cluster found at high frequencies in England, Friesland and Atlantic populations, and which may represent a remnant paternal signal of a Paleolithic migration event.

ArmenianYChromosome

I already posted an article about oldest shoe found in Armenia (link is here Ancient shoe found in Armenia) and now the same location in Armenia revealed even more interesting find – oldest winery.

I archived the article from National Geogrphic and you can view it by clicking the link below but i also wanted to mention what extra-ordinary finds and conclusions were made by the scientitsts who made the discovery. Here are just few:

…radiocarbon-dated to between 4100 B.C. and 4000 B.C.

The chemical tests revealed traces of malvidin, the plant pigment largely responsible for red wine’s color.

McGovern called the discovery “important and unique, because it indicates large-scale wine production, which would imply, I think, that the grape had already been domesticated.”

Twenty burials have been identified around the wine-pressing installation. There was a cemetery, and the wine production in the cave was related to this ritualistic aspect… Significantly, drinking cups have been found inside and around the graves.

Please enjoy the original article from National Geographic web site and be patient it may take few seconds to load:
Earliest Known Winery Found in Armenian Cave

In these pages of “Patmutjun Hayoc” Movses Khorenaci gives us a story of capture of Shambat Bagratuni by King Nabugodonosor of Babylon. Armenian King Hrachya (Firey Eyes) then asks King Nabugodonosor to free the captive who will become the founder of Bagratuni family name.

These pages are from “Armenian rare books” online digital library. Click on the pages to get full size versions for better viewing.

MovsesKhorenaci_70

MovsesKhorenaci_72