ELISHE History of Vardan and the ) Armenian War Translation and Commentary by Robert W. Thomson Harvard University Press Cambridge, Massachusetts London, England 1982 Copyright © 1982 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Eliseus, Saint, Vardapet, d. 480. History of Vardan and the Armenian War. (Harvard Armenian texts and studies ; 5) Translation of: Vasn Vardanay ew Hayots‘ Paterazmin. Bibliography: p. Includes indexes. 1. Armenia—History—Persian and Greek rule, 429-640. 2. Vardan Mami Konian, Saint, d. 451. I. Thomson, Robert W., 1934- . IL. Title. III. Series. DS186.E3413 1982 939.55 81-7117 ISBN 0-674-40335-5 AACR2 This material is presented solely for non-commercial educational/research purposes. To Judith The preparation of this translation was made possible by a grant from the Translations Program of the National Endowment for the Humanities, an independent federal agency. This assistance is most gratefully acknowl- edged. Preface HE importance of Elisheé’s History, both as a document in its own right and as a text that lives on in Armenian tradi- tion, is explained in the Introduction that follows. Here I would like to acknowledge the help I have received from nu- merous friends and colleagues who over the past few ‘years have endured my spoken or written words and in turn have made useful comments. I am grateful to Frank Cross for carefully documented criticisms, and to many others for verbal remarks. But I cannot hold anyone else responsible for my interpreta- tions, or misinterpretations. It also seems appropriate to state in this preface my gen- eral objective, for this study of Elishé follows closely on studies of two other early Armenian Histories, those of Agathangelos and Moses Khorenats‘i. In the first place, these great works of Armenian literature are of sufficient interest outside the small circle of readers of classical Armenian to merit translation. They contain information of relevance for the study of Arme- nian political and social history, Armenian literature, theology, and art history, as well as information of interest for the study of numerous other peoples and cultures with whom Armenians came into contact over the ages. Second, these histories are lit- erary documents of some complexity, intriguing to unravel. In the Introduction that follows the problems of Elishé are spelled out in detail. Here it will suffice to say in more general terms that the classical Armenian histories are not untutored recollec- tions of events seen by their authors or told them by witnesses. vil Preface They are learned works that impose a certain form on the his- torical matter and seek to interpret events. Their authors had some basic assumptions (such as a Christian outlook) that col- ored their view of things, and sometimes they had more specific motivations (for instance, the need to flatter a patron and his family). Unfortunately, a critical investigation of these works which may cast doubt on the veracity of their narratives or hint at bias in their authors has sometimes been received with ani- mosity. The ire of some modern readers is particularly aroused by the suggestion that these ancient authors may have surrep- titiously altered their sources, and indeed may have claimed to be eyewitnesses of the events they describe, when in fact their histories were composed at a later period. In this regard, it must be stressed that Armenian writers of the fifth century are not being singled out as especially culpable of tendentiousness. A modern scholar looks at texts that have come down through manuscripts—themselves often copied a thousand years after the original text was written—with the same critical eye, be they copies of Homer’s Iliad, the book of Genesis, a Syriac chronicle, or Moses Khorenats‘i’s Hestory of the Armenians. If the critic discerns (or thinks he discerns) anomalies and difficulties in the text as it has survived, it is his duty to say so. If he thinks that the text does not date to the period it describes, but is the work of a later author who has treated his material in order to state a certain case, he must try to identify the sources, isolate the succeeding revisions, and elucidate the author’s motivation. Of course, the critic may be wrong in his interpretations, but he is not wrong in applying such methods of historical and literary analysis to any given text. Adverse public reaction to the study of texts some fifteen hundred years old does point to one very significant feature that makes such work so timely. These are not dead but living histories with a message for the present day and an interpreta- tion of the past that is relevant for contemporary situations. That is why they are classics, and that is why there are “ortho- dox” and “unorthodox” ways of reading them. Some of these points are discussed in the Introduction. But we are now only at the beginning of an understanding of the development of the Armenian tradition. So my commentary is more concerned with how Elishé put together his narrative and with the models he used than with the later life of his History as an authoritative text. viii Contents Introduction Vardan and the Armenian War 97 Appendix: The Armenian War According to Lazar P‘arpets‘ 251 Bibliography 329 Index of Scriptural Quotations and Allusions 338 Index 346 Map: The Armenia of Elishé 356 Transcription wpqnieq¢ thy nwpp 6 nYY 5R 6 a abgdexzzhilxkhé t ékht d z i Gv yu pnp wpnudomp gt ch myn sh o chi pj * s vt r tS € w ih pono pkuw 6 Note on Texts All references to the texts of Elishé and Lazar are to the pages of the critical Armenian editions. For details of these see the Bibliogra- phy under Armenian Texts. The pages of the Armenian texts have been noted in the texts of the translations. All references to the Bible are to the Armenian version, which fol- lows the numbering of the Septuagint for the Old Testament. Where an allusion to the Bible is noted, the parallel is a verbal one in Arme- nian; this may not be apparent if the English translation of Elishé is compared with the text of the English Bible. Introduction LASSICAL Armenian literature, which begins with an astonishing efflorescence in the fifth century of the Christian era, is rich in historical writing. The majority of these works were composed by learned clerics familiar with a wide range of literary sources in Greek and Syriac, but also conscious of the non-Hellenistic, Iranian cultural background of Armenia. For the conversion of King Trdat (Tiridates) to Christianity in the early fourth century and the work of Saint Gregory the Illumi- nator in founding an organized church did not bring about an immediate and total rejection of pre-Christian Armenian tra- ditions. Thus, early Armenian historiography presents us with a fascinating picture of the interplay of cultures pagan ‘and Christian, Iranian and Hellenistic. But the Armenian histori- ans themselves, being Christians, impose upon that compli- cated amalgam interpretations based upon their own beliefs and ideals, using imagery drawn from the Judaeo-Christian world. The unraveling of the numerous strands of cultural tra- dition that have gone into the making both of the historical sit- uation in Armenia and then of its interpretation in the early Armenian writers is thus a very complex task. The present work deals with only one history, that of Elishé, and with one of those strands, his literary models in Christian literature. There- fore, in what follows I shall primarily be concerned with this history as a conscious and sophisticated interpretation of events that took place in the fifth century in an Iranian setting as viewed through the eyes of a Christian. I trust that other schol- ars will in turn take up other strands, so that in time a fuller I Introduction understanding of Elishé’s cultural milieu and the interaction of rival ideologies will emerge. Early Armenian historians are of interest for what they tell us about events in Armenia, or which affected Armenia, and - also for their interpretations of those events—in other words, for both the form and the matter of their literary compositions. But there is a third reason why these histories are significant. They are part of a living Armenian tradition that has persisted to the present day. For the image of the Armenian past as ex- pounded by these classical authors has had a profound impact in the last two centuries on the way in which Armenians look upon themselves, their history, and their nation. In this respect, three works stand out as being of very spe- cial importance. The History of Agathangelos, which describes the conversion of Armenia to Christianity; the History of Moses Khorenats‘i, which describes the origins of the Armenian na- tion and its early history down to the time of Mashtots, inven- tor of the Armenian script; and the History of Elishé, which de- scribes the resistance of Christian Armenians to religious persecution in the fifth century. Other histories may be of greater interest to modern scholars as sources for understanding Armenian culture in certain periods of change—that of Faustos Buzand, for example, which describes fourth-century Armenia and the conflicts between church and traditional pagan society. But Agathangelos, Moses Khorenats‘i, and Elishé have a par- ticular place in Armenian tradition as enshrining the received account of Armenian history: Armenia, a small country but of great antiquity where many manly deeds have been performed (Moses); a nation converted to Christianity before others, where God’s grace has been manifested (Agathangelos); a peo- ple steadfast in their faith, true to their ancestral traditions, and ready for martyrdom should larger and stronger empires attempt to suppress Armenian liberties (Elishé). This Introduction is therefore divided into two sections. In the first part the sources used by Elishé are discussed and an attempt made to elucidate his motivation and to date the text. The second part deals with the role of this History in later Ar- menian literature, the development of legends about the au- thor, and the continuing influence of the figure of Vardan as an Armenian hero and patriot. For it is that continuous life of Elishé’s History that has made it a classic in Armenian litera- ture, a work of perennial significance for Armenians, a book