Kingdom of Armenia (Antiquity) Information
The Kingdom of Armenia was an independent monarchy from 190 BC to AD 428. The peak of the kingdom's power and its integration in Hellenistic culture under Tigranes and his son Artavasdes is also referred to as Armenian Empire.
After the fall of the Achaemenid Empire, the former Satrapy of Armenia was divided in about 120 clan territories ruled by nakharars. These were united under Artaxias I, the founder of the Artaxiad Dynasty, after whom the early phase of the kingdom is also known as Artaxiad Armenia (Armenian: Արտաշեսյանների Թագավորություն Artashesianneri Tagavorutyun). Armenia reached its greatest size and influence under King Tigranes II (r. 95-55 BC) stretched from the Mediterranean Sea northeast to the Kura River. The Artaxiads were overthrown by the Romans in AD 12, resulting in a period of turmoil and civil war. Two Roman client kings were installed, Tigranes V and Tigranes VI. After AD 54, the kingdom came to be ruled by the Arsacid Dynasty after which it is also known as Arsacid Armenia (Armenian: Արշակունիների Թագավորություն Arshakunineri Tagavorutyun). In AD 387, Armenia was divided into Byzantine Armenia in the west and Persian Armenia in the east. Persian Armenia remained under the rule of Arsacid client kings until AD 428.
Today, when not referring to Wilsonian Armenia, Greater Armenia generally refers to the kingdom's borders under the Arsacid dynasty.
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History
Origins
Main article: Satrapy of ArmeniaWhen the Achaemenid Empire conquered the Caucasus and Asia Minor in the 6th century BC, the territory of Urartu was reorganized into a satrapy called Armina (Harminuya in Elamite, Urashtu in the Bablylonian). The Satrapy was ruled by the Orontid Dynasty with limited to full independence, giving birth to the Kingdom of Armenia. Weakened by the Seleucid Empire, the kingdom was taken over by the Artaxiad Dynasty.
Artaxiad Dynasty
Main article: Artaxiad DynastyThe Seleucid Empire's influence over Armenia had weakened after it was defeated by the Romans in the Battle of Magnesia in 190 BC. A Hellenistic Armenian state was thus founded in the same year by Artaxias I alongside the Armenian kingdom of Sophene led by Zariadres. Artaxias seized Yervandashat, united the Armenian Highland at the expense of neighboring tribes and founded the new royal capital of Artaxata near the Araxes River.[1] According to Strabo and Plutarch, Hannibal Barca received hospitality at the Armenian court of Artaxias I. The authors add an apocryphal story of how Hannibal planned and supervised the building of Artaxata.[2] The new city was laid on a strategic position at the juncture of trade routes that connected the Ancient Greek world with Bactria, India and the Black Sea which permitted the Armenians to prosper.[1] At its zenith, from 95 to 66 BC, Armenia led by Tigranes the Great extended its rule outside of the Armenian Highland over parts of the Caucasus and the area that is now south-eastern Turkey, Iran, Syria and Lebanon, as one of the most powerful states in the Roman East.
Roman rule
Armenia came under the Ancient Roman sphere of influence in 66 BC, after the battle of Tigranocerta and the final defeat of Armenia's ally, Mithridates VI of Pontus. Mark Antony invaded and defeated the kingdom in 34 BC, but Romans lost hegemony during the Final war of the Roman Republic in 32-30 BC. In 20 BC, Augustus negotiated a truce with the Parthians, making Armenia a buffer zone between the two major powers.
Augustus installed Tigranes V as king of Armenia in AD 2, but he was replaced by Erato of Armenia in AD 6. The Romans then installed Mithridates of Armenia as client king. Mithridates was arrested by Caligula, but later restored by Claudius.
Subsequently, Armenia was often a focus of contention between Rome and Parthia, with both major powers supporting opposing sovereigns and usurpers. The Parthians forced Armenia into submission in AD 37, but in AD 47 the Romans retook control of the kingdom. In AD 51 Armenia fell to an Iberian invasion sponsored by Parthia, led by Rhadamistus. Tigranes VI of Armenia ruled from AD 58, again installed by Roman support. The period of turmoil ends in AD 66, when Tiridates I of Armenia was crowned king of Armenia by Nero For the remaining duration of the Armenian kingdom, Rome still considered it a client kingdom de jure, but the ruling dynasty was of Parthian extraction, and contemporary Roman writers thought that Nero had de facto yielded Armenia to the Parthians.[3]
Arsacid Dynasty
Main article: Arsacid Dynasty of ArmeniaUnder Nero, the Romans fought a campaign (55–63) against the Parthian Empire, which had invaded the Kingdom of Armenia, allied with the Romans. After gaining Armenia in 60, then losing it in 62, the Romans sent the legion XV Apollinaris from Pannonia to Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo, legatus of Syria. In 63, strengthened further by the legions III Gallica, V Macedonica, X Fretensis and XXII, General Corbulo entered into the territories of Vologases I of Parthia, who then returned the Armenian kingdom to Tiridates.
Another campaign was led by Emperor Lucius Verus in 162–165, after Vologases IV of Parthia had invaded Armenia and installed his chief general on its throne. To counter the Parthian threat, Verus set out for the east. His army won significant victories and retook the capital. Sohaemus, a Roman citizen of Armenian heritage, was installed as the new client king. But during an epidemic within the Roman forces, Parthians retook most of their lost territory in 166. Sohaemus retreated to Syria, аnd Arsacid’s dynasty was restored power over Armenia.
After the fall of the Arsacid Dynasty in Persia, the succeeding Sassanian Dynasty aspired to reestablish Persian control. The Sassanid Persians occupied Armenia in 252. However, in 287, Tiridates III the Great was established King of Armenia by the Roman armies. After Gregory the Illuminator's spreading of Christianity in Armenia, Tiridates accepted Christianity and made it his kingdom's official religion. The traditional date for Armenia's conversion to Christianity is established at 301, which precedes the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great's conversion and the Edict of Milan by a dozen years.
In 387, the Kingdom of Armenia was split between the Eastern Roman Empire and the Persians. Western Armenia quickly became a province of the Roman Empire under the name of Armenia Minor; Eastern Armenia remained a kingdom within Persia until 428, when the local nobility overthrew the king, and the Sassanids installed a governor in his place. In 885, after years of Roman, Persian, and Arab rule, Armenia regained its independence under the Bagratid dynasty.
Geography
During Artashes I's reign Greater Armenia covered 350,000 km2 (135,000 sq mi). At its peak, under Tigranes II the Great, it covered 3,000,000 km2 (1,158,000 sq mi), incorporating (besides greater Armenia) Iberia, Albania, Cappadocia, Cilicia, Syria, Assyria, Judea and Atropatene. Lesser Armenia's area was 100,000 km2 (39,000 sq mi).
Provinces
Arsacid Armenia and its provinces.Here is a list of the 15 provinces of the Kingdom of Armenia with their capital:
- Upper Armenia, 23,860 km2 (9,000 sq mi) (Garin)
- Sophene; 18,890 km2 (7,000 sq mi) (Arsamosata)
- Aghdznik; 17,532 km2 (7,000 sq mi) (Tigranakert)
- Turuberan; 25,008 km2 (10,000 sq mi) (Manzikert)
- Korduq; 14,707 km2 (6,000 sq mi) (Pinik)
- Moxoene; 2,962 km2 (1,000 sq mi) (Moks)
- Nor-Shirakan; 11,010 km2 (4,000 sq mi) (Her)
- Vaspurakan; 40,870 km2 (16,000 sq mi) (Van)
- Syunik; 15,237 km2 (6,000 sq mi) (Baghaberd)
- Artsakh; 11,528 km2 (4,000 sq mi) (Shusha)
- Paytakaran; 21,000 km2 (8,000 sq mi) (Paytakaran)
- Utik; 11,315 km2 (4,000 sq mi) (Partav)
- Gugark; 16,765 km2 (6,000 sq mi) (Ardahan)
- Tayk; 10,179 km2 (4,000 sq mi) (Olti)
- Ayrarat; 40,105 km2 (15,000 sq mi) (Armavir)
Other Armenian regions:
- Lesser Armenia; 100,000 km2 (39,000 sq mi) (Nikopolis)
- Armenian Mesopotamia. (Edessa)[4] [5] [6][7]
References
- ^ a b Hovannisian, Richard G. (2004). The Armenian People From Ancient to Modern Times, Volume I: The Dynastic Periods: From Antiquity to the Fourteenth Century. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 49. ISBN 1-4039-6421-1.
- ^ Bournoutian, George A. (2006). A Concise History of the Armenian People: From Ancient Times to the Present. Costa Mesa, CA: Mazda, p. 29. ISBN 1-56859-141-1.
- ^ Redgate, Anne Elizabeth (2000). The Armenians (First ed.). Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishers Inc.. pp. 88–91. ISBN 0-631-22037-2.
- ^ Knowledge Barn, page 40
- ^ Armenian Soviet Encyclopedia, 7nth volume, page 436
- ^ Time Almanac, page 724 by Editors of Time Magazine
- ^ The New Review, page 208. Edited by Archibald Grove, William Ernest Henley
Further reading
- M. Chahin, The Kingdom of Armenia (1987, reissued 1991)
- Vahan Kurkjian, Tigran the Great (1958)
- Ashkharbek Kalantar, Armenia: From the Stone Age to the Middle Ages, Civilisations du Proche Orient, Se´rie 1, Vol. 2, Recherches et Publications, Neuchâtel, Paris, 1994;ISBN 978-2-940032-01-3
- Ashkharbek Kalantar, The Mediaeval Inscriptions of Vanstan, Armenia, Civilisations du Proche-Orient: Series 2 - Philologie - CDPOP 2, Vol. 2, Recherches et Publications, Neuchâtel, Paris, 1999;ISBN 978-2-940032-11-2
- Ashkharbek Kalantar, Materials on Armenian and Urartian History (with a contribution by Mirjo Salvini), Civilisations du Proche-Orient: Series 4 - Hors Série - CPOHS 3, Neuchâtel, Paris, 2004;ISBN 978-2-940032-14-3
External links
Categories: Former monarchies of Europe | Former countries in Europe | Kingdom of Armenia | Armenian kingdoms | 428 disestablishments | States and territories established in 190 BC | 190 BC establishments | History of Armenia | Seleucid Empire | States in Hellenistic Anatolia | Former empires | Seleucid Empire successor states | History of Turkey | History of Iran | History of Iraq | History of Syria | History of Azerbaijan | History of Georgia (country)
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