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Re: Is Russia an ally or foe, nowadays?
Hakob, I agree with your thought above.
In fact, a long time ago I was reading an author named Jean Markale extensively, until I discovered that he is a die-hard Marxist with a different agenda than expected. Regardless of his political leanings and agenda, he had a very interesting idea about the Celts around which formed the basis of his political characterization of the Celts versus the Romans.[1]
First, he said, the Celts were not as territorial, literal, and legalistic about such core aspects of life as "owership, proprietorship" and so on and considered land to be sacred, a living organism almost of which the Celts considered themselves a part.
The "Urartuan" (Armenian kings of the Aramian dynasty, please, let's stop it with the Turkophile charade) king's "Oath to Haldi" (I think it was mentioned in S. Kramer's works) upon ascending the throne is remarkably similar to the later Celtic ideas as described by Markale to the land and people, entities which were considered as inseparable parts of a single, for lack of a more distinct term, organism. Vahan Mamikonian's last will upon his deathbed was also very revealing and also made evident that even in Christian times this paradigm prevailed. Even Robert Thompson admitted in his writings that the usage of the term "orenk" (law of the land) by the opponents of Sassanian (a reformed and more fascistic form of Zoroastrian) religious imposition upon Armenians used the term to denote "our traditions and attachment to the land of our forefathers."
Second, Markale noted that despite the tribal and ethnic divisions, the Celts did consider themselves to be a part of a larger national/cultural entity and were often united against the Romans in defense of this ideal versus the more territorial and legalist concept of "country, territory, region" as separate from the overall ideal that is the nation and the land to which it is attached and to which owes its very existence and character.
Armenians did not differ much in this sense. Armenians rarely adopted a similar political character to those of empires, legalist and possessive empires for whom displacement of their conquered subject's autonomy, dispossession of their land, weakening and impoverishment of subjects through collection of taxes and tributes, as the main order of business. Empire simply means large scale banditry that in turn glorifies its accomplishments by sanctifying with in fictitious myth. Empire means the construction of an artificial identity and mythology through imposition and destruction of the mythology (historical/ancestral memory and value systems) of its conquered subjects.
Nothing has changed when it comes to behavior of empires in terms of what the goals and agenda are. Only the methodology and means of waging this war against target subjects has changed.
Armenians grew out of a set of tribes in a specific territory who had blood relations. Now, when England and Germany were not yet inundated with anti-Armenian paradigms, their scholars were recognizing the pervasiveness and extensive presence of the Armenian identity and language throughout a quite large territory. Robert Ellis and Peter Jensen are my two favorite authors of an era when politics apparently didn't influence scholarship as much as it did after the well-documented anti-Armenian paradigm kicked in. [2]
Your assertion that the "identity survives" has a lot of merit. The "identity" is strong if it is rooted the idea that there is a sacred being, this nation and land, that are one and the same, not something based on political successes or conquest, but that of being something "that just came to be" through an ancestral mythology, indicative of very ancient roots. For example, even the loss of the King as "ordained" by political entities such as the Sassanian or Byzantine courts didn't seem to dissolve the Armenian State itself, which adopted a status of Sparapetutyun upon having no Tagavor, in a Tagavorutyun that considered all its Nakharar, great and small, to be "equal and among many". [3] This "equal among many" is a strong confederate idea, a trait of very ancient and primordially formed national identities. We see a looser form of this among the Iroquois, Sioux, Cherokee, (all of whom were [con]federations) and so on in the neolithic cultures of the New World as well.
[1] "King of the Celts" - Jean Markale
[2] Imperialism, Racism, and Development Theories: The Construction of a Dominant Paradigm on Ottoman Armenians By Hilmar Kaiser
[3] Armenia, Survival of a Nation - Christopher Walker
Hakob, I agree with your thought above.
In fact, a long time ago I was reading an author named Jean Markale extensively, until I discovered that he is a die-hard Marxist with a different agenda than expected. Regardless of his political leanings and agenda, he had a very interesting idea about the Celts around which formed the basis of his political characterization of the Celts versus the Romans.[1]
First, he said, the Celts were not as territorial, literal, and legalistic about such core aspects of life as "owership, proprietorship" and so on and considered land to be sacred, a living organism almost of which the Celts considered themselves a part.
The "Urartuan" (Armenian kings of the Aramian dynasty, please, let's stop it with the Turkophile charade) king's "Oath to Haldi" (I think it was mentioned in S. Kramer's works) upon ascending the throne is remarkably similar to the later Celtic ideas as described by Markale to the land and people, entities which were considered as inseparable parts of a single, for lack of a more distinct term, organism. Vahan Mamikonian's last will upon his deathbed was also very revealing and also made evident that even in Christian times this paradigm prevailed. Even Robert Thompson admitted in his writings that the usage of the term "orenk" (law of the land) by the opponents of Sassanian (a reformed and more fascistic form of Zoroastrian) religious imposition upon Armenians used the term to denote "our traditions and attachment to the land of our forefathers."
Second, Markale noted that despite the tribal and ethnic divisions, the Celts did consider themselves to be a part of a larger national/cultural entity and were often united against the Romans in defense of this ideal versus the more territorial and legalist concept of "country, territory, region" as separate from the overall ideal that is the nation and the land to which it is attached and to which owes its very existence and character.
Armenians did not differ much in this sense. Armenians rarely adopted a similar political character to those of empires, legalist and possessive empires for whom displacement of their conquered subject's autonomy, dispossession of their land, weakening and impoverishment of subjects through collection of taxes and tributes, as the main order of business. Empire simply means large scale banditry that in turn glorifies its accomplishments by sanctifying with in fictitious myth. Empire means the construction of an artificial identity and mythology through imposition and destruction of the mythology (historical/ancestral memory and value systems) of its conquered subjects.
Nothing has changed when it comes to behavior of empires in terms of what the goals and agenda are. Only the methodology and means of waging this war against target subjects has changed.
Armenians grew out of a set of tribes in a specific territory who had blood relations. Now, when England and Germany were not yet inundated with anti-Armenian paradigms, their scholars were recognizing the pervasiveness and extensive presence of the Armenian identity and language throughout a quite large territory. Robert Ellis and Peter Jensen are my two favorite authors of an era when politics apparently didn't influence scholarship as much as it did after the well-documented anti-Armenian paradigm kicked in. [2]
Your assertion that the "identity survives" has a lot of merit. The "identity" is strong if it is rooted the idea that there is a sacred being, this nation and land, that are one and the same, not something based on political successes or conquest, but that of being something "that just came to be" through an ancestral mythology, indicative of very ancient roots. For example, even the loss of the King as "ordained" by political entities such as the Sassanian or Byzantine courts didn't seem to dissolve the Armenian State itself, which adopted a status of Sparapetutyun upon having no Tagavor, in a Tagavorutyun that considered all its Nakharar, great and small, to be "equal and among many". [3] This "equal among many" is a strong confederate idea, a trait of very ancient and primordially formed national identities. We see a looser form of this among the Iroquois, Sioux, Cherokee, (all of whom were [con]federations) and so on in the neolithic cultures of the New World as well.
[1] "King of the Celts" - Jean Markale
[2] Imperialism, Racism, and Development Theories: The Construction of a Dominant Paradigm on Ottoman Armenians By Hilmar Kaiser
[3] Armenia, Survival of a Nation - Christopher Walker
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