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Index

Armenia

The Urartu Civilisation

Victory for Independence

Artashisian Dynasty on the Armenian Throne

Armenia caught between Rome and the Arsacids

The Acceptance of Christianity

Defending Christianity

Armenia Under the Bagratouni Dynasty

Cilicia - the New Armenia

Armenia Under Turanian Rule

The Renaissance or the Resurrection of Armenia

The Eastern Question

Russia in the Caucasus

The Armenian Question

Battle on Two Fronts

Tsarist Russia Against the Armenians

The Revolution of the Young Turks and the Armenian People on the Eve of World War I

The First World War

The Resurrection of Armenia

Armenia on the Road to Independence, 1918

- Armenia on the Road to Independence, 1918

Eastern Armenia

Western Armenia

"The Fateful Years" (1914-1917)

"Hopes and Emotions" (March-October, 1917)

The Bolshevik Revolution and Armenia

Transcaucasia Adrift (November, 1917

Dilemmas (March-April, 1918)

War and Independence (April-May, 1918)

The Republics of Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia

The Suppliants (June-October, 1918)

In conclusion

Soviet Armenia

The Second Independent Republic of Armenia

Epilogue

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Victory for Independence

?t is not the speech at the last second that wins the victory, but the organization and the customs that the people make themselves that makes them worthy of a victory.?B# Xenophon

Armenia and the Empire of the Medes

It took the newcomers (the Indo-European Armenians) around 100-200 years to conquer their new home and establish themselves. At the end of the 7th century B.C., the Medes allied themselves with the Chaldeans in the war against Assyria, a war that ended with the defeat of the Assyrians, which in turn meant the disintegration of the great Assyrian empire. According to Movses Khorenatsi, there was an Armenian prince by the name of Parouyr who participated in the defeat and the conquest of the Assyrian capital Nineveh (Ninv?. He was later, by the victors, rewarded for his efforts and was appointed as king of Armenia. The victors then each founded their own separate nations: the Medes founded the Median kingdom which constitutes presentday Iran, and the Chaldeans founded the Chaldean Empire (also called the Babylonian empire) which included presentday Iraq, Syria and Israel/Palestine. According to this division Armenia ended up in the Median Empire, but that rule does not seem to have lasted a long time (probably between 590-559 B.C.) Armenia soon regained its independence and according to the Greek historian Xenophon mentined that the Armenian leader allied himself with Cyrus, the king of the Medes.

Armenia and the Persian Empire

During the 6th century B.C., Cyrus, who was the leader of the Persians, an ethnic group who were under the rule of the Medes, gained control over the kingdom of the Medes. After having conquered Asia Minor and Mesopotamia, he then founded the Persian Achaemenidian Empire.

Kambiz, son of Cyrus, started a campaign against Egypt and conquered it. After his death, Darius I came to the power. During his reign Persia was transformed into one of the most advanced and organised political structures that the world had ever seen. Its borders stretched from Armenia to the river Indus in India.

In the famous cuneiform script of Darius I, son to Hystaspes (Vishtaseb), dated 521 B.C. and found at Bisutun in present-day Iran, it is written: ? and I conquered Pontos and Armenia?. Thus, in 521 B.C. Armenia is presented to us for the first time in modern history.

The 7th century B.C. is known as the era when mankind left its childhood and began its youth. It was during this century that the republic of Rome started to take shape and the Greeks laid the cornerstones of their philosophy. Contemporaneously the great prophets of Israel emerged while Buddha spread his knowledge in India and Confucius his in China. Among the scripts there are many inscriptions that bear witness of several bloody battles, e.g. Zura, Tigra (Tigris) and Uyama, between Persia and Armenia, during the rule of Darius I. The sites of these battles testify to the Armenians skill in warfare for instead of merely defending their own land, they had started to wage war on enemy territory.