Urartu soon developed into one of the most modern civilisations of that era. Their art of architecture was one of the most advanced among contemporary kingdoms and several remaining bridges, buildings, metal handicrafts and mosaics bear witness to this. 48 They also had a very advanced irrigation system which consisted of well-constructed networks of channels. This system, which was built during the reign of king Menoa, was used until recently in the irrigation of the fruit gardens of Van. 49
"Crops, pasturelands, trees for building and minerals were in plenty among the mountains of Armenia, which was the home of a mountain people with the strictest of customs. The living conditions, even if they were not as pleasant or as easy as those in #Mesopotamia, it allowed a strong civilisation to be established there." 50
These were some of the descriptions that researchers had unveiled by the beginning of the 20th century about the history of Armenia and its people. This information also, to some extent, replaced earlier assertions which suggested that Armenia, during its early years, was inhabited by Chaldeans and Assyrians who, at the arrival of the Indo-European Armenians, were then forced southwards. 51
Nowadays researchers believe that the original inhabitants constituted an ethnic people of their own and spoke a language that probably belonged to the Caucasian linguistic group, and that they were not driven southward but were in due course assimilated by the newly arrived Aryan tribes.
However, in a landscape with high mountains such as Armenia, small pockets of the native population were able to escape blending with the newcomers and assimilation. And it is this fact which, without a doubt, inspired professor Pittard, the famous ethnology scientist and teacher at the university of Geneva, to write the following: "When we think of the great civilisations that have overshadowed the Asian continent, we are saddened that we cannot tell for certain which of the existing groups can claim to be descended from these civilisations. One should perhaps consider the Kurds and the Armenians as some of the inheritors of the great civilisations in western Asia." 52
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