The Project Gutenberg EBook of Armenian Literature, by Anonymous

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Title: Armenian Literature

Author: Anonymous

Release Date: March 5, 2004 [EBook #11461]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ARMENIAN LITERATURE ***

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ARMENIAN LITERATURE

COMPRISING

POETRY, DRAMA, FOLK-LORE, AND CLASSIC TRADITIONS

TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH FOR THE FIRST TIME

WITH A SPECIAL INTRODUCTION BY

ROBERT ARNOT, M.A.

REVISED EDITION

1904

SPECIAL INTRODUCTION

The literature of ancient Armenia that is still extant is meagre in
quantity and to a large extent ecclesiastical in tone. To realize its
oriental color one must resort entirely to that portion which deals with
the home life of the people, with their fasts and festivals, their
emotions, manners, and traditions. The ecclesiastical character of much
of the early Armenian literature is accounted for by the fact that
Christianity was preached there in the first century after Christ, by
the apostles Thaddeus and Bartholomew, and that the Armenian Church is
the oldest national Christian Church in the world.

It is no doubt owing to the conversion of the entire Armenian nation
under the passionate preaching of Gregory the Illuminator that most of
the literary products, of primitive Armenia--the mythological legends
and chants of heroic deeds sung by bards--are lost. The Church would
have none of them. Gregory not only destroyed the pagan temples, but he
sought to stamp out the pagan literature--the poetry and recorded
traditions that celebrated the deeds of gods and goddesses and of
national heroes. He would have succeeded, too, had not the romantic
spirit of the race clung fondly to their ballads and folk-lore.
Ecclesiastical historiographers in referring to those times say quaintly
enough, meaning to censure the people, that in spite of their great
religious advantages the Armenians persisted in singing some of their
heathen ballads as late as the twelfth century. Curiously enough, we owe
the fragments we possess of early Armenian poetry to these