Two Armenian Historians: Kirakos of Gandzak and Ukhtanes of Edessa

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I N T R O D U C T I O N.

Thus, the only points that remain indisputable, according to the Preface of the book of Oukhtanès, are that the author lived and wrote between 972 and 992; that in one of the three years indicated above, probably the earliest, in 973, since he believes it necessary to remind his correspondent of these details as if the latter might have forgotten them, he had an interview with Anania and decided to write his History at the invitation of this abbot and perhaps of the Catholicos Khatchic.

As for the plan of the work, here are the author's own terms ¹). "In order to make my discourse correct, to proportion it to the needs and appropriateness of things, to reduce to a just measure that which is excessive, to develop that which is too compressed, to remove the superfluous, to supply according to my strength that which is lacking, to arrange everything successively in the economy of the plan, I will first tell of the number of our kings and pontiffs; then the separation of the Iberians from the Armenian communion; after that the baptism of the nation of the Dzad Ծադ; the cantons, principal villages, cities, fortresses of this country; the hermitages of the solitaries; the places where the cenobites live in solitude; the manifestations of divine power upon the converts, whether secret or public, through the production of miracles, extraordinary apparitions ²), of revelations; the spiritual works, the discourses, labors, episcopal solemnities, of Gregory and his servants; the cooperation and the orders of King Sembat ³); the zeal of the magnates for the spiritual work; the eagerness of the princes, each in his own domain; of all honorable people, each within the limits of his influence, who have all seconded me in my literary work and in my spiritual work, and also the fears and anxieties that the threats of ferocious men have caused me, men light in faith and similar in morals to dragons: all this, in execution of your orders, gives consistency to the history, at the same time as the length of the composition is for me a cause of fatigue."

If such was the plan of Oukhtanès, either he did not fulfill it, or our manuscript is very incomplete. The 1st Part of his History contains in effect only a thin summary of the works of Moses of Khoren and of Movses Kaghankatvatsi, the historian of the Aghovans, with short notices only on the most prominent characters of the history of Armenia; then the series of Roman or Greek emperors, with order numbers of these princes, copied from the Chronicle of Eusebius, and two or three legends of martyrs: all up to the time of Constantine. The legend of St. Gregory the Illuminator is a highly abbreviated excerpt of that of Agathangelos. Here our historian stops, having devoted to this long narrative only about fifty pages, which contain nothing original or particularly interesting.

The second Part deals exclusively with the secession of the Iberians from the communion

¹) In his Preface, p. 9 of the manuscript.
²) The author says literally aruestits tesleamb, which one can translate as "of skillful, artificial apparitions."

³) Within the time limits indicated above, 972—992, it concerns King Sembat II Tiezeralkal the master of the world, who reigned 977—989.