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124-524: Mount Ararat ( / ˈ ær ə r æ t / , ARR -ə-rat ; Armenian : Արարատ , romanized :  Ararat ) or Mount Ağrı ( Turkish : Ağrı Dağı ; Kurdish : Çiyayê Agirî ) is a snow-capped and dormant compound volcano in Eastern Turkey . It consists of two major volcanic cones: Greater Ararat and Little Ararat . Greater Ararat is the highest peak in Turkey; Little Ararat's elevation

248-534: A moribund language spoken by only a small percentage of Armenians in Turkey (especially in Istanbul ) as a first language, with 18 percent among the community in general and 8 percent among younger people. There are notable diaspora L2 Western Armenian speakers in Lebanon ( Beirut ), Syria ( Aleppo , Damascus ), California ( Fresno , Los Angeles ), and France ( Marseilles ). Western Armenian used to be

372-485: A Mount Ararat valley glacier of Pleistocene, possibly in the Last Glacial Period , downvalley from Lake Balık . The higher moraine lies at an altitude of about 2,200 meters (7,200 ft) and the lower moraine lies at an altitude of about 1,800 meters (5,900 ft). The lower moraine occurs about 15 kilometers (9.3 mi) downstream from Lake Balık. Both moraines are about 30 meters (98 ft) high. It

496-613: A bottle, considering the water holy. On 8 November [ O.S. 27 October] 1829, Parrot and Abovian together with the Akhuri hunter Sahak's brother Hako, acting as a guide, climbed up Lesser Ararat. Other early notable climbers of Ararat included Russian climatologist and meteorologist Kozma Spassky-Avtonomov (August 1834), Karl Behrens (1835), German mineralogist and geologist Otto Wilhelm Hermann von Abich (29 July 1845), British politician Henry Danby Seymour (1848) and British army officer Major Robert Stuart (1856). Later in

620-520: A consistent Proto-Indo-European pattern distinct from Iranian, and that the inflectional morphology was different from that of Iranian languages. The hypothesis that Greek is Armenian's closest living relative originates with Holger Pedersen (1924), who noted that the number of Greek-Armenian lexical cognates is greater than that of agreements between Armenian and any other Indo-European language. Antoine Meillet (1925, 1927) further investigated morphological and phonological agreement and postulated that

744-516: A few basaltic lava flows . These volcanic rocks were erupted from approximately north northwest–south southeast-trending extensional faults and fissures prior to the development of Mount Ararat. Second, a cone-building phase began when the volcanic activity became localized at a point along a fissure. During this phase, the eruption of successive flows of lava up to 150 meters (490 ft) thick and pyroclastic flows of andesite and dacite composition and later eruption of basaltic lava flows, formed

868-500: A half-dozen other forms are in gradual decline and are being replaced by the i -form, which has virtually attained the status of a regular form: գիտութ եանց գիտութիւն ով Like English and some other languages, Armenian has definite and indefinite articles. The indefinite article in Western Armenian is /mə/ , which follows the noun: ator mə ('a chair', Nom.sg), atori mə ('of a chair', Gen.sg) The definite article

992-651: A kingdom that existed in the Armenian Highlands in the 9th–6th centuries BC. The mountain is known as Ararat in European languages, however, none of the native peoples have traditionally referred to the mountain by that name. This mountain was not called by the name Ararat until the Middle Ages ; early Armenian historians considered the biblical Ararat to be in Corduene . Ayrarat , the central province of

1116-1198: A lion along with the Armenian eternity sign . The mountain appears on the emblem of the Armenian Catholic Ordinariate of Armenia and Eastern Europe . Ararat appeared on the coat of arms of the Armenian Oblast and the Georgia-Imeretia Governorate ( image ), subdivisions of the Russian Empire that included the northern flanks of the mountain. They were adopted in 1833 and 1843, respectively. Armenian language Pontic Steppe Caucasus East Asia Eastern Europe Northern Europe Pontic Steppe Northern/Eastern Steppe Europe South Asia Steppe Europe Caucasus India Indo-Aryans Iranians East Asia Europe East Asia Europe Indo-Aryan Iranian Indo-Aryan Iranian Others European Armenian

1240-468: A loan from Armenian (compare to Armenian եւ yev , ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₁epi ). Other loans from Armenian into Urartian includes personal names, toponyms, and names of deities. Loan words from Iranian languages , along with the other ancient accounts such as that of Xenophon above, initially led some linguists to erroneously classify Armenian as an Iranian language. Scholars such as Paul de Lagarde and F. Müller believed that

1364-527: A narrow strip of Turkish territory containing the E99 road which enters Nakhchivan at 39°39′19″N 44°48′12″E  /  39.6553°N 44.8034°E  / 39.6553; 44.8034 . From the 16th century until 1828 the range was part of the Ottoman-Persian border; Great Ararat's summit and the northern slopes, along with the eastern slopes of Little Ararat were controlled by Persia. Following

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1488-425: A network of schools where modern Armenian was taught, dramatically increased the rate of literacy (in spite of the obstacles by the colonial administrators), even in remote rural areas. The emergence of literary works entirely written in the modern versions increasingly legitimized the language's existence. By the turn of the 20th century both varieties of the one modern Armenian language prevailed over Grabar and opened

1612-685: A new edition of the Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger was released by UNESCO in which the Western Armenian language in Turkey was defined as a definitely endangered language . In modern day Armenia, there is a municipality called Gyumri , the city took host to large numbers of Armenian refugees fleeing the Ottoman Empire from the Armenian Genocide. Many of these people spoke

1736-515: A three-way distinction of stops and affricates (one voiced and two voiceless: one plain and one aspirated ), Western Armenian has kept only a two-way distinction (one voiced and one aspirated). For example, Classical Armenian has three bilabial stops ( /b/ ⟨բ⟩ , /p/ ⟨պ⟩ , and /pʰ/ ⟨փ⟩ ), but Western Armenian has only two bilabial stops ( /b/ ⟨պ⟩ and /pʰ/ ⟨բ⟩ / ⟨փ⟩ ). Secondly, Western Armenian has both changed

1860-448: A wide north–south-trending crack. This crack is the surface expression of an extensional fault . Numerous parasitic cones and lava domes have been built by flank eruptions along this fault and on the flanks of both of the main volcanic cones. Mount Ararat lies within a complex, sinistral pull-apart basin that originally was a single, continuous depression. The growth of Mount Ararat partitioned this depression into two smaller basins,

1984-700: Is Grîdax , which is composed of the word grî , presumably a corrupted version of the Kurdish girê , meaning hill, or Agirî , and dax , which is the Turkish dağ , meaning mountain. The traditional Armenian name is Masis ( Մասիս [maˈsis] ; sometimes Massis ). However, nowadays, the terms Masis and Ararat are both widely, often interchangeably, used in Armenian. The folk etymology found in Movses Khorenatsi 's History of Armenia derives

2108-598: Is کوه نوح ( [ˈkuːhe ˈnuːh] , Kūh-e Nūḥ ), literally the "mountain of Noah". In classical antiquity , particularly in Strabo 's Geographica , the peaks of Ararat were known in ancient Greek as Ἄβος ( Abos ) and Νίβαρος ( Nibaros ). Mount Ararat is located in the Eastern Anatolia Region of Turkey, between the provinces of Ağrı and Iğdır , near the border with Iran , Armenia and Nakhchivan exclave of Azerbaijan , between

2232-507: Is 3,896 m (12,782 ft). The Ararat massif is about 35 km (22 mi) wide at ground base. The first recorded efforts to reach Ararat's summit were made in the Middle Ages, and Friedrich Parrot , Khachatur Abovian , and four others made the first recorded ascent in 1829. In Europe, the mountain has been called by the name Ararat since the Middle Ages , as it began to be identified with " mountains of Ararat " described in

2356-514: Is a steep-sided volcanic cone that is larger and higher than the eastern volcanic cone. Greater Ararat is about 25 kilometers (16 mi) wide at the base and rises about 3 kilometers (1.9 mi) above the adjacent floors of the Iğdir and Doğubeyazıt basins. The eastern volcanic cone, Lesser Ararat, is 3,896 meters (12,782 ft) high and 15 kilometers (9.3 mi) across. These volcanic cones, which lie 13 kilometers (8.1 mi) apart, are separated by

2480-429: Is a suffix attached to the noun, and is one of two forms, either -n (when the final sound is a vowel) or -ə (when the final sound is a consonant). When the word is followed by al (ալ = also, too), the conjunction u (ու), or the present or imperfect conjugated forms of the verb em (to be); however, it will always take -n : but: The indefinite article becomes mən when it is followed by al (ալ = also, too) or

2604-458: Is a tense in its own right, and takes no other particles or constructions. The "present" tense in Western Armenian is based on three conjugations ( a, e, i ): The present tense (as we know it in English) is made by adding the particle gə before the "present" form, except the defective verbs em (I am), gam (I exist, I'm there), unim (I have), kidem (I know) and gərnam (I can), while

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2728-485: Is an Indo-European language belonging to the Armenic branch of the family, along side Eastern and Classical Armenian . According to Glottolog , Antioch , Artial, Asia Minor, Bolu , Hamshenic , Kilikien , Mush -Tigranakert, Stanoz, Vanic and Yozgat are the main dialects of Western Armenian. Eastern Armenian and Western Armenian are, for the most part, mutually intelligible for educated or literate users of

2852-552: Is an independent branch of the Indo-European languages . It is of interest to linguists for its distinctive phonological changes within that family. Armenian exhibits more satemization than centumization , although it is not classified as belonging to either of these subgroups. Some linguists tentatively conclude that Armenian, Greek (and Phrygian ), Albanian and Indo-Iranian were dialectally close to each other; within this hypothetical dialect group, Proto-Armenian

2976-561: Is clearly the dialect to be most closely related to Armenian. Eric P. Hamp (1976, 91) supports the Graeco-Armenian thesis and even anticipates a time "when we should speak of Helleno-Armenian" (meaning the postulate of a Graeco-Armenian proto-language). Armenian shares the augment and a negator derived from the set phrase in the Proto-Indo-European language * ne h₂oyu kʷid ("never anything" or "always nothing"),

3100-499: Is depicted along with the ark on its peak on the shield on an orange background. The emblem of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic (Soviet Armenia) was created by the painters Martiros Saryan and Hakob Kojoyan in 1921. Mount Ararat is depicted in the center and makes up a large portion of it. It is also depicted on the emblem and flag of Yerevan since 2004. It is portrayed on the breast of

3224-634: Is depicted on the coat of arms of Armenia along with Noah's Ark. Mount Ararat forms a near- quadripoint between Turkey , Iran , Armenia , and the Nakhchivan exclave of Azerbaijan . Its summit is located some 16 km (10 mi) west of both the Iranian border and the border of the Nakhchivan exclave of Azerbaijan, and 32 km (20 mi) south of the Armenian border. The Turkish-Armenian-Azerbaijani and Turkish-Iranian-Azerbaijani tripoints are some 8 km (5 mi) apart, separated by

3348-474: Is derived from Proto-Indo-European *h₂r̥ǵipyós , with cognates in Sanskrit (ऋजिप्य, ṛjipyá ), Avestan ( ərəzifiia ), and Greek (αἰγίπιος, aigípios ). Hrach Martirosyan and Armen Petrosyan propose additional borrowed words of Armenian origin loaned into Urartian and vice versa, including grammatical words and parts of speech, such as Urartian eue ("and"), attested in the earliest Urartian texts and likely

3472-457: Is not an official language of any state, Western Armenian faces extinction as its native speakers lose fluency in Western Armenian amid pressures to assimilate into their host countries. According to Ethnologue, there are 1.58 million native speakers of Western Armenian, primarily in Turkey, Armenia, Georgia, Lebanon, and Iraq. The language is classified as 6b (i.e., threatened, with interruptions in intergenerational transmission). Western Armenian

3596-415: Is not considered conclusive evidence of a period of common isolated development. There are words used in Armenian that are generally believed to have been borrowed from Anatolian languages, particularly from Luwian , although some researchers have identified possible Hittite loanwords as well. One notable loanword from Anatolian is Armenian xalam , "skull", cognate to Hittite ḫalanta , "head". In 1985,

3720-652: Is one of the two standardized forms of Modern Armenian , the other being Eastern Armenian . It is based mainly on the Istanbul Armenian dialect , as opposed to Eastern Armenian, which is mainly based on the Yerevan Armenian dialect . Until the early 20th century, various Western Armenian dialects were spoken in the Ottoman Empire , predominantly in the historically Armenian populated regions of Western Armenia . The dialectal varieties of Western Armenian currently in use include Homshetsi , spoken by

3844-417: Is probably more accurate. The current elevation may be as low as 5,125 m (16,814 ft) due to the melting of its snow -covered ice cap . The ice cap on the summit of Mount Ararat has been shrinking since at least 1957. In the late 1950s, Blumenthal observed that there existed 11 outlet glaciers emerging from a summit snow mass that covered about 10 km (3.9 sq mi). At that time, it

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3968-699: Is suspected that Lake Balık occupies a glacial basin. Mount Ararat is a polygenic, compound stratovolcano . Covering an area of 1,100 km (420 sq mi), it is the largest volcanic edifice within the region. Along its northwest–southeast trending long axis, Mount Ararat is about 45 kilometers (28 mi) long and is about 30 kilometers (19 mi) long along its short axis. It consists of about 1,150 km (280 cu mi) of dacitic and rhyolitic pyroclastic debris and dacitic, rhyolitic, and basaltic lavas . Mount Ararat consists of two distinct volcanic cones, Greater Ararat and Lesser Ararat ( Little Ararat ). The western volcanic cone, Greater Ararat,

4092-538: Is the Hebrew name of Urartu , the geographical predecessor of Armenia; they argue that the word referred to the wider region at the time and not specifically to Mount Ararat. The phrase is translated as "mountains of Armenia" ( montes Armeniae ) in the Vulgate . Nevertheless, Ararat is traditionally considered the resting-place of Noah's Ark, and, thus, regarded as a biblical mountain. Mount Ararat has been associated with

4216-696: Is the first language of about 3,000 people of Armenian descent. Forms of the Karin dialect of Western Armenian are spoken by several hundred thousand people in Northern Armenia, mostly in Gyumri , Artik , Akhuryan , and around 130 villages in the Shirak province , and by Armenians in Samtskhe–Javakheti province of Georgia ( Akhalkalaki , Akhaltsikhe ). A mostly diasporic language and one that

4340-593: Is the third most prominent mountain in West Asia . An elevation of 5,165 m (16,946 ft) for Mount Ararat is given by some encyclopedias and reference works such as Merriam-Webster's Geographical Dictionary and Encyclopedia of World Geography . However, a number of sources, such as the United States Geological Survey and numerous topographic maps indicate that the alternatively widespread figure of 5,137 m (16,854 ft)

4464-572: Is the working language. Armenian (without reference to a specific variety) is officially recognized as a minority language in Cyprus , Hungary , Iraq , Poland , Romania , and Ukraine . It is recognized as a minority language and protected in Turkey by the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne . Western Armenian Western Armenian ( Western Armenian : Արեւմտահայերէն , romanized:  Arevmdahayeren [ɑɾɛvmədɑhɑjɛˈɾɛn] )

4588-404: Is thus considered the legendary founding father (patriarch) and the name giver of the Armenian people. According to Razmik Panossian , this legend "makes Armenia the cradle of all civilisation since Noah's Ark landed on the 'Armenian' mountain of Ararat. [...] it connects Armenians to the biblical narrative of human development. [...] it makes Mount Ararat the national symbol of all Armenians, and

4712-494: Is used for the glide after vowels. The IPA / ɑj / (like English long i) and / uj / diphthongs are common, while / ej / (English long a), / ij, iə / (a stretched-out long e), and / oj / (oy) are rare. The following examples are sometimes across syllable and morpheme boundaries, and gliding is then expected: This is the Western Armenian Consonantal System using letters from

4836-433: Is usually considered the earliest reference for the tradition of Mount Ararat as the landing place of the ark in European literature. John Mandeville is another early author who mentioned Mount Ararat, "where Noah's ship rested, and it is still there". The ark on Ararat was often depicted in mappae mundi as early as the 11th century. Most Christians, including most of Western Christianity , identify Mount Ararat with

4960-633: The Seyahatnâme . Despite the supposed meaning in Turkish Ağrı Dağı as "pain mountain" and Kurdish Çiyayê Agirî as "fiery mountain", some linguists underline a relationship between the mountain's name and a village on its slopes called Ağori that was decimated after a landslide in 1840. The exact meaning of these related names remains unknown. The Kurdish name of the mountain is Çiyayê Agirî ( [t͡ʃɪjaːˈje aːgɪˈriː] ), which translates to "fiery mountain". An alternative Kurdish name

5084-543: The 1826–28 Russo-Persian War and the Treaty of Turkmenchay , the Persian controlled territory was ceded to the Russian Empire. Little Ararat became the point where the Turkish, Persian, and Russian imperial frontiers converged. The current international boundaries were formed throughout the 20th century. The mountain came under Turkish control during the 1920 Turkish–Armenian War . It formally became part of Turkey according to

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5208-807: The Abeghian orthography, was introduced in the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic and is still used by most Eastern Armenian speakers from modern Armenia. However, it has not been adopted by Eastern Armenian speakers of Iran and their diaspora or by speakers of Western Armenian, with the exception of periodical publications published in Romania and Bulgaria while under Communist regimes. Western Armenian nouns have four grammatical cases : nominative - accusative (subject / direct object), genitive - dative (possession / indirect object), ablative (origin) and instrumental (means). Of

5332-613: The Aras and Murat rivers. The Serdarbulak lava plateau , at 2600 meters of elevation, separates the peaks of Greater and Little Ararat. There are Doğubayazıt Reeds on the western slopes of Mount Ararat. Mount Ararat's summit is located some 16 km (10 mi) west of the Turkey-Iran border and 32 km (20 mi) south of the Turkey-Armenia border. The Ararat plain runs along its northwest to western side. Ararat

5456-466: The Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia (11–14th centuries) resulted in the addition of two more characters to the alphabet (" օ " and " ֆ "), bringing the total number to 38. The Book of Lamentations by Gregory of Narek (951–1003) is an example of the development of a literature and writing style of Old Armenian by the 10th century. In addition to elevating the literary style and vocabulary of

5580-508: The Armenian genocide , mostly in the diaspora ). The differences between them are considerable but they are mutually intelligible after significant exposure. Some subdialects such as Homshetsi are not mutually intelligible with other varieties. Although Armenians were known to history much earlier (for example, they were mentioned in the 6th-century BC Behistun Inscription and in Xenophon 's 4th century BC history, The Anabasis ),

5704-595: The Greater Armenia , is believed to originate from the same name. The Turkish name Mount Ağrı ( Ağrı Dağı , [aːɾɯ da.ɯ] ; Ottoman Turkish : آغـر طﺎﻍ , romanized :  Āġır Ṭāġ , [aːɣæɾ taɣ] ), has been known since the late Middle Ages . Although the word "ağrı" literally translates to "pain" the current name is considered a derivative of the mountain's initial Turkish name "Ağır Dağ" which translates as "heavy mountain". The 17th century explorer Evliya Çelebi referred to it as Ağrî in

5828-641: The Greek language , the Armenian language, and the Indo-Iranian languages . Graeco-Aryan unity would have become divided into Proto-Greek and Proto-Indo-Iranian by the mid-3rd millennium BC. Conceivably, Proto-Armenian would have been located between Proto-Greek and Proto-Indo-Iranian, consistent with the fact that Armenian shares certain features only with Indo-Iranian (the satem change) but others only with Greek ( s > h ). Graeco-Aryan has comparatively wide support among Indo-Europeanists who believe

5952-882: The Hemshin peoples , who were Muslim converts, did not fall victim to the Armenian genocide. Western Armenian isn't just predominant for Armenian's in the Middle East, the Armenians living in Southeastern Europe/Balkans, mostly Bulgaria , Romania , Greece , and Turkey ( Istanbul ) are Western Armenian speakers, who immigrated of the Armenian Genocide . Historically there was presence of Western Armenians (Cilicians) in Moldova . On 21 February 2009, International Mother Language Day ,

6076-568: The Hemshin peoples ; the dialects of Armenians in Kessab , Latakia and Jisr al-Shughur in Syria, Anjar in Lebanon, and Istanbul and Vakıflı , in Turkey (part of the "Sueidia" dialect). The Sasun and Mush dialects are also spoken in modern-day Armenian villages such as Bazmaberd and Sasnashen. The Cilician dialect is also spoken in Cyprus , where it is taught in Armenian schools (Nareg), and

6200-643: The Indo-European homeland to be located in the Armenian Highlands , the " Armenian hypothesis ". Early and strong evidence was given by Euler's 1979 examination on shared features in Greek and Sanskrit nominal flection. Used in tandem with the Graeco-Armenian hypothesis, the Armenian language would also be included under the label Aryano-Greco-Armenic , splitting into Proto-Greek/Phrygian and "Armeno-Aryan" (ancestor of Armenian and Indo-Iranian ). Classical Armenian (Arm: grabar ), attested from

6324-570: The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), followed by the corresponding Armenian letter in brackets. The /f/ in Armenian is rare; the letter "ֆ" was added to the alphabet much later. The /w/ glide is not used except for foreign proper nouns, like Washington (by utilizing the "u" vowel, Armenian "ու"). Differences in phonology between Western Armenian and Classical Armenian include the distinction of stops and affricates . Firstly, while Classical Armenian has

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6448-728: The Karin dialect of Armenian , which is spoken in Gyumri but overtime many Eastern Armenian and Russian words have been borrowed into the dialect . There was also a wave of Armenians coming from the Middle East who were Western Armenian , who moved to the Soviet Union , mostly in Soviet Armenia . Many have assimilated into the Eastern Armenian dialect. With Western Armenian being declared an endangered language, there has been recent pushback on reviving

6572-542: The Mekhitarists . The first Armenian periodical, Azdarar , was published in grabar in 1794. The classical form borrowed numerous words from Middle Iranian languages , primarily Parthian , and contains smaller inventories of loanwords from Greek, Syriac, Aramaic, Arabic, Mongol, Persian, and indigenous languages such as Urartian . An effort to modernize the language in Bagratid Armenia and

6696-670: The Māšu (Mashu) mountain mentioned in the Epic of Gilgamesh , which sounded like Māsu in Assyrian. The name meant "twin", referring to the twin peaks of the mountain. Erkuahi , a land mentioned in Urartian texts and identified with Mt. Ararat, could reflect the native Armenian form of this same name (compare to Armenian erku (երկու, "two")). Today, both Ararat and Masis are common male first names among Armenians. The traditional Persian name

6820-650: The University of Dorpat arrived at Etchmiadzin in mid-September 1829, almost two years after the Russian capture of Yerevan , for the sole purpose of exploring Ararat. The prominent Armenian writer Khachatur Abovian , then a deacon and translator at Etchmiadzin, was assigned by Catholicos Yeprem, the head of the Armenian Church, as interpreter and guide. Parrot and Abovian crossed the Aras River into

6944-472: The sacred mountain was "to tie the womb of the mother of all mankind in a dragonish mode". By contrast, in the 21st century to climb Ararat is "the most highly valued goal of some of the patriotic pilgrimages that are organized in growing number from Armenia and the Armenian diaspora". The first recorded ascent of the mountain in modern times took place on 9 October [ O.S. 27 September] 1829. The Baltic German naturalist Friedrich Parrot of

7068-407: The "two great objects of Armenian veneration". He noted that the "noble snowy mountain takes the place, in the estimation of the Armenians, that Mount Sinai and the traditional Mount Zion do among the adherents of other Eastern Christians ". Jonathan Smele called Ararat and the medieval capital of Ani the "most cherished symbols of Armenian identity". The Genesis flood narrative was linked to

7192-575: The 1921 Treaty of Moscow and Treaty of Kars . In the late 1920s, Turkey crossed the Iranian border and occupied the eastern flank of Lesser Ararat as part of its effort to quash the Kurdish Ararat rebellion , during which the Kurdish rebels used the area as a safe haven against the Turkish state. Iran eventually agreed to cede the area to Turkey in a territorial exchange . The Iran-Turkey boundary skirts east of Lesser Ararat (or Little Ararat),

7316-495: The 1958 glacier tongues. Blumenthal explained the absence of such moraines by the lack of confining ridges to control glaciers, insufficient debris load in the ice to form moraines, and their burial by later eruptions. Years later, Birman observed on the south-facing slopes a possible moraine that extends at least 300 meters (980 ft) in altitude below the base of the 1958 ice cap at an elevation of 4,200 meters (13,800 ft). He also found two morainal deposits that were created by

7440-683: The 19th century, two British politicians and scholars— James Bryce (1876) and H. F. B. Lynch (1893)—climbed the mountain. The first winter climb was by Turkish alpinist Bozkurt Ergör, the former president of the Turkish Mountaineering Federation , who climbed the peak on 21 February 1970. According to the Book of Genesis of the Old Testament , Noah's Ark landed on the " mountains of Ararat " ( Genesis 8:4 ). Historians and Bible scholars generally agree that "Ararat"

7564-449: The 19th-century era of romantic nationalism , when an Armenian state did not exist, Ararat symbolized the historical Armenian nation-state. In 1861 Armenian poet Mikael Nalbandian , witnessing the Italian unification , wrote to Harutiun Svadjian in a letter from Naples : " Etna and Vesuvius are still smoking; is there no fire left in the old volcano of Ararat?" Theodore Edward Dowling wrote in 1910 that Ararat and Etchmiadzin are

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7688-408: The 5th century to the 19th century as the literary standard (up to the 11th century also as a spoken language with different varieties), was partially superseded by Middle Armenian , attested from the 12th century to the 18th century. Specialized literature prefers "Old Armenian" for grabar as a whole, and designates as "Classical" the language used in the 5th century literature, "Post-Classical" from

7812-408: The Arabian platform with Laurasia closed and eliminated the Tethys Ocean from the area of what is now Anatolia. The closure of these masses of continental crust collapsed this ocean basin by middle Eocene and resulted in a progressive shallowing of the remnant seas, until the end of the early Miocene. Post-collisional tectonic convergence within the collision zone resulted in the total elimination of

7936-403: The Armenian myth of origin by the early medieval historian Movses Khorenatsi . In his History of Armenia , he wrote that Noah and his family first settled in Armenia and later moved to Babylon . Hayk , a descendant of Japheth , a son of Noah, revolted against Bel (the biblical Nimrod ) and returned to the area around Mount Ararat, where he established the roots of the Armenian nation. He

8060-481: The Armenian language by adding well above a thousand new words, through his other hymns and poems Gregory paved the way for his successors to include secular themes and vernacular language in their writings. The thematic shift from mainly religious texts to writings with secular outlooks further enhanced and enriched the vocabulary. "A Word of Wisdom", a poem by Hovhannes Sargavak devoted to a starling, legitimizes poetry devoted to nature, love, or female beauty. Gradually,

8184-408: The Bible as the resting-place of Noah's Ark , despite contention that Genesis 8:4 does not refer specifically to a Mount Ararat. Although lying outside the borders of modern Armenia , the mountain is the principal national symbol of Armenia and has been considered a sacred mountain by Armenians. It has featured prominently in Armenian literature and art and is an icon for Armenian irredentism . It

8308-712: The Classical Armenian voiced stops and voiced affricates to aspirated stops and aspirated affricates and replaced the plain stops and affricates with voiced consonants. Specifically, here are the shifts from Classical Armenian to Western Armenian: As a result, a word like [dʒuɹ] 'water' (spelled ⟨ջուր⟩ in Classical Armenian) is cognate with Western Armenian [tʃʰuɹ] (also spelled ⟨ջուր⟩ ). However, [tʰoɹ] 'grandson' and [kʰaɹ] 'stone' are pronounced similarly in both Classical and Western Armenian. Western Armenian uses Classical Armenian orthography , also known as traditional Mashtotsian orthography. The Armenian orthography reform , commonly known as

8432-428: The Genesis account since the 11th century, and Armenians began to identify it as the ark's landing place during that time. F. C. Conybeare wrote that the mountain was "a center and focus of pagan myths and cults… and it was only in the eleventh century, after these had vanished from the popular mind, that the Armenian theologians ventured to locate on its eternal snows the resting-place of Noah's ark". William of Rubruck

8556-440: The Greater Ararat cone with a low conical profile. Third, during a climatic phase , copious flows of andesitic and basaltic lavas were erupted. During this phase, the current cones of Greater and Lesser Ararat were formed as eruptions along subsidiary fissures and cracks and flank occurred. Finally, the volcanic eruptions at Mount Ararat transitioned into a flank eruption phase , during which a major north–south-trending fault offset

8680-403: The Hurro-Urartian and Northeast Caucasian origins for these words and instead suggest native Armenian etymologies, leaving the possibility that these words may have been loaned into Hurro-Urartian and Caucasian languages from Armenian, and not vice versa. A notable example is arciv , meaning "eagle", believed to have been the origin of Urartian Arṣibi and Northeast Caucasian arzu . This word

8804-455: The Iğdir and Doğubeyazıt basins. This pull-apart basin is the result of strike-slip movement along two en-echelon fault segments, the Doğubeyazıt–Gürbulak and Iğdir Faults , of a sinistral strike–slip fault system. Tension between these faults not only formed the original pull-apart basin, but created a system of faults, exhibiting a horsetail splay pattern, that control the position of the principal volcanic eruption centers of Mount Ararat and

8928-460: The Present or imperfect conjugated forms of the verb em (to be): but: Adjectives in Armenian do not decline for case or number, and precede the noun: Verbs in Armenian are based on two basic series of forms, a "present" form and an "imperfect" form. From this, all other tenses and moods are formed with various particles and constructions. There is a third form, the preterite, which in Armenian

9052-669: The Russian Empire), removed almost all of their Turkish lexical influences in the 20th century, primarily following the Armenian genocide . In addition to Armenia and Turkey, where it is indigenous , Armenian is spoken among the diaspora . According to Ethnologue , globally there are 1.6 million Western Armenian speakers and 3.7 million Eastern Armenian speakers, totalling 5.3 million Armenian speakers. In Georgia, Armenian speakers are concentrated in Ninotsminda and Akhalkalaki districts where they represent over 90% of

9176-404: The Russian and Ottoman empires led to creation of two separate and different environments under which Armenians lived. Halfway through the 19th century, two important concentrations of Armenian communities were further consolidated. Because of persecutions or the search for better economic opportunities, many Armenians living under Ottoman rule gradually moved to Istanbul , whereas Tbilisi became

9300-833: The Soviet linguist Igor M. Diakonoff noted the presence in Classical Armenian of what he calls a "Caucasian substratum" identified by earlier scholars, consisting of loans from the Kartvelian and Northeast Caucasian languages . Noting that Hurro-Urartian-speaking peoples inhabited the Armenian homeland in the second millennium BC, Diakonoff identifies in Armenian a Hurro-Urartian substratum of social, cultural, and animal and plant terms such as ałaxin "slave girl" ( ← Hurr. al(l)a(e)ḫḫenne ), cov "sea" ( ← Urart. ṣûǝ "(inland) sea"), ułt "camel" ( ← Hurr. uḷtu ), and xnjor "apple (tree)" ( ← Hurr. ḫinzuri ). Some of

9424-505: The area of Mount Ararat in 139, 368, 851–893, and 1319 AD. During the 139 AD earthquake, a large landslide that caused many casualties and was similar to the 1840 AD landslide originated from the summit of Mount Ararat. A phreatic eruption occurred on Mount Ararat on July 2, 1840 and pyroclastic flow from radial fissures on the upper north flank of the mountain and a possibly associated earthquake of magnitude 7.4 that caused severe damage and numerous casualties. Up to 10,000 people died in

9548-643: The associated linear belt of parasitic volcanic cones. The strike-slip fault system within which Mount Ararat is located is the result of north–south convergence and tectonic compression between the Arabian Platform and Laurasia that continued after the Tethys Ocean closed during the Eocene epoch along the Bitlis–Zagros suture . During the early Eocene and early Miocene , the collision of

9672-677: The biblical mountains of Ararat "largely because it would have been the first peak to emerge from the receding flood waters". H. G. O. Dwight wrote in 1856 that it is "the general opinion of the learned in Europe" that the Ark landed on Ararat. James Bryce wrote that the ark rested upon a "mountain in the district which the Hebrews knew as Ararat, or Armenia" in an 1878 article for the Royal Geographical Society , and he added that

9796-707: The biblical writer must have had Mount Ararat in mind because it is so "very much higher, more conspicuous, and more majestic than any other summit in Armenia". In 2001 Pope John Paul II declared in his homily in Yerevan's St. Gregory the Illuminator Cathedral : "We are close to Mount Ararat, where tradition says that the Ark of Noah came to rest." Patriarch Kirill of Moscow , the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, also mentioned it as

9920-434: The center of Armenians living under Russian rule. These two cosmopolitan cities very soon became the primary poles of Armenian intellectual and cultural life. The introduction of new literary forms and styles, as well as many new ideas sweeping Europe, reached Armenians living in both regions. This created an ever-growing need to elevate the vernacular, Ashkharhabar, to the dignity of a modern literary language, in contrast to

10044-411: The center of the Armenian Church. Despite numerous reports of ark sightings (e.g. Ararat anomaly ) and rumors, "no scientific evidence of the ark has emerged". Searches for Noah's Ark are considered by scholars an example of pseudoarchaeology . Kenneth Feder writes: "As the flood story itself is unsupported by any archaeological evidence, it is not surprising that there is no archaeological evidence for

10168-522: The continuing north–south shortening deformation of Anatolia. In their detailed study and summary of the Quaternary volcanism of Anatolia, Yilmaz et al. recognized four phases to the construction of Mount Ararat from volcanic rocks exposed in glacial valleys deeply carved into its flanks. First, they recognized a fissure eruption phase of Plinian-subPlinian fissure eruptions that deposited more than 700 meters (2,300 ft) of pyroclastic rocks and

10292-608: The district of Surmali and headed to the Armenian village of Akhuri on the northern slope of Ararat, 1,220 metres (4,000 ft) above sea level. They set up a base camp at the Armenian monastery of St. Hakob some 730 metres (2,400 ft) higher, at an elevation of 1,943 metres (6,375 ft). After two failed attempts, they reached the summit on their third attempt at 3:15 p.m. on October 9, 1829. The group included Parrot, Abovian, two Russian soldiers – Aleksei Zdorovenko and Matvei Chalpanov – and two Armenian Akhuri villagers – Hovhannes Aivazian and Murad Poghosian. Parrot measured

10416-544: The dominant Armenian variety, but as a result of the Armenian genocide , the speakers of Western Armenian were mostly murdered or exiled. Those who fled to Eastern Armenia now speak either Eastern Armenian or have a diglossic situation between Western Armenian dialects in informal usage and an Eastern Armenian standard. The only Western Armenian dialect still spoken in Western Armenia is the Homshetsi dialect , since

10540-623: The earthquake, including 1,900 villagers in the village of Akhuri (Armenian: Akori, modern Yenidoğan ) who were killed by a gigantic landslide and subsequent debris flow . In addition, this combination of landslide and debris flow destroyed the Armenian monastery of St. Jacob near Akori, the town of Aralik , several villages, and Russian military barracks. It also temporarily dammed the Sevjur (Metsamor) River. The 13th century missionary William of Rubruck wrote that "Many have tried to climb it, but none has been able." The Armenian Apostolic Church

10664-469: The elevation at 5,250 metres (17,220 ft) using a mercury barometer. This was not only the first recorded ascent of Ararat, but also the second highest elevation climbed by man up to that date outside of Mount Licancabur in the Chilean Andes. Abovian dug a hole in the ice and erected a wooden cross facing north. Abovian also picked up a chunk of ice from the summit and carried it down with him in

10788-509: The existence of an impossibly large boat dating to 5,000 years ago." Despite lying outside the borders of modern Armenia, Ararat has historically been associated with Armenia, and Armenians have been called the "people of Ararat". It is widely considered the country's principal national symbol . The image of Ararat, usually framed within a nationalizing discourse, is ubiquitous in everyday material culture in Armenia. Tsypylma Darieva argues that Armenians have "a sense of possession of Ararat in

10912-513: The existence of the two modern versions of the same language was sanctioned even more clearly. The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic (1920–1990) used Eastern Armenian as its official language, whereas the diaspora created after the Armenian genocide preserved the Western Armenian dialect. The two modern literary dialects, Western (originally associated with writers in the Ottoman Empire) and Eastern (originally associated with writers in

11036-437: The future is made by adding bidi : For the exceptions: bidi əllam, unenam, kidnam, garenam (I shall be, have, know, be able). In vernacular language, the particle "gor" is added after the verb to indicate present progressive tense. The distinction is not made in literary Armenian. The verb without any particles constitutes the subjunctive mood, such as "if I eat, should I eat, that I eat, I wish I eat": In informal speech,

11160-425: The hypothetical Mushki language may have been a (now extinct) Armenic language. W. M. Austin (1942) concluded that there was early contact between Armenian and Anatolian languages , based on what he considered common archaisms, such as the lack of a feminine gender and the absence of inherited long vowels. Unlike shared innovations (or synapomorphies ), the common retention of archaisms (or symplesiomorphy )

11284-410: The ice cap on top of Mount Ararat had lost 29% of its total area at an average rate of ice loss of 0.07 km (0.027 sq mi) per year over 35 years. This rate is consistent with the general rates of retreat of other Turkish summit glaciers and ice caps that have been documented by other studies. According to a 2020 study by Yalcin, "if the glacial withdrawals continue with the same acceleration,

11408-470: The interests of the population at large were reflected in other literary works as well. Konsdantin Yerzinkatsi and several others took the unusual step of criticizing the ecclesiastic establishment and addressing the social issues of the Armenian homeland. These changes represented the nature of the literary style and syntax, but they did not constitute immense changes to the fundamentals of the grammar or

11532-502: The land of Ararat". Ararat has traditionally been the main focus of the searches for Noah's Ark . Augustin Calmet wrote in his 1722 biblical dictionary: "It is affirmed, but without proof, that there are still remains of Noah's ark on the top of this mountain; but M. de Tournefort , who visited this spot, has assured us there was nothing like it; that the top of mount Ararat is inaccessible, both by reason of its great height, and of

11656-746: The language in Los Angeles , which is home to the largest concentration of Western Armenians. Shushan Karapetian , in her evaluation of both the Eastern and Western dialects of Armenian, concludes that heritage languages, in the face of an English dominant society, rapidly die out within no more than 2 generations, calling America a "linguistic graveyard." In US census data, the percentage of people of Armenian ancestry who speak Western Armenian at home has rapidly declined, down from 25% in 1980 to 16% in 2000. Western Armenian has eight monophthongs. Western Armenian has ten environments in which two vowels in

11780-434: The late 5th to 8th centuries, and "Late Grabar" that of the period covering the 8th to 11th centuries. Later, it was used mainly in religious and specialized literature, with the exception of a revival during the early modern period, when attempts were made to establish it as the language of a literary renaissance, with neoclassical inclinations, through the creation and dissemination of literature in varied genres, especially by

11904-645: The lower peak of the Ararat massif. As of 2004 the mountain was open to climbers only with "military permission". The procedure to obtain the permission involves submitting a formal request to a Turkish embassy for a special "Ararat visa", and it is mandatory to hire an official guide from the Turkish Federation for Alpinism. Ararat ( Western Armenian : Ararad ) is the Biblical Hebrew name ( אררט ʾrrṭ ) cognate with Assyrian Urartu , of

12028-572: The middle-late Miocene. During the late Miocene– Pliocene period, widespread volcanism blanketed the entire East Anatolian–Iranian plateau under thick volcanic rocks. This volcanic activity has continued uninterrupted until historical times. Apparently, it reached a climax during the latest Miocene–Pliocene, 6 to 3 Ma. During the Quaternary , the volcanism became restricted to a few local volcanoes such as Mount Ararat. These volcanoes are typically associated with north–south tensional fractures formed by

12152-567: The morphology of the language. Often, when writers codify a spoken dialect, other language users are then encouraged to imitate that structure through the literary device known as parallelism . In the 19th century, the traditional Armenian homeland was once again divided. This time Eastern Armenia was conquered from Qajar Iran by the Russian Empire , while Western Armenia , containing two thirds of historical Armenia, remained under Ottoman control. The antagonistic relationship between

12276-486: The name from king Amasya, the great-grandson of the legendary Armenian patriarch Hayk , who is said to have called it after himself. Various scholarly etymologies have been proposed. Anatoly Novoseltsev suggested that Masis derives from Middle Persian masist , "the largest". According to Sargis Petrosyan the mas root in Masis means "mountain", cf. Proto-Indo-European *mņs-. Armen Petrosyan suggested an origin from

12400-475: The northwest flank of Mount Ararat destroyed and buried at least one Kura–Araxes culture settlement and caused numerous fatalities in 2500–2400 BC. Oral histories indicated that a significant eruption of uncertain magnitude occurred in 550 BC and minor eruptions of uncertain nature might have occurred in 1450 AD and 1783 AD. According to the interpretation of historical and archaeological data, strong earthquakes not associated with volcanic eruptions also occurred in

12524-403: The now-anachronistic Grabar. Numerous dialects existed in the traditional Armenian regions, which, different as they were, had certain morphological and phonetic features in common. On the basis of these features two major standards emerged: Both centers vigorously pursued the promotion of Ashkharhabar. The proliferation of newspapers in both versions (Eastern & Western) and the development of

12648-541: The official status of the Armenian language. Eastern Armenian is the official variant used, making it the prestige variety while other variants have been excluded from national institutions. Indeed, Western Armenian is perceived by some as a mere dialect. Armenian was also official in the Republic of Artsakh . It is recognized as an official language of the Eurasian Economic Union although Russian

12772-639: The oldest surviving Armenian-language writing is etched in stone on Armenian temples and is called Mehenagir . The Armenian alphabet was created by Mesrop Mashtots in 405, at which time it had 36 letters. He is also credited by some with the creation of the Georgian alphabet and the Caucasian Albanian alphabet . While Armenian constitutes the sole member of the Armenian branch of the Indo-European family, Aram Kossian has suggested that

12896-470: The orthography appear next to each other, called diphthongs. By definition, they appear in the same syllable. For those unfamiliar with IPA symbols, / j / represents the English "y" sound. The Armenian letter "ե" is often used in combinations such as / ja / (ya) and / jo / (yo). If used at the beginning of a word, "ե" alone is sufficient to represent / jɛ / (as in yes). The Armenian letter "յ"

13020-588: The other, while illiterate or semiliterate users of lower registers of each one may have difficulty understanding the other variant. One phonological difference is that voiced stops in Eastern Armenian are voiceless in Western Armenian. Western Armenian is spoken by Armenians of most of the Southeastern Europe and Middle East except for Iran , and Rostov-on-Don in Russia . It is

13144-483: The parent languages of Greek and Armenian were dialects in immediate geographical proximity during the Proto-Indo-European period. Meillet's hypothesis became popular in the wake of his book Esquisse d'une histoire de la langue latine (1936). Georg Renatus Solta (1960) does not go as far as postulating a Proto-Graeco-Armenian stage, but he concludes that considering both the lexicon and morphology, Greek

13268-407: The path to a new and simplified grammatical structure of the language in the two different cultural spheres. Apart from several morphological, phonetic, and grammatical differences, the largely common vocabulary and generally analogous rules of grammatical fundamentals allows users of one variant to understand the other as long as they are fluent in one of the literary standards. After World War I ,

13392-483: The permanent glacier will likely turn into a temporary glacier by 2065." Blumenthal estimated that the snow line had been as low as 3,000 meters (9,800 ft) in elevation during the Late Pleistocene . Such a snow line would have created an ice cap of 100 km (39 sq mi) in extent. However, he observed a lack of any clear evidence of prehistoric moraines other than those which were close to

13516-480: The population. The short-lived First Republic of Armenia declared Armenian its official language. Eastern Armenian was then dominating in institutions and among the population. When Armenia was incorporated into the USSR, the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic made Eastern Armenian the language of the courts, government institutions and schools. Armenia was also russified . The current Republic of Armenia upholds

13640-599: The remaining seas from East Anatolia at the end of early Miocene, crustal shortening and thickening across the collision zone, and uplift of the East Anatolian–Iranian plateau. Accompanying this uplift was extensive deformation by faulting and folding, which resulted in the creation of numerous local basins. The north–south compressional deformation continues today as evidenced by ongoing faulting, volcanism, and seismicity. Within Anatolia, regional volcanism started in

13764-436: The representation of word-initial laryngeals by prothetic vowels, and other phonological and morphological peculiarities with Greek. Nevertheless, as Fortson (2004) comments, "by the time we reach our earliest Armenian records in the 5th century AD, the evidence of any such early kinship has been reduced to a few tantalizing pieces". Graeco-(Armeno)-Aryan is a hypothetical clade within the Indo-European family , ancestral to

13888-460: The resting-place of Noah's Ark in his speech at Etchmiadzin Cathedral in 2010. Those critical of this view-point out that Ararat was the name of the country at the time when Genesis was written, not specifically the mountain. Arnold wrote in his 2008 Genesis commentary, "The location 'on the mountains' of Ararat indicates not a specific mountain by that name, but rather the mountainous region of

14012-445: The sense of symbolic cultural property ". There is historical and modern mountain worship around it among Armenians. Ararat is known as the " holy mountain " of the Armenian people. It was principal to the pre-Christian Armenian mythology , where it was the home of the gods. With the rise of Christianity, the mythology associated with pagan worship of the mountain was lost. Ararat was the geographical center of ancient Armenia . In

14136-414: The similarities between the two languages meant that Armenian belonged to the Iranian language family . The distinctness of Armenian was recognized when philologist Heinrich Hübschmann (1875) used the comparative method to distinguish two layers of Iranian words from the older Armenian vocabulary . He showed that Armenian often had two morphemes for one concept, that the non-Iranian components yielded

14260-433: The six cases, the nominative and accusative are the same, except for personal pronouns, and the genitive and dative are the same, meaning that nouns have four distinct forms for case. Nouns in Armenian also decline for number (singular and plural). Declension in Armenian is based on how the genitive is formed, since all other cases are consistent. There are several declensions , but one is dominant (the genitive in i ) while

14384-426: The snow which perpetually covers it." Archaeological expeditions, sometimes supported by evangelical and millenarian churches, have been conducted since the 19th century in search of the ark. According to a 1974 book, around 200 people from more than 20 countries claimed to have seen the Ark on Ararat since 1856. A fragment from the ark supposedly found on Ararat is on display at the museum of Etchmiadzin Cathedral ,

14508-519: The terms he gives admittedly have an Akkadian or Sumerian provenance, but he suggests they were borrowed through Hurrian or Urartian. Given that these borrowings do not undergo sound changes characteristic of the development of Armenian from Proto-Indo-European , he dates their borrowing to a time before the written record but after the Proto-Armenian language stage. Contemporary linguists, such as Hrach Martirosyan , have rejected many of

14632-480: The territory around it the Armenian homeland from time immemorial ." Mount Ararat has been depicted on the coat of arms of Armenia consistently since 1918. The First Republic 's coat of arms was designed by architect Alexander Tamanian and painter Hakob Kojoyan . This coat of arms was readopted by the legislature of the Republic of Armenia on April 19, 1992, after Armenia regained its independence. Mount Ararat

14756-688: The two cones that developed along with a number of subsidiary fissures and cracks on the volcano's flanks. Along this fault and the subsidiary fissures and cracks, a number of parasitic cones and domes were built by minor eruptions. One subsidiary cone erupted voluminous basalt and andesite lava flows. They flowed across the Doğubeyazıt plain and along the southerly flowing Sarısu River. These lava flows formed black ʻaʻā and pāhoehoe lava flows that contain well preserved lava tubes . The radiometric dating of these lava flows yielded radiometric ages of 0.4, 0.48 and 0.81 Ma. Overall, radiometric ages obtained from

14880-511: The volcanic rocks erupted by Mount Ararat range from 1.5 to 0.02 Ma. The chronology of Holocene volcanic activity associated with Mount Ararat is documented by either archaeological excavations, oral history, historical records, or a combination of these data, which provide evidence that volcanic eruptions of Mount Ararat occurred in 2500–2400 BC, 550 BC, possibly in 1450 AD and 1783 AD, and definitely in 1840 AD. Archaeological evidence demonstrates that explosive eruptions and pyroclastic flows from

15004-567: Was found that the present glaciers on the summit of Ararat extend as low as an elevation of 3,900 meters (12,800 ft) on the north-facing slope, and an elevation of 4,200 meters (13,800 ft) on its south-facing slope. Using pre-existing aerial imagery and remote sensing data, Sarıkaya and others studied the extent of the ice cap on Mount Ararat between 1976 and 2011. They discovered that this ice cap had shrunk to 8.0 km (3.1 sq mi) by 1976 and to 5.7 km (2.2 sq mi) by 2011. They calculated that between 1976 and 2011,

15128-454: Was historically opposed to ascents of Ararat on religious grounds. Thomas Stackhouse , an 18th-century English theologian, noted that "All the Armenians are firmly persuaded that Noah's ark exists to the present day on the summit of Mount Ararat, and that in order to preserve it, no person is permitted to approach it." In response to its first ascent by Parrot and Abovian, one high-ranking Armenian Apostolic Church clergyman commented that to climb

15252-405: Was situated between Proto-Greek ( centum subgroup) and Proto-Indo-Iranian ( satem subgroup). Ronald I. Kim has noted unique morphological developments connecting Armenian to Balto-Slavic languages . The Armenian language has a long literary history, with a 5th-century Bible translation as its oldest surviving text. Another text translated into Armenian early on, and also in the 5th-century,

15376-682: Was the Armenian Alexander Romance . The vocabulary of the language has historically been influenced by Western Middle Iranian languages , particularly Parthian ; its derivational morphology and syntax were also affected by language contact with Parthian, but to a lesser extent. Contact with Greek, Persian , and Syriac also resulted in a number of loanwords. There are two standardized modern literary forms, Eastern Armenian (spoken mainly in Armenia) and Western Armenian (spoken originally mainly in modern-day Turkey and, since

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