The first complete edition of “Ashkharatsuyts” in Russian translated by professor of Yerevan State University

Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor Hakob Harutyunyan translated not only the full text of the ancient Armenian source “Ashkharatsuyts” (Ancient Armenian Geography), but also wrote a detailed preface, prepared 1070 commentaries, and also compiled appendices. It should be noted that Professor Harutyunyan published more than 40 articles about “Ashkharatsuyts” in foreign scientific journals, some of which were published in journals included in the Scopus scientometric database.

“Ashkharatsuyts” is the first historical and geographical source in Armenian reality, which represents what development trends social sciences had in early medieval Armenia, and how great Armenian scientists combined them with natural science.                

“Ashkharatsuyts” has two introductory chapters; the next three chapters are devoted to a description of 58 countries in Europe, Africa and Asia (from Britain and Spain to China, in the south to Ethiopia).               

“Ashkharatsuyts” can be considered not only a brief summary of the political map of the world of the 5th-7th centuries. Many famous states that existed before the 5th century are also mentioned here, with their natural and mineral resources.               

H. Harutyunyan emphasizes that “Ashkharatsuyts” is an extremely important source for those who study the historical geography of the territories listed above.               

In 1992, short and complete translations of “Ashkharatsuyts” were published in English. The translation into Russian by the Yerevan State University professor is intended to fill a serious gap that exists in the field of translations of the text of this ancient Armenian source.               

“For the last 20 years I have been studying “Ashkharatsuyts” and have repeatedly witnessed the justified dissatisfaction of Russian-speaking researchers who express regret that “Ashkharatsuyts” has not been completely translated into Russian. We believe that the availability of the full text in Russian will further expand the circle of scientists studying this ancient Armenian source,” noted H. Harutyunyan.               

Let us add that two editors of the book (N.N. Bolgov and E.Sh. Khurshudyan) and three reviewers (S.S. Kazarov, A.V. Podosinov, O.Yu. Klimov) are scientists from Russia and Kazakhstan, benefiting from a large international authority.               

Let us also note that back in 1877, a short version of “Ashkharatsuyts” in Russian was published by the famous armenologist K.P. Patkanov.