Artsruni dynasty
Template:Short description Template:For Template:Royal house The House of Artsruni (Template:Langx; also Ardzruni or Artsrunid) was an ancient princely and, later, royal dynasty of Armenia.Template:Sfn
Name
The name Artsruni contains the ending Template:Lang, which is widespread in old Armenian family names.Template:Sfn The early Armenian historian Movses Khorenatsi derives the name from Template:Lang Template:Gloss (Template:Lang, Template:Abbr Template:Lang).Template:Sfn He implies that the Artsrunis carried standards with eagles on themTemplate:Efn and makes reference to a legend from Hadamakert (the center of the Artsrunis' home district of Aghbak)Template:Sfn in which a bird protects a sleeping boy from the rain and sun;Template:Sfn this is presumed to be a legend about the Artsrunis' ancestor (Sanasar, according to Manuk Abeghian) involving an eagle.<ref>Template:Harvnb, cited in Template:Harvnb.</ref>Template:Sfn James Russell notes that the eagle was a totemic animal for the Artsrunis and connects the dynasty's name with Urartian Template:Lang,Template:Sfn which is attested as the name of an Urartian king's horse and may derive from Armenian Template:Lang.Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Efn On this basis, Russell suggests that the Artsrunis may have had Urartian ancestors.Template:Sfn
Hrach Martirosyan writes that this connection of Artsruni with Template:Lang Template:Gloss is "is quite attractive as far as the mythical context [surrounding the Artsrunis] is concerned" but is unlikely to be a true etymology. He instead proposes that Artsruni is a patronymic deriving from an unattested name *Template:Lang, meaning "having swift horses".Template:Sfn
Origins
The Artsrunis claimed descent from the Assyrian king Sennacherib (Template:Reign).Template:Sfn It mirrors the Bagratuni claim of Davidic descent and the Mamikonian claim of descent from the royal Han dynasty and is usually interpreted as a piece of genealogical mythology.Template:Citation needed The Armenian historian Movses Khorenatsi is the first to mention this claim. This tradition likely developed among those houses after the Christianization of Armenia in the early 4th century, drawing from the biblical account according to which Sennacherib's sons Adramelech and Sharezer fled to Armenia after murdering their father (Isaiah 37:38). Khorenatsi writes that the Armenian leader Skayordi settled one of the princes, Sanasar (biblical Sharezer), on the mountain of Sim (in the region of Sasun) and from him descended the Artsrunis and the Gnunis.Template:Sfn
On this basis of his connection of Artsruni with Urartian Template:Lang (see above), Russell suggests that the Artsrunis may have had Urartian ancestors.Template:Sfn Vrezh Vardanyan writes that the dynasty was of purely local, Armenian origin and that they are mentioned in Urartian inscriptions as Template:LangTemplate:Efn and lived southeast of Lake Van at that time.Template:Sfn
According to the genealogist and historian Cyril Toumanoff, as well as historian M. Chahin, the Artsruni family were an offshoot of the earlier Orontids.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Toumanoff, following Nicholas Adontz and Josef Markwart,Template:Sfn suggests that Mithrobarzanes, the viceroy of Tigranes the Great in Sophene in 69 BC, may have been the earliest attested member of the family.Template:Sfn Mithrobarzanes, or more precisely Mithrobuzanes, corresponds to Armenian Template:Lang, which was a common name among members of the Artsruni dynasty. Mithrobuzanes was also the name of the successor of Zariadres, a king of Sophene in the 2nd century BC who is thought to have been an Orontid. Markwart, Adontz and Toumanoff hypothesized that Mithrobuzanes, the viceroy of Tigranes, was a member of the Orontid branch which ruled Sophene as independent kings until Tigranes annexed Sophene to Greater Armenia. The Artsrunis are supposed to have ruled continued to rule Sophene, giving up their royal title but receiving the title of Template:Lang (vitaxa, 'viceroy' or 'margrave').Template:Sfn Then, according to Toumanoff, after the adoption of Christianity in Armenia, the Artsrunis obscured their Orontid origins with a genealogical myth drawn from the Bible.Template:Sfn
History
During the reign of the Arsacid dynasty over Armenia, the Artsrunis ruled the princely estates of Greater and Lesser Aghbak in Vaspurakan (around modern Başkale, Turkey), southeast of Lake Van, gradually annexing the surrounding territory.Template:Sfn In the middle of the 4th century the family was deposed. Chavash survived, and recovered power. In 369 the state was led by Meruzhan Artsruni who guided Persian troops to Armenia, exchanged Christianity for Mazdaism,Template:Sfn and defeated the General (sparapet) Mamikonian. The latter recovered power soon after, however, and Meruzhan was killed.
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Around 772 the Artsruni presided over the families of Amatuni, Rshtuni, Teruni of Daroynk (before a possession of the Bagratuni) and ruled the regions of Maku, Artaz, Great Zab Valley and Van river.Template:Citation needed In the same 8th century, the Bagratid dynasty, re-established the monarch of Armenia, and the Artsrunis were "among its most powerful vassals and rivals".Template:Sfn When the territory of historical Armenia was, about a century later, succeeded by several subkingdoms (each of whom were rule by "lesser princes"), the area of Vaspurakan came to be ruled in by the Artsrunis, who, in 908, received their investiture from their Abbasid suzerains.Template:Sfn Thus, Khatcḥik-Gagik II Artsruni was the first of the Artsrunis to rule Vaspurakan under Abbasid suzerainty.Template:Sfn
Gagik I of Vaspurakan claimed the title of "King of Armenia" from the Bagratuni dynasty until his death in 936 or 943.
In the beginning of the 11th century, the Artsruni settled westwards in Cappadocia, retreating from eastern invaders. In 1021, Senekerim-Hovhannes of Vaspurakan was given Sebaste, Evdokia, and possibly Amasia as fiefdom from the Byzantine emperor Basil II in return for his entire kingdom.Template:Sfn He and 14,000 of his retainers settled in the Theme of Sebasteia, while the Kingdom of Vaspurakan became the Byzantine theme of Vasprakania, which lasted for fifty years until 1071.<ref>Template:Harvnb.</ref>
Cultural legacy
The Artsrunis were patrons of the arts, which, as Toumanoff states, is evidenced in the "splendid tenth-century monuments of architecture and of fresco and miniature painting especially in the palace and the church of Aghtamar". These two constructions were built on the order of Khachik Gagik II.Template:Sfn In the ninth and tenth centuries, a member of the house, Tovma Artsruni, wrote The History of the House of Artsruni.Template:Sfn
In popular culture
Umberto Eco introduced the character of Ardzrouni, a nobleman and alchemist in Cilicia, in his fantastic novel Baudolino.
Notes
References
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Sources
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