Alphabet                             

The creator of the Armenian alphabet was Mesrop Mashtots (c. 362-440), a learned scholar and clergyman. He was born in the province of Taron, had studied Greek and Syriac, and was the royal archivist. According to his student, Koriun, who wrote a biography of his master in the mid-fifth century, he had become well versed in secular law and the military arts before devoting himself to the religious life. He had travelled all over Armenia, and fully recognised the threat of assimilation. After becoming a celibate priest in 394, he had chosen the province of Goghtn, an unruly place, in which to preach the Christian faith. His experience there, fraught with untold difficulties, convinced him that the creation of a native alphabet was an absolute necessity, and would provide missionaries with an essential tool  for carrying out their work. He found in Catholicos (the Armenian patriarch)  Sahak a staunch supporter, and the two of them appealed to King Vramshapuh, who readily gave his full consent and assistance.

 

Taking a number of his students with him, Mesrop Mashtots set out to visit some of the Greek and Syrian centers of learning of his day, such as Edessa, Amida, and Samosata, in order to try out and make comparative studies of the phonetic principles of various alphabets. After much stenuous labor he came up with a unique alphabet, consisting of thirty six characters to represent the sounds of the Armenian language, each of which is designed in a manner unlike the characters of any existing alphabet. After naming the characters (ayb, ben, gim, da etc) and arranging them more or less in the sequence of the Greek alphabet, he took them to a renowned calligrapher, Rufinus, in Samosata, who added artistic refinements.

 

To test the effectiveness and precision of this new alphabet, Mesrop with the collaboration of two of his students, Hovhannes Kekeghetsatsi and Hovsep Paghnetsi, began to translate the Book of Proverbs from Syriac. Then, with joy and satisfaction of a mission well accomplished, Mesrop and his party returned to Armenia (in the year 405), to an enthusiastic reception by the king, the Catholicos, and the people.

 

The created alphabet was so well suited to the sounds of the Armenian language that it has served its purpose for more than fifteen hundred years without requiring any major change, in spite of the dialectal diversification that has occurred over this long period of time. Even though the alphabet was conceived in a Syriac-dominated milieu, Western influence was obvious. The most important characteristics of the alphabet can be summarised as follows: each letter represents only one phoneme and each phoneme is designated by only one letter, with the exception of the sound [u], which is represented by a combination of two letters; each vowel is written individually; the language is written from left to right, in contrast to all Semitic languages; and there are no diacritical marks.

 

It is an interesting and perhaps unique phenomenon that for the Armenian nation, merely possessing an alphabet of its own has played a major, if not most important, role in preserving the national identity, even to this day.

 

 

 

 

 Armenian Grammar

 

Armenian Language belongs to the Indo-European family of languages where it constitutes an independent branch of its own.Modern Armenian is represented by two main literary variants: Western Armenian and Eastern Armenian. Western Armenian is spoken by the Armenian communities in Lebanon, Syria, Greece and other countries of the Middle East. The Eastern Armenian is the official language of the Republic of Armenia. Being an official language since 1918, Eastern Armenian has developed functional variability: it is not only a conversational language and that of fine literature and poetry, but also a language of science, business, office work etc. According to the Republic of Armenia law on language, all business correspondence in this country must be carried out in Armenian. As an independent branch of the Indo-European languages, Armenian is unique in terms of its grammar and more than half of the etymological roots of its vocabulary. It is governed by a system of inflection by declensions and conjugation dissimilar from many of the languages that evolved within the vicinity of historical Armenia.

 

Unlike many modern languages with roots in ancient times and contrary to the assertions that the language has gone through radical changes through the ages, only few of the grammatical fundamentals have been modified since the first surviving texts while the basic vocabulary remained remarkably intact except the addition of new loan words or coining of new derivatives or compound words. As a matter of fact, an average knowledge of Modern (Western or Eastern) Armenian is adequate to read and fully understand the Armenian Bible, written in Classical Armenian (circa 425 BC).

 

Since early in the 5th century, Armenian grammarians developed the new fundamentals that contributed to the evolution and advancement of Armenian grammatical and linguistic principles.

 

The word grammar was once a synonym for learning in general. In early English usage, grammar meant only Latin grammar. Not until the 17th century was the word used generically. In the early Armenian centers of higher learning (5th century and onwards), Grammatical Structures as well as Rhetoric and Lexicology were considered part of the Armenian linguistic tradition and heritage.

 

Ancient and medieval Armenian grammarians wrote extensively on Armenian etymology, phonetics and syntax. In the fifth century, the Armenian grammarian David was already developing his own theories on etymology and had discarded the grammatical treaties articulated by Dionysius of Thrax.

 

Movses Kertoghahayr (5th-6th centuries) researched the phonetic features of the Armenian language by elucidating the differing aspects of the sounds and the letters they designate. Stepanos Sunetsi (735) is known for his research on pronunciation and etymology as well as his writings on the principles and rules of the exact articulation of separate sounds and syllables. He was also the first Armenian linguist known for his classification of the vowels and diphthongs. Krikor Magistros Pahlavouni’s (990-1059) Definition of Grammar is another monumental work on the subject of Armenian grammar and syntax. Long before F. Bopp had established the discipline of comparative languages in early 19th century, K. Pahlavouni had written many comparative studies on Armenian and Arabic languages.

 

In addition to pursuing the development of the classical grammatical elements of the language, linguists in the Armenian kingdom of Cilicia pioneered a new branch by developing the “art of writing.” During this period, the first orthographic reform was carried out. Aristages Kritch (12th century) introduced a methodology and certain orthographic principles that served as the basis for future linguists. Remarkably, two grammatical works by Vartan Areveltsi (1269) are written in Middle Armenian, the precursor of Modern Armenian. His Parts of Speech is the first attempt to elaborate the principles of Armenian syntax. Interestingly, Areveltsi predicted that in the future all mankind will use one general language. Another grammarian of this era, Hovhannes Yerzingatsi, the author of A Collection of Definition of Grammar, defies Plato’s contention that “…a power more than human gave things their first names” and considers language as an achievement of human intellect and not guided by divine intervention.

 

Among the grammarians of 14th and 15th centuries, Essai Nshetsi, Krikor Datevatsi, Hagop Khrimetsi and Arakel Sunetsi have made more than a casual contribution to the fundamentals of Armenian grammar.
It is perhaps worthy to note that Armenian grammarians, throughout the centuries, were in their own right also creative writers, translators or experts on foreign languages.

 

The Words of Poetry, known in the 13th century, defining “difficult” words in poetry and other grammatical works, as well as dialectal words, can be considered one of the first dictionaries in the Armenian language.

 

Considering this brief historical background, it is perhaps appropriate to derive a conclusion: In all living languages, grammar is certainly a palladium that foreign influence cannot touch or exert any major impact. Armenian grammar is a good case in point. It displays a relatively rich inflection for Armenian still has four cases of nouns distinguished by endings and five of pronouns; in verbs, without considering the infinitive and participles, it distinguishes by means of inflection active and passive, indicative, subjunctive, reflexive and imperative, present, imperfect, simple and compound aorist. Consequently, a close scrutiny of the paradigm of Armenian grammar only reveals the singular path of a language that evolved throughout the ages by maintaining an evolutionary process of its own. This aspect is an important element that only asserts the maturity of a language.

designed by assistant  Antoaneta Anguelova

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