Talks at Ararat-Eskijian Museum Highlight Armenian Archaeology
By Armenian Weekly Staff
January 24, 2010
On Dec. 6, 2009, Dr. Pavel Avetisyan, the director of Armenia’s
Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology, and Dr. Gregory Areshian of
the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA, presented illustrated
lectures at the Ararat-Eskijian Museum in Mission Hills, Calif. The
event was co-sponsored by the museum, the Friends of UCLA Armenian
Language and Culture Studies, and the National Association for
Armenian Studies and Research (NAASR).
(L-R) NAASR Board member Bruce W. Roat, Ararat-Eskijian Museum
director Maggie Mangassarian-Goschin, Dr. Pavel Avetisyan, Dr. Gregory
Areshian, Effie Eskijian, and Museum chairman Martin Eskijian.
Avetisyan spoke in Armenian, with English translation provided by
Areshian, on the subject `International Academic Cooperation and Its
Importance for Studies in Armenian History and Civilization.’ He
explained that a major transformation of Armenian studies has taken
place during the last two decades since Armenia gained independence
from the Soviet Union. Besides traditional areas such as the study of
the Armenian past based on written historical records and Armenian
literature, `younger’ areas of inquiry more focused on the Armenian
material cultural heritage, long-term processes in Armenian history,
anthropological and sociological researches, and others started
gaining momentum.
`It is not surprising that the Institute of Archaeology and
Anthropology of the National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of
Armenia has become the world’s fastest growing institution of Armenian
studies,’ Avetisyan said. The institute focuses on previously
unexplored or poorly understood areas of Armenian life and
civilization: from the appearance of the first humans on the Armenian
Highland to the formation of values and the transformation of national
identities in contemporary Armenian society at the threshold of the
new millennium.
What propels this growth, said Avetisyan, is the exponential expansion
of international cooperation. Currently the institute is the senior
partner in two dozen international collaborative projects, the largest
11 of which are concerned with the study and documentation of the
Ancient and Medieval Armenian material cultural heritage. In the last
six to seven years, these projects have made amazing discoveries, some
of which Avetisyan presented.
In his view, the most significant implications of the international
collaboration are: (1) that the most recent advances in social theory
developed in the West are applied to the social researches in Armenia;
(2) the Armenian cultural heritage is brought to the attention of
scholarly audiences and the general public in the U.S. and Europe; (3)
new discoveries not only make major corrections and fill gaps in our
knowledge of Armenian history, but also contribute to a better
understanding of significant stages in the development of human
civilization; (4) a major improvement in the training of students in
Armenia has been achieved; (5) Armenian society has been enriched by a
large number of new sites, monuments, and findings of cultural and
historical value, all of which are kept in different museums in
Armenia; and (6) the scientific data obtained during those
explorations are processed and studied in the best laboratories of
Europe and North America.
Areshian, in a talk in English entitled `The Discovery of a 6,000
Year-Old Cave Civilization in Armenia,’ presented information
connected with discoveries made during 2007-09 in the Vayots-Dzor
Province by the Arpa River Valley Joint Project of the Institute of
Archaeology and Anthropology of the National Academy of Sciences of
Armenia and the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at the University of
California, Los Angeles.
The Arpa River Valley is a little-explored area, despite having the
highest concentration of karstic caves in Armenia and such outstanding
monuments of Armenian medieval architecture as the Noravank Monastery.
The project identified more than three dozen inhabited caves in that
region and other important sites dating from the Stone Age to the 17th
century A.D. In the summer of 2010, the Project will start a
systematic survey of the region.
For Areshian, however, the most exciting and sensational discoveries
were made at the cave known as Areni-1, where a small-scale excavation
began in 2007. The explorations carried out thus far attest to a very
large site with cultural remains in three interconnected cave
galleries, each up to 40 meters long, and also under the rock shelter
in front of the galleries and on the slope descending toward the
river. In the uppermost layer, fragments of a Medieval Armenian
manuscript were found. Beneath, a carbonated, hard, and natural crust
covered more than 15-feet-thick cultural layers.
The crust, together with extreme dryness and stable temperatures
inside, created unique conditions that preserved artifacts and various
organic remains not found in other earlier excavations. Non-burnt
wooden artifacts, seeds, rope, cloth, straw, grass, reeds, and even
dried fruits (grapes and prunes) were found in the top three layers
dating back to the Copper Age (Chalcolithic), ca. 4,000 B.C. Various
remains may indicate the presence of a full cycle of wine making in
the cave.
Areshian explained that a human brain found in a ritually deposited
head is the most astounding discovery from that period. This is the
oldest human brain ever found in the Old World. He stated that the
newly discovered cave society will prompt a major revision of our
knowledge concerning the early civilizations of the Middle East and
southeastern Europe.
For more information on the talks by Avetisyan and Areshian, contact
the Ararat-Eskijian Museum by calling (818) 838-4862 or emailing
[email protected]; the Friends of UCLA Armenian
Studies by calling (310) 704-4353; or NAASR by calling (617) 489-1610
or emailing [email protected].
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
