Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 16.djvu/894

Rh 862 MOSES we find other notices of this celebrated man, 1 such as, that he was the nephew of Mesrob, that he was publicly complimented by the emperor Marcian, that he had been ordained bishop of Bagrewand by the patriarch Giut, and that he was buried in the church of the Apostolic Cloister at Mush in the district of Taron ; but these accounts must be received with great caution. This remark applies especially to the statement of Thomas Ardsruni, 2 that Moses, like his Hebrew prototype, lived to the age of 120 years, and recorded his own death in a fourth book of his great work. 3 The same caution must be extended to another tradition, based on an arbitrary construction of a passage in Samuel of Ani, 4 which places his death in the year 489. Of the works of Moses 5 the best known is the History of Armenia, 6 or, as the more exact title runs, the Genealogi cal Account of Great Armenia. It consists of three books, and reaches down to the death of Saint Mesrob, in the second year of Jazdegerd II. (17th February 440). 7 It is dedicated to Sahak Bagratuni (who was afterwards chosen to lead the revolted Armenians in the year 481), as the man under whose auspices the work had been undertaken. This work, which in course of time acquired canonical authority among the Armenians, is partly compiled from sources which we yet possess, viz., the Life of Saint Gregory by Agathangelos, the Armenian translation of the Syriac Doctrine of the Apostle Addai, the Antiquities and the Jeivish War of Josephus, and above all the History of Mar Abas Katina (still preserved in the extract from the book of Sebeos), 8 who, however, did not write, as Moses alleges, in Syriac and Greek, at Nisibis, about 131 B.C., but was a native of Medsurch, and wrote in Syriac alone about 383 A.D., or shortly thereafter. Besides these, Moses refers to a whole array of Greek authorities, which were known to him from his constant use of Eusebius, but which cannot possibly have related all that he makes them relate. 9 Although Moses assures us that he is going to rely entirely upon Greek authors, the contents of his work show that it is mainly drawn from native sources. He is chiefly indebted to the popular ballads and legends of Armenia, and it is to the use of such materials that the work owes its perma nent value. Its importance for the history of religion and mythology is, in truth, very considerable, a fact which it is the great merit of Emin 10 and Dulaurier u to have first pointed out. For political history, on the other hand, it is of much less value than was formerly assumed. In particular, it is not a history of the people or of the country, but a history of the Armenian aristocracy, and, in 1 Collected by Langlois, Collection des historiens de V Armenie, ii. 47 sq. 2 In Brosset, Collection d historiens Arme niens, i. 68. 3 There is not the slightest allusion elsewhere to any such book. 4 In Brosset, ii. 387. 5 Complete edition of the Mechitarists, Venice, 1843 ; new ed., 1865, 8vo. 6 The oldest MS. is that of S. Lazaro of the 12th century. Col lations of MSS. of Etchmiadzin and Jerusalem are given by Agop Garinian, Tiflis, 1858, 4to. The book has been edited and translated by Whiston, London, 1736, 4to ; and by Le Vaillant de Florival, Venice and Paris, s.a. (1841), 2 vols. 8vo. 7 The commencement of this king s reign has been fixed by Noldeke (Geschichte der Sassaniden aus Tabari, p. 423) as 4th August 438 ; and this date has subsequently been established by documentary evidence from the fact of the martyrdom of Pethion (see Hoffmann, Ausziige aus Syrischen Akten persischer Martyrer, p. 67). 8 Translated in Langlois, i. 195 sq. 9 For the following statements, the proofs may be found in the article &quot; Ueber die Glaubwiirdigkeit der Armenischen Geschichte des Moses von Khoren,&quot; by the present writer, in the Berichte der phil. histor. Classe der Kijnigl. Sacfis. Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften, 1876, p. 1 sq. 10 The Epic Songs of Ancient Armenia (Arm.), Moscow, 1850. &quot; Etudes sur les chants historiques et les traditions populaires de I ancieuue Armenie,&quot; in the Journ. Asiat., iv., ser. 19 (1852), p. 5 sq. opposition to the Mamikonian tendency which pervades the rest of the older Armenian historical literature, it is written in the interest of the rival Bagratunians. Down to the 3d century it is proved by the contemporary Gryeco-Roman annals to be utterly untrustworthy ; but even for the times of Armenian Christianity it must be used far more cautiously than has been done, for example, by Gibbon. The worst feature is the confusion in the chronology, which, strange to say, is most hopeless in treating of the con temporaries of Moses himself. What can be thought of a, writer who assigns to Jazdegerd I. (399-420) the eleven years of his predecessor Bahrain IV., and the twenty-one years of Jazdegerd I. to his successor Bahram V. (420-439) I The present writer 12 formerly attempted to explain this unhistorical character of the narrative from a tendency arising out of the peculiar ecclesiastical and political cir cumstances of Armenia, situated as it was between the eastern Roman and the Persian empires, circumstances which were substantially the same in the 5th as they were in the two following centuries. In the course of further investigations, however, he has come to the conclusion that, besides the many false statements which Moses of Khor ni makes about his authorities, he gives a false account of himself. That is to say, the author of the History of Armenia is not the venerable translator of the 5th century, but some Armenian writing under his name during the years between 634 and 642. The proof is furnished on the one hand by the geographical and ethno graphical nomenclature of a later period and similar anachronisms, 13 which run through the whole book and are often closely incorporated with the narrative itself, and on the other hand by the identity of the author of the History with that of the Geography, a point on which all doubt is excluded by a number of individual affinities, 14 not to speak of the similarity in geographical terminology. The critical decision as to the authorship of the Geography settles the question for the History also. The Geography is a meagre sketch, based mainly on the Choro- graphy of Pappus of Alexandria (in the end of the 4th century), and indirectly on the work of Ptolemy. Only Armenia, the Persian empire, and the neighbouring regions of the East are independently described from local information, and on these sections the value of the little work depends. Since the first published text 15 contains names like &quot;Russians &quot; and &quot; Crimea,&quot; Saint Martin in his edition 1S denied that it was written by Moses, and assigned its origin to the 10th century. It was shown, however, by L. Indjidjean 17 that these are interpolations, which are not found in better manuscripts. And in fact it is quite evident that a book which gives the division of the Sasanid empire into four spahbehships in pure old Persian names cannot possibly have been composed at a long interval aftei- the time of the Sasanidaj. But of course it is equally clear that such a book cannot be a genuine work of Moses of Khor ni ; for that division of the empire dates from the early part of the reign of King Chosrau I. (531-579). 18 Accordingly the latest editor, K. P. Patkanow, 19 to whom we are indebted for the best text of the 12 &quot;Ueber die Glaubwiivdigkeit, &quot; &c., p. 8 sq. 13 Instances of these may be found in i. 14, where the arrangement of Armenian provinces I., II., III., IV., introduced in the year 536, is carried back to Aram, an older contemporary of Ninus ; and in the passage iii. 18, according to which Shapiir II. penetrated to Bithyuia, although the Persians did not reach that till 608. 14 See the confusion, common to both books, between Cappadocia I. and Armenia I., in consequence of which Mazaka and Mount Argaus are transferred to the latter locality (Hist., i. 14 ; Gcogr., Saint Martin s ed., ii. p. 354) ; also the passages which treat of China and DcLeubakur (Hist., ii. 81 ; Geogr., ii. p. 376), &c. 15 Edition with translation by Whiston, London, 1736, 4to. 16 In the Memoires historiques et gtographiques sur I Armenie (Paris, 1819, 8vo), ii. p. 301 sq. 17 Antiquities of Armenia (Arm.), iii. p. 303 sq. 18 See Noldeke s Tabari, p. 155 sq. 19 Armjanskaja gcographija vii. wdka po r. Ch. (pripisiw awschajasja Moiseju Chorenskomu), St Petersburg, 1877, 8vo. Before him Kiepert (in the Monatsb. d. Berliner Akad., 1873, p. 599 sq.) had substantially arrived at the right conclusion when he assigned the portions of the Geography referring to Armenia to the time between Justinian and Maurice.