«ARMENIAN PERSONAL NAMES», (Part B) H. ACHARYAN

«ARMENIAN PERSONAL NAMES», (Part B)
H. ACHARYAN

The beginning — with the previous publication:

«Any mountain, lake, sea and river has an eternal life; any city or village has a life of hundreds and thousands of years; consequently their name too is in general permanent and enduring: But the life of persons has a duration of at most one century:

The generation passes, ideas change, influences change and the names too disappear together with them — giving way to ever new forms:

The durability of personal names depends to a certain extent on a few circumstances, which are.

1. The shortness of the word –
   Excessively long names are soon forgotten or at least are so shortened that they become unrecognizable any longer: Abednago, Agatangeghos because of their length did not find success or were soon, forgotten: As long as the first is Astuatsatur, which, though a very usual
   name, has nowhere been preserved in its original form, but with various shortenings has become — Asatur, Astur, Astik, Aso, Tsatur, Tsati:
   In general two-syllable names are loved; names having more than two syllables are shortened; this is why Martiros becomes Marto, Mrto, Martik.– Mkrtich becomes Mkyr, Mko, Mikit, Mikich, Mukuch.– Hripsime becomes Horop, Horom, Huri: – Eghisabet becomes Eghis, Ekhsa, Ekhso, Sabet, and in the European languages too — Eliz, Eliza, Liza, Izabella, Zabel, Bela and so on:
2. The harmony of the word –
   According to the artistic taste of each nation and people, names considered harsh-sounding and ugly-sounding are naturally soon wiped out, while names having a pleasant sound are always more sought:
3. The beauty of the meaning –
   A name considered meaningless or ugly grows old and withdraws from the arena sooner than a name beautiful in meaning… Varduhi is a very old name, it existed in the 5th century, it is mentioned in the Haysmavurk and will still live long: So also — Shushan or Shushanik: Equally pleasant are Manishak, Siranoysh, Hranoysh, Varsenik and so on, whereas Agapi, Evpraksia, Heghine, Katarine are already forgotten and disappearing names:
4. The circumstance that the persons bearing that name happened to be famous and unforgettable people has caused those names to live long; thus Abgar, Vardan, Hayk, Nerses, Sahak, Mesrop are unforgettable names, because in our history we have had famous personalities called by these names: While Vasak, Yuda, Meruzhan — are dead, unusable names, because famous betrayers and traitors have been found with these names: The name itself has no significance here; the word Vasak is really more beautiful than Vardan; but the bad memory of the «apostate» Vasak has caused the beauty and harmony of that name to be forgotten: (In that war, which took place because of discord, Vasak — faithful to the national sources — inspired the sons of Hayk with the valiant deeds of the Armenian Ancestors, while Ghevond the priest — as a Christian, reminded the Armenian soldiers of the ancestors of another nation — Abraham, Isaac… K. A.)
5. Religious or national ideas.– These are according to the bent of the time: There was a time when religious feeling was the chief guide of life; at that time names were more religious, such as — Astuatsatur, Toros, Kirakos, Markos, Ghukas, Matteos, Petros, Poghos and so on: Religious feeling passed away and gave way to the purely national period: That was in the middle of the last century: At that time religious names became unpleasant and in their place began the Armenian national names – Vardan, Eruand, Zareh, Gurgen, Artashes, Hracheay, Zarmayr, Paroyr and so on:

If we wish to arrange the Armenian personal names in their distinct groups and present the influences to which they have been subjected from our most ancient period until today, we will see that they form 15 groups, which correspond to 15 periods, which are the following — in chronological order.

1. PRE-ARMENIAN NAMES
   The pre-Armenian names belong to that people which occupied Armenia: The Armenian language, certainly, took much from them; to this category belong our place names:
   It is almost certain that the place names of Armenia are for the most part pre-Armenian (Khaldian) borrowings; such as — Ararat, Van, Archesh, Karin, Masis and so on, and so on, which cannot be explained in Armenian at all: By the reasoning brought a little earlier — personal names are much fewer:
   Among these we can mention Aram and Manavaz: The first, certainly, comes from the name of the famous Khaldian king Arame (Between them there is a difference of almost one millennium, K. A.): The second sounds very similar to the royal name Menvas, but that is accidental and Manavaz is an Iranian name: We leave aside those numerous uncertain forms, particularly the nakharar clan names, which in the opinion of various authors — come from pre-Armenian Khaldian names:

1. UNKNOWN NAMES
   Khorenatsi in Book I of his History gives us a group of Armenian names whose origin is entirely unknown: To this category belong Hayk, Armenak, Aramayis, Amasia, Harma, Ara, Dardos and so on, and so on, which are surely not Armenian, since they cannot be explained in Armenian: Whether these too belong to the Khaldian period, or are remnants of Hattian names, or are borrowed from some Phrygian language, or finally are inventions of Khorenatsi (at least some of them), cannot be determined with certainty in the present state of science: It is certain for me that Mushegh, so usual a name in Armenian history, is borrowed from the Hattian name Murshili: Several Hattian kings are called by this name (see my History of the Armenian Language, vol. I, p. 149):

1. GENUINE ARMENIAN NAMES
   The first period of genuine Armenian names falls in the time of the Arshakunis: Agathangelos, Buzand, Koryun, Khorenatsi, Parpetsi and Eghishe hand down to us numerous names of this category, which are repeated also in the succeeding historians: These names are purely Armenian, because they are explained in the Armenian language; such as — Ardzan, Tirayr, Ayruk, Astghik, Giut, Tatik, Tatul, Tornik, Ishkhan, Eghbayr, Eraneak, Zarmayr, Bazuk, Gorak, Arnak and so on: Among genuine Armenian names the names of animals and birds are very usual, such as — Ariudz, Aytsemnik, Koriun, Artoyt, Garnik, Eznik, Tslik, Enjugh, Mrjiunik and so on:

The genuine Armenian names, as we said, belong to the Arshakuni period, speaking more definitely — to pre-Christian Armenians: After Christianity these begin little by little to give way; after the middle of the Great Anarchy, at the time of the Arab domination and of the Bagratuni kingdom they become exceedingly few and in the time of the Rubenids they disappear entirely: After the middle of the 19th century, when the Armenian awakening began, the genuine Armenian names came alive again and the best of them, that is those beautiful in meaning, being brought out from the pages of history, began to be used again — some in religious, some in secular circles, such as — Tirayr, Koriun, Eznik, Garnik, Zarmayr, Eraneak, Ishkhan, but not Mrjiunik, Tslik, Artoyt and so on:

4. PAHLAVI NAMES
   The Parthian influence on the Armenians is exceedingly great: Pahlavi was the language of the Armenian nobility; the courtiers and the nakharars spoke that language, chancery relations were conducted in that language: It should not seem astonishing, then, if we say that a certain part of the names of the ancient Armenians, which we consider purely national names, are simply Pahlavi borrowings; thus, for example, Vardan, Vahan, Bagarat, Atrnerseh,
   Drastamat, Zareh, Sepuh, Zohrap, Khosrov, Khosrovidukht, Hamazasp, Artashes, Gisak, Gurgen, Anoysh, Ashkhen, Arastom, Arshak, Sanatruk, Artavazd, Trdat, Vramshapuh and so on, and so on:
   The Pahlavi names too began to be forgotten after the fall of the Iranian domination: In the time of the Rubenid principality they are for the most part already wiped out; there remain only those which represent the greatest figures of our history, such as — Vahan, Vardan, Trdat and so on: With the Armenian awakening they came alive again and are the most beloved names of today’s Armenians:

4. SYRIAC NAMES
   After accepting Christianity, the Armenians for the first time fell under Syriac influence: Greece was far, while Mesopotamia was very near: There were numerous Syrian preachers in our country, where they spread their language from the church pulpit: The language of church worship was Syriac: The Gospel was read in Syriac: Armenian young men received their education in the school of Edessa: The Bible was first translated from Syriac: In this period a group of Syriac names entered among us, such as — Arsham, Abgar, Eghishe, Gadisho, Barzapran and so on:
   The Syriac influence was short-lived; soon came the Greek and then the purely Armenian civilization, which stifled the Syriac: The Syriac names too were wiped out and of them barely one or two have life today; that is — Abgar and Eghishe, which live thanks to the circumstance that they represent the name of our first Christian king (according to tradition) and of our most beloved poet-historian:
5. HEBREW NAMES
   Among the nations deeply influenced by Hebrew civilization we too are found: It is true that this influence is not the result of direct relations and has reached us through the Greeks, but it has been so strong that it would not have had a very different form if it had been the product of direct relations: Through Christianity and the Bible a great number of personal names has passed to us from Hebrew, which for 1600 years has filled our whole life:
   Adam, Eva, Abel, Abraham, Set, Sahak, Daniel, Gabriel, Davit, Esayi, Hakob, Zakaria, Soghomon and so on, and so on: They are names so familiar to all strata of the Armenian people, so usual, so Armenianized and to such a degree domestic, that they will still live for centuries and centuries; and one can hardly say that they will ever be able to be wiped out from among the Armenians and the world:
   The Hebrew names have passed to us through the translation of the Bible, and because our Bible was translated from Greek and not directly from Hebrew, these names too bear a Greek stamp: Here the most salient point is the following – in the Greek language there is no «sh» sound; so wherever Hebrew has «sh», the Greek puts «s»: We too, though we have the «sh» sound, following Greek — put «s»: Thus, for example — the Hebrew says «Yerushlim», while we say «Erusaghem»: This phenomenon is common to all European nations:

4. GREEK NAMES
   The Greek has been the spreader of Christianity and the nurse of world
   civilization; there is no nation in this world which is not indebted to Greek civilization for something:

Even the Chinese have words borrowed from Greek: Particularly our nation has been influenced by the Greeks to the greatest extent: If our pre-Christian civilization was entirely Parthian civilization, our post-Christian civilization too is fully Greek: A part of our literature is an imitation of the Greek; our first books were translated from Greek authors; and this thing continued
until the Rubenid kingdom: The Bible, the Gospel, the Mashtots, the Lives of the Saints, the Haysmavurk, the Book of Mysteries — were translated from Greek or edited on the Greek model:
The natural result of such a great influence is also an abundant number of proper names, which from the 4th century until today has dominated Armenian life; for example — Anastas (resurrection), Ghevond (lion), Vasil (king), Gevorg (farmer), Grigor (wakeful), Teodoros (God-given), Pilipos (horse-loving), Kirakos (of the Lord), Hripsime (fallen), Agapi (love), Stepan (crown) and so on»…

To be continued…