The history of the emergence and differences of the Armenian language from the rest. Armenian language: history, alphabet and interesting facts

An attempt to attribute the Armenian language to any language group did not lead to anything. It formed a separate group of the Indo-European language family. The modern Armenian alphabet was invented by Mesrop Mashtots in the 4th century. Its creation was not a simple copying of already existing alphabets. Mashtots and his students, among whom was Moses Khorensky, carried out extensive scientific research. Young people were sent to Persia, Egypt, Greece, and Rome, whose goal was to deeply study the language, its sound series and the correspondence of the sound with its letter designation.

It was a kind of multi-year linguistic expedition, at the end of which information was collected and processed, on the basis of which the original Armenian alphabet was created. Its accuracy and uniqueness have been proven over the centuries: it is known that the linguistic composition of speech changes over time, the ancient language becomes “dead” (ancient Greek, Latin), but the uniqueness of the Mashtots alphabet allows us today to speak fluently in ancient Armenian and read ancient Armenian manuscripts. Although the vocabulary of the language has changed, its sound range has remained the same, and all the richness of speech sounds is embodied in the Armenian alphabet. Mesrop Mashtots is also the creator of the Georgian alphabet.

Until recently, it was believed that before the advent of the Mashtots alphabet, Armenians used Persian scripts, and previously did not have their own written language. Indeed, during the reign of the Arsacids - a dynasty that had close blood ties with the Persian kings - official documents and correspondence were conducted in Persian, and there was no need to talk about the presence of more ancient writing among the Armenians due to the lack of “material evidence”. More recently, at the end of last year, a group of young scientists from Yerevan made an attempt to decipher the previously almost unreadable writings of Urartu.

The key was the ancient Armenian language. Unfortunately, there are no official publications on this issue in our press yet, but there is a high probability that the Urartu cuneiform was the oldest alphabet of the Armenians. There is also some information that before Mesrop Mashtots there was a certain Armenian alphabet consisting of 28 letters, which absolutely did not correspond to the sound series of the Armenian language. Mashtots' alphabet consists of 36 letters.

Speaking about Armenian writing, one cannot fail to mention the first Armenian historians and writers, thanks to whom much of antiquity has survived to this day. The oldest Armenian historian is considered to be Mar - Ibas - Katina, the secretary of King Vagharshak I. Having received permission from the Persian king Arshak to study in the archives of Nineveh, where the libraries of Babylon captured by the Persians were kept, Mar - Ibas, based on Chaldean sources, wrote the history of Armenia from the first kings to Tigran I. This work came to us only in lists.

Agafangel - secretary of King Trdat, who wrote the history of the spread of Christianity in Armenia (IV century). Gregory the Illuminator - author of a collection of sermons and prayers in Armenian. Postus Buzand - compiled the history of Armenia from 344 - 392. Mesrop Mashtots - in collaboration with Catholicos Sahak, translated the Holy Scriptures into Armenian, author of the Breviary (known as Mashdots) and the Festive Menaion. Moses Khorensky is the author of the history of Armenia in 4 books. Yeghishe - left to his descendants a description of the wars of the Armenians with the Persians between 439 - 463. Lazar Parbetsi - history of Armenia 388 - 484. David the Invincible - philosophical works on principles. Among the authors of the 7th century: Ioannes Mamikonyan - the history of the Mamikonian princes. Shirakatsi - nicknamed the Arithmetician, astronomer, compiler of the Armenian calendar. Moses II is the author of grammar and rhetoric. VIII century: John Ocnetziator of teachings against heresies. XI century: Thomas Artsruni - history of the house of Artsruni; historians John VI, Moses Kagkantovotsi; Gregory Magistros is the author of the Grammar of the Armenian language and the poetic transcription of the “history of the Old and New Testaments”; Aristakes Lasdiverdzi - “history of Armenia and neighboring cities” (988 - 1071). XII century: Samuel - compiler of chronologies from the creation of the world to 1179. Physician Mkhitar - “Consolation in fever.” Nerses Klaetsi - patriarch, theologian, author of a poetic translation of the Bible, including 8,000 verses. Mkhitar Gosh is the author of 190 fables, the Code of Church and Civil Laws. XIII century: Stefan Orbelian - Bishop of Syunik, author of the elegy “Lamentation for Etchmiadzin”. Vartan the Great is the author of “General History from the Creation of the World to 1267.” “Kirakos Kanzaketsi - described the devastation of the city of Ani by the Mongols in 1230 and the flight of the Armenians to Astrakhan, Trebizond, and Poland. Magakia Apega - described the Tatar invasions of Asia before 1272. Mkhitar Anetsi - gave rich information on the history of Armenia, Georgia, Persia and translated astronomy from Persian. Aristakes is the author of “the science or instructions on how to write correctly” and the “Dictionary of the Armenian Language”. The 14th century brought terrible trials to the Armenian people.

Subjected to continuous persecution and extermination, the Armenians sought salvation in other countries
When a person’s house is on fire, he unconsciously grabs the most valuable thing, trying to save it. Among the most valuable things that Armenians saved, sometimes at the cost of their own lives, were books - guardians of the memory of the people, their language, history, and culture. These books, saved from fire, water, and enemy desecration, are collected today in the treasury of Armenia - Matenodaran. Among them there are many that were rewritten, or rather redrawn, by absolutely illiterate people who can neither read nor write. But it is precisely thanks to their high patriotic feat that today we can read ancient sources, torn out of oblivion by the hands and labors of these people.

With the advent of printing in the 16th century. Armenian literature continued its development. Everywhere where the Armenians settled, they tried to open their own printing house. So, in 1568 such a printing house appeared in Venice, and in the 17th century. Printing houses were founded in Milan, Paris, Amsterdam, Leipzig, Constantinople, and later in London, Smyrna, Madras, Echmiadzin, Trieste, Tiflis, Shusha, Astrakhan, in St. Petersburg (1783), Nakhichevan. With the resettlement of Armenians to America, printing houses appeared in many countries of the New World.

Until the beginning of the 5th century, Armenians wrote in Greek, Assyrian and Syriac, which was perceived quite naturally by many at that time. But thoughts about the fate of Christianity in Armenia and the difficult political situation led the warrior, scientist and monk Mesrop Mashtots to the idea of ​​creating an Armenian alphabet. In this incredibly difficult task, the Catholicos of All Armenians Sahak Partev, the great-great-grandson of Gregory the Illuminator, helped him a lot.

Having received an excellent education, Mashtots, in addition to Armenian, was also fluent in Greek, Persian, Assyrian and Georgian. Having carried out titanic work, traveling with his 40 students all over Armenia from Persia to Byzantium, Mashtots created Armenian writing bit by bit. He and Partev understood that without their alphabet our people would very soon lose their national identity, because in everyday life people began to communicate with each other in Persian or Greek.

The situation in religion was also unimportant: Armenia had adopted Christianity as the state religion for almost a hundred years, but only monks and a few literate secular citizens could read the Bible in Greek and Assyrian. Therefore, it was necessary to urgently translate the Holy Scripture into Armenian, which was brilliantly done by Mashtots and Partev.

For its accuracy, conciseness and expressiveness, their translation of the Bible (the seventh in a row) was recognized by experts as unsurpassed - it is known as the queen of translations. Thanks to this, services in churches began to be held in a native language understandable to the people, which contributed to the conscious perception of Christianity.

Mashtots and his students traveled to villages and taught the Armenian language, becoming the first teacher of their native speech. One of his students, Koryun, who later became a historian, wrote in detail about all this. In the Middle Ages, in addition to schools at monasteries, universities began to be formed.
Translations of many works of Greek and Syrian scientists and philosophers into Armenian helped preserve them for posterity, since the originals were lost. And now they are being translated back from Armenian into the original language.

In 2005 all Armenian people celebrated the 1600th anniversary of the Armenian alphabet - one of the oldest in the world. It is noteworthy that during this huge period it has not undergone significant changes. In honor of this significant event, all 39 stone letters of the Armenian alphabet were installed on the eastern slope of Mount Aragats. There is no such monument to letters anywhere in the world!

The Armenian language is a language spoken by about 10 million Armenians. Most of them are residents of the Republic of Armenia, the rest make up a huge diaspora and are settled all over the world.
The Armenian language belongs to the Indo-European family. The place of Armenian among other Indo-European languages ​​has been the subject of much debate; it has been suggested that Armenian may be a descendant of a language closely related to Phrygian (known from inscriptions found in ancient Anatolia). The Armenian language belongs to the eastern (“Satem”) group of Indo-European languages, and shows some commonality with other languages ​​of this group - Baltic, Slavic, Iranian and Indian. However, given the geographical location of Armenia, it is not surprising that the Armenian language is also close to some Western (“centum”) Indo-European languages, primarily Greek.
The Armenian language is characterized by changes in the field of consonantism. which can be illustrated by the following examples: lat. dens, Greek o-don, Armenian a-tamn "tooth"; lat. genus, Greek genos, Armenian cin "birth". The advancement of stress on the penultimate syllable in Indo-European languages ​​led to the disappearance of the overstressed syllable in Armenian; Thus, Proto-Indo-European bheret turned into ebhret, which gave in Armenian ebr.

As a result of centuries-old Persian domination, many Persian words entered the Armenian language. Christianity brought with it Greek and Syriac words; in the Armenian lexicon there is also a large share of Turkish elements that penetrated during the long period when Armenia was part of Ottoman Empire; there are a few left French words, borrowed in the era Crusades. The grammatical system of the Armenian language preserves several types of nominal inflection, seven cases, two numbers, four types of conjugation and nine tenses. Grammatical gender, as in English, has been lost.

The Armenian language became a written language at the end of the 4th century AD thanks to the Armenian enlightener, scholar-monk, Mesrop Mashtots (362-440). Some historical documents say that Mesrop Mashtots is the creator of not only the Armenian alphabet, but also the Albanian (Caucasian Albania) and Georgian. Together with his students, he translated part of the Bible from Syriac into Armenian. The translation of the Bible into the “classical” national language is one of the first monuments of Armenian writing. Mesrop Mashtots founded national schools in all regions of Ancient Armenia, wrote the first textbook of the Armenian language and developed teaching methods. He laid the foundation for Armenian professional poetry and music.

In the first half of the 5th century, Armenian literature consisted of more than 40 literary works written in the ancient Armenian language called “Grabar”. This ancient written language, in its structural features, has great similarities with the ancient Indo-European languages: Sanskrit (an ancient Indian language), Latin, Greek, ancient Slavic, ancient Germanic, etc., differing from them in the completeness of its linguistic system.

Varieties of writing: “bolorgir” -<круглое>letter using rounds capital letters and slanted lowercase letters made straight horizontal and vertical elements, and "notrgir" - slanted cursive writing using rounded elements.
The next stage in the development of the Armenian language is the Middle Armenian language, which arose in the 10th century and existed next to Grabar until the 15th century. In the XIV-XIX centuries. next to Grabar, a living national literary language emerged and developed, called “Ashkharabar”, i.e. “secular language”. Grabar began to be used only as the cult language of the church.

Since the 50s of the 19th century, the modern Armenian national literary language has been developing from Ashkharabar. In the modern Armenian language, two dialects are distinguished: eastern, which is spoken in Armenia and Iran; and western, used in Asia Minor, Europe and the USA. . The state language of Armenia (Eastern literary) is similar in its grammatical structure to the dialect group called the “um” branch, according to the principle of composing the forms of the present tense of the indicative mood. The Western Armenian literary language is similar in its grammatical structure to the dialect group called the “ke” branch, according to the same principle. The main difference between them is that in the Western dialect a secondary devoicing of voiced plosives occurred: b, d, g became p, t, k. Differences between Eastern and Western literary languages insignificant (unlike spoken dialects). All dialects are characterized by: consonantism (consonance of consonants in a word); 7 cases, 8 types of declension, 5 moods, 2 types of conjugation, 7 participles; 3 voices (active, passive, neuter), 3 persons (incl. binary), 3 numbers; 3 genders (M.R., F.R., Middle R.) in Western. dial; to the east dial there is no genus category; 3 types of action for verbs (perfect, imperfect, to be committed). In the name paradigm, synthetic forms of expressing grammatical meaning predominate, and in the verb paradigm, analytical forms predominate.

Moscow State Institute Foreign Languages them. Maurice Teresa

Translation faculty

Subject: Introduction to linguistics

Armenian Language Group

First year student

Hakhverdyan M.A.

Moscow 2003

I. The first written recording of the Armenian language 2500 years before Mesrop Mashtots

1) Armenian language in inscriptions of the 3rd – 1st millennium BC. e.

2) Armenian language in Cretan inscriptions of the 3rd–2nd millennium BC

3) Armenian language in Etruscan inscriptions of the 1st millennium BC.

4) Armenian language and the Hurrito-Urartian group of the Indo-European family

II . Armenian language

III . From the history of the Armenian language

IV . Modern Armenian language

V. Poem by Vahan Teryan

THE FIRST WRITTEN FIXATION OF THE ARMENIAN LANGUAGE 2500 YEARS BEFORE MESROP MASHTOTS

Armenian language in inscriptions of the 3rd – 1st millennia BC. e.

Armenian language as an ancient phenomenon

Addressing the Paris Armenian Student Union in 1923 with a speech (“Armenian culture, its roots and prehistoric connections according to linguistic data”), academician N. Ya. Marr said: “...we are inspired and driven by a common very expensive thing, the only and most powerful force culture and progress, love for the same subject, for the Armenian people.” “...While preserving an inexhaustible treasury and creative environment, the Armenian language undoubtedly has a rich vocabulary and an endless choice of words.” According to Marr, through language “the Armenian people are connected by the closest ties not only with the now scattered various Japhetic tribes, with the modern peoples that have survived to us from antiquity, but also with all cultural humanity, with the indigenous layer of the Mediterranean humanity of Europe since the days of the emergence of human word" “But how many, how many millennia should we measure the period of time during which the Armenian complex language was formed..?” Throughout its long history, “the Armenian people, not only one of the eldest heirs of the Japhetic epic, but also the eldest of all the others, was the heir to a cultural tradition coming from a universal human source, was a faithful guardian of its integrity, a grower and sower in the East and West.” Concluding the lecture, Marr talks about “what fabulous horizons open up the exceptional linguistic riches of this amazing people... and what amazing materials they convey to expose the cultural connections and roots of their own and other peoples.”

It was no coincidence that we began our conversation about the Armenian language by quoting N. Ya. Marr, a man who has exceptional services to Armenian studies. His “Grammar of the Ancient Armenian Language” (1903) became “the midwife at the birth of Armenian studies.” Of the 213 publications by N. Ya. Marr between 1888 and 1915, over 100 are specifically devoted to the language and culture of the Armenians. This way you can see on what material the scientist’s linguistic talent grew.

The Armenian language occupies a special place in the Indo-European family. Its material is very important for elucidating the genesis and distribution of Indo-European dialects, ancient phonetic phenomena, etc. Indicative in this regard was the linguistic discussion devoted to the problem of the origin of the Armenian language and its individual phenomena, on the pages of the journal “Questions of Linguistics.”

An indicator of the importance of the Armenian language for broad and deep comparative historical research was the numerous appeals of the discussion participants to the entire range of problems of Indo-European studies, including the problem of pre-Indo-European substrates. “The debates and discussions on various genetic problems of the Armenian language have gone beyond the boundaries of Armenian linguistics in their constructiveness and have acquired exceptionally great importance for Indo-European studies as a whole.”

Armenian language in Cretan inscriptions of the 3rd–2nd millennium BC .

Implemented by us in 1997-2001. intensive studies of ancient Cretan writings have shown that the hieroglyphics of the island of Crete (XXII - XVII centuries BC), Cretan Linear A (XX - XV centuries BC) and the Phaistos disc (traditional dating - XVII century BC .) record the Greek language 1), and the so-called Eteocritan inscriptions in Greek letters, which are not read in Greek (VI - IV centuries BC), are Paleo-Balkan (Greco-Thraco-Phrygian) 2).

Researchers note the closeness of the Armenian language to Greek 3), pointing out that the Greek-Armenian parallels of Indo-European origin are very archaic and date back to the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC. 4), that is, to the era of the Cretan inscriptions under study.

The presence in the language of ancient Cretan writings of expressive Paleo-Balkan (Macedonian-Thraco-Phrygian) features that are different from the classical Greek language, the impossibility of explaining all the linguistic facts recorded by these writings only Greek allow us to use the Armenian language, which exhibits numerous Paleo-Balkan features, to interpret the inscriptions. It's about about the closeness of the Armenian language to Phrygian 5), Thracian 6) and the pre-Greek Indo-European substrate - the so-called Pelasgian language. “...The closeness of individual dialects of the pre-Greek language to Armenian with a more detailed comparison of them becomes more and more obvious. This striking closeness is manifested not only in the sound composition, but also in the material identity of the inflections, not to mention their functional identity” 7). Academician N. Marr 8) wrote about the Pelasgian layer of the Greek and Armenian languages ​​(although he considered the Pelasgians to be speakers of a pre-Indo-European language).

Among the possible pre-Greek-Armenian parallels, one of the most striking is pre-Greek. asp-is"snake", asp-al-os“fish” – Armenians. visap"dragon fish" Pre-Greek-Armenian parallels also concern public life(pre-Greek koiranos, Macedonian korannos“ruler” – Armenians. karan“prince”), and religious and mythological ideas (pre-Greek. cosmos“universe” – Armenians. kazm, pre-Greek ouranos“sky” – Armenians. veran"tent" 9)). Proto-Armenian dialects, as evidenced by linguistic correspondences, were both genetically and territorially close to the Greek and Pelasgian-Paleo-Balkan dialects.

Particularly noteworthy is the fact that the names of the letters in the Greek and Armenian languages ​​turn out to be common: Greek. grapho"writing", gramma"letter", grapheys, gropheys“scribe” – Armenians. grabar"letter", groh"scribe". In other Indo-European languages, this root conveys more archaic concepts not directly related to writing (Ukr. lot, German kerben and etc.). So, the speakers of the Proto-Greek and Proto-Armenian dialects obviously had a common written tradition. Its traces must be looked for in Crete (and also, possibly, in Urartian hieroglyphs; we must also take into account the assumption of V.V. Ivanov: Asia Minor hieroglyphs in ancient times could record not only the Luwian, but also the Hurrian language, related to Armenian). Information about the use of non-literal writing in the past can be obtained not only by comparing Greek and Armenian writing terms with related Indo-European words, but also from Greek itself: graphiketekhne –“painting” (cf. modern use of the word graphic arts regarding both writing and drawing).

The application of Armenian data to the analysis of Cretan inscriptions provides a very important positive result. Yes, syllabic inscription da-ku on the Cretan ax from Selakonos 10) can confidently be interpreted as Armenian daku"axe" (cognate with the Greek verb thego, thago"sharpen, sharpen")

Name of the Cretan capital Knos(s)os comes from Greek gno(s)tos“famous” (which is confirmed by the homonyms used to denote this name in Cretan hieroglyphs). However, in Linear A the name of this city has the form ka-nu-ti, which is explained only in connection with the Armenian language, where we have canaut c"familiar" (cognate with Greek gno(s)tos).

Cretan Linear A inscription from Knossos, which begins with a group of characters a-ka-nu-we-ti(PopeM. TheLinearAQuestion // Antiquity. – Vol. XXXII. – N 126. – June 1958. –– P. 99), records the same Armenian language form canaut c.

Finally, in Cretan hieroglyphics late III– beginning of the 2nd millennium BC e. (on the so-called eight-sided seal) to record the name of Knossos, in particular, the image of a shell is used ( gonthos), which once again indicates the closeness of the sound of the name of the Cretan capital (the meaning of this name - “famous, famous” - is known and confirmed by the meanings of the names of other Cretan cities - Festus “bright”, Kydonia “glorious”) precisely to the Armenian word.

This means that Cretan Linear A (XX-XV centuries BC) and even Cretan hieroglyphics (XXII-XVII centuries BC) record, along with Greek linguistic forms, those forms that are explained only in the Armenian language . So, the proto-Armenian language forms were recorded in writing in Cretan inscriptions already at the end of the third millennium BC. e.

Armenian language in Etruscan inscriptions of the 1st millennium BC.

Mysterious inscriptions in the Etruscan language (VII–I centuries BC) have always aroused great interest. Now we can confidently say that this is an Indo-European language, with material and typological parallels in Hittite-Luvian, Greek and other Paleo-Balkan, Latin and other Italic (research by B. Grozny, V. Georgiev, A. I. Kharsekin and others, incl. including the author of these lines; we also identified Etruscan-Iranian parallels).

The Armenian language is a language belonging to the Indo-European family, the Paleo-Balkan branch, the Greco-Phrygian-Armenian group, the Phrygian-Armenian subgroup. Is state language Armenia. The Armenian language has a very extensive geography: the number of speakers around the world significantly exceeds the country's population. Countries with the largest number of Armenian speakers outside Armenia:

  • Russia;
  • France;
  • Lebanon;
  • Georgia;
  • Iran.

Before the appearance of the first written sources about the Armenian language, little information was preserved. However, the first written mentions of the Armenian people are found in documents dating back to the 6th century. BC. Due to the fact that the periods of emergence of the oral and written forms of the language do not coincide, it is not possible to unambiguously answer the question of where the history of the Armenian language originates. Most scientists identify several periods of language formation:

  • pre-Grabar (from antiquity to the 5th century AD - pre-literate period);
  • Grabarsky (from the 5th to the 12th centuries - the first centuries after the advent of writing);
  • Middle Armenian (from the 12th to the 19th centuries);
  • New Armenian (from XIX to the present day).

Before the advent of writing, Armenian documents reached us only using the letters of the Greek, Syriac, and Persian alphabet. In the 5th century AD linguist and priest Mesrop Mashtots developed. In connection with this significant development received Grabar - the classical, or ancient Armenian language - the most ancient form of the Armenian language, preserved in written sources and extant to this day. The first printed book in Armenian, “Urbatagirk,” was published by Hakob Megapart in 1512 in Venice.

Features of the Armenian language

The Armenian language has a number of features that significantly distinguish it from other languages:

  • At the end of a sentence in the Armenian language there is not a period, but a colon;
  • Many sounds in the Armenian language have no analogues in any language in the world;
  • There are not many languages ​​in the world that contain 39 letters in the alphabet;
  • For almost two millennia, the Armenian alphabet has remained virtually unchanged
  • no significant changes;
  • The Armenian language contains 120 roots, thanks to which material from any language can be translated into it;
  • In Armenia there is special holiday, dedicated to the Armenian language and writing and called “Translator's Holiday”. This fact indicates high level written culture of the Armenian people;
  • Armenian is the only language in which the title of the Bible refers to God. Literally translated, Astvatsashunch (Armenian “Bible”) means “Breath of God.”

Modifiers and punctuation

In addition to having a special alphabet, the Armenian language is also distinguished from the languages ​​of the Indo-European family by its punctuation system. Most of the punctuation marks in modern Armenian go back to the Grabar punctuation. The end of a sentence is indicated by a colon, and a period in Armenian performs the function of a comma in Russian. Question and exclamation marks are placed not at the end of the sentence, but above the vowel in the last syllable of the intonationally emphasized word.

Numbers and numbers of the Armenian language

The Armenian number system uses capital letters of the alphabet. The old system did not have the number zero. The last letters of the Armenian alphabet, “O” (Օ) and “fe” (Ֆ), were added to its composition after the appearance of Arabic numerals and therefore have no numerical value. In modern Armenia, familiar Arabic numerals are used.

Grammar

The grammar of the Armenian language also has a number of features. Nouns vary in number and case, but do not have gender characteristics. The Armenian language uses a postpositive article. In most languages, the article is placed before the noun and is prepositive. If an article is used after a noun, it is called postpositive.
The syntactic relationship between words in a sentence is expressed through agreement, control, and partly word order. The Armenian language belongs to the group of nominative languages. The word order is quite variable. The stress is almost always placed on the last syllable.

Phonetics

The phonetics of the Armenian language implies the presence of:

  • Affricate (compound consonants ձ, ծ, ց, ջ, ճ, չ).
  • Aspirate (voiceless aspirated consonants փ, թ, ք).
  • The back lingual fricative consonants are the voiceless խ (х) and the voiced ղ.
  • Laryngeal aspiration – հ.

Classification of dialects

Modern Armenian has various dialects. In total there are about 60 varieties of them. Some dialects of the Armenian language are so different from each other that speakers may well not understand each other. There are many principles for classifying Armenian dialects, but traditionally the language is divided into two directions: eastern and western.
The Eastern Armenian dialect is widespread in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Russia, and Iran. Western Armenian is used in eastern Turkey, Europe and the USA. In addition to the traditional, the Armenian linguist R.A. Acharyan differentiated the Armenian dialects also according to the following principle (using the example of the verb gnal - “to go”):

  • um dialects (gnum em);
  • kə dialects (kə gnam);
  • l dialects (gnal em).

The Armenian language is unique: it has no close “relatives” within the Indo-European family, so numerous attempts to assign it to any group have been unsuccessful.

What Mesrop Mashtots did for the Armenian language. New discoveries of 2017

The authorship of the modern alphabet belongs to Mesrop Mashtots (IV century). Its creation was not a simple copying of already existing alphabets. Linguists testify that the Armenian language has retained the features of its Indo-European ancestor to a greater extent than other languages ​​of this language family.

The creation of the Armenian language is associated with a kind of long-term linguistic expedition: young men, students of Mashtots, went to Persia, Egypt, Greece, Rome, with the goal of in-depth study of the language, its sound composition and letter designation. Returning back, they all provided language material, then processed all the information. It was on this basis that the unique Armenian alphabet was created.

In fact, Mashtots and his students, among them Movses Khorenatsi, carried out real scientific research in the field of linguistics in a fairly short period.

Note that the Armenian language did not become “dead”, like, for example, ancient Greek and Latin. And this is also the merit of Mashtots: phonetics, grammar, vocabulary, syntax - all the structural links of the Armenian language - are organized and correlated in such a way that it has not yet lost its relevance and linguists, for example, can freely read and speak ancient Armenian and study ancient Armenian manuscripts.

Over time, the lexical composition of the language changed, the sound composition turned out to be stable, and together phonetics and vocabulary create a unique speech sound, which is embodied in the alphabet of the Armenian people.

An interesting fact is that Mesrop Mashtots is the author of the Georgian alphabet. Some historical sources contain information that Mashtots is the creator of Albanian (Caucasian Albania).

There was a version that before the creation of the alphabet by Mashtots, the Armenian people used a language associated with Persian letters, and before that they allegedly did not have a written language.

This fact is partly a reality: during the reign of the Arsacids, all documents and correspondence were conducted in the Persian language. There was no evidence of the existence of ancient Armenian writing.

However, at the end of 2017, young scientists from Yerevan tried to decipher the most complex writings of Urartu, which almost no one had previously been able to decipher.

It is noteworthy that the key to the writings of Urartu was the ancient Armenian language. Currently, the research results have not yet been published. However, there is a hypothesis - the Urartu cuneiform was the oldest alphabet of the Armenians!

According to some linguistic studies, even before Mesrop Mashtots the Armenian alphabet was used. It included 28 letters. This, of course, did not correspond to the sound series of the Armenian language - the Mashtots alphabet includes 36 letters.

Names that are important to remember

The first Armenian historians and writers played a special place in the process of the formation of writing: thanks to them, the written culture of antiquity reached its contemporaries.

The first name that comes to mind among Armenian historians of antiquity is Mar Abbas Katina, secretary of King Vagharshak I.

With the permission of the Persian king Arshak, he worked in the archives of Nineveh, where the libraries of Babylon were kept. Mar Abbas, relying on Chaldean sources, described the history of Armenia in the period from the first kings to Tigran I. This work reached his contemporaries only in copies.

Agatangekhos - secretary of King Trdat, author of the history of Christianity in Armenia (IV century), Gregory the Illuminator - created a collection of sermons and prayers in the Armenian language. Pavstos Byuzand is the creator of the history of Armenia from 344 - 392. These are just a few names on a long list.

Mesrop Mashtots and SahakPartev carried out the translation Holy Scripture into Armenian. Movses Hirenatsi described the history of Armenia, his work is a collection of works in four volumes. Yeghishe described the wars of the Armenians with Persia from 439 to 463 years. David the Invincible gave Armenia philosophical works on principles.
Authors from the 7th century are widely represented. Among them is Hovhannes Mamikonyan, who described the history of the Mamikonyan princes. Anania Shirakatsi, also known as the Arithmetician, is a famous astronomer; Armenia owes him the compiler of the calendar. The author of grammar and rhetorical knowledge was Moses II.

Let's name the famous figure of the 8th century. HovnanOtsnetsi wrote teachings directed against heresies.

In the 11th century, many people glorified Armenia through their labors. TovmaArtsruni wrote the history of Artsruni's house. The grammar of the Armenian language was described in detail by Gregory Magistros, who is also the author of the poetic transcription “The History of the Old and New Testaments”; AristakesLasdiverdzi created the “History of Armenia and neighboring cities.”

Let us recall the names of scientists in the 12th century. Samuel compiled a chronology in the period from the creation of the world to 1179. Mkhitar, a former doctor, wrote a valuable work, “Consolation in Fever.” NersesKlaetsi is a famous patriarch, theologian, author of a poetic translation of the Bible; his latest work consists of 8,000 verses. Mkhitar Gosh is the author of 190 fables, the Code of Church and Civil Laws.

In the 13th century, the culture and science of Armenia were enriched by scientists, historians and writers. Stefan Orbelian is a bishop who wrote a famous poetic work - the elegy “Lamentation for Etchmiadzin”. Vardan the Great described “The General History from the Creation of the World to 1267.” Kirakos Kanzaketsi dedicated his work to describing the devastation of the city of Ani by the Mongols in 1230, as well as the flight of the Armenians to Astrakhan, Trebizond, Poland. Magakia is a monk who described the Tatar invasion of Asia before 1272. Mkhitar Anetsi created a work, rich in information presented in it, on the history of Armenia, Georgia, Persia, and he is also the author of the translation of astronomical research from Persian. Aristakes wrote a work related to rhetorical knowledge, “the science or instructions on how to write correctly,” as well as a “Dictionary of the Armenian Language.”

The 14th century became extremely difficult for the Armenian people: it was full of formidable trials for Armenia.

Armenians were forced to seek refuge in other countries. The reason for this was persecution and mass extermination

No matter how difficult it was for the Armenian people during this period, they preserved the most valuable thing - the culture reflected in books. It was books that Armenians saved first of all, leaving their homes and native land. Sometimes they gave their lives for a book. Matenadaran is a real treasury of Armenia, where all the saved books are collected.

There are books in it that were rewritten, or rather redrawn. Such work was sometimes performed by illiterate people. They could neither read nor write, but they accomplished a real feat - they gave future generations the opportunity to become acquainted with ancient works. If not for them, much would have sunk into oblivion.

A new round in the development of Armenian culture is associated with book printing. Since the 16th century. Everywhere they tried to open printing houses where the Armenians settled. So in 1568 a printing house was founded even in Venice, and in the 17th century. - already in Milan, Paris, Amsterdam, Leipzig, Constantinople, and a little later - in London, Smyrna, Madras, Etchmiadzin, Trieste, Tiflis, Shusha, Astrakhan, in St. Petersburg (1783), Nakhichevan.

America is another country where many printing houses were opened.

Mashtots Bible: the best of seven

At a time when Armenia had become Christian almost a hundred years ago, the Bible was still not translated; it was distributed in Greek and Assyrian, so monks and only some enlightened and literate citizens could familiarize themselves with it. The primary task was to translate the Holy Scriptures into the native language. This is exactly what Mashtots and Partev did brilliantly.

Mashtots’ translation was the seventh in a row, but to this day it is considered the best of all for its brevity, special expressiveness and clarity. Now the common people were able to attend services in churches, understanding the priests, and therefore perceive Christianity consciously.

Mashtots was also involved in educational activities: he and his followers traveled to villages and taught the illiterate. It is he who we can rightfully call the first literature teacher in Armenia. His student, Koryun, described his activities, and he himself later became a historian. In the Middle Ages, only schools at monasteries became few, and the first universities began to be formed in Armenia.

As a result, he founded national schools in almost all regions of Ancient Armenia. Mashtots is the author of the first Armenian textbook, he was also the first in the history of Armenian linguistics to develop a methodology for teaching the language. In addition, he laid the foundations of Armenian poetry and music.

A great date for the language – a great milestone in the culture of Armenia

Let us recall that thirteen years ago the Armenian people celebrated the 1600th anniversary of the alphabet. The Armenian alphabet is one of the oldest in the world. The Armenian language is surprisingly stable: over such a long period of existence, no significant changes have been made to it. On the eastern slope of Mount Aragats, a monument was created dedicated to this significant event - all 39 letters of the Armenian alphabet, carved from stones. This unique monument is the only one in the world!
Nowadays, more than 10 million Armenians speak Armenian. About five million live on the territory of Armenia, the rest form a diaspora, parts of which are located in various countries of the world.

We have already said that the Armenian language belongs to the Indo-European family. According to one version, he close relative Phrygian, inscriptions of which were found in ancient Anatolia.

The Armenian language has common features with other languages ​​- the Baltic, Slavic, Iranian and Indian languages, since they are all part of the eastern group of the Indo-European family. The geographical location of Armenia contributes to the fact that the Armenian language is also close to Western (“centum”) Indo-European languages, the first closest being Greek.

Phonetics of the Armenian language and its features. From the history of borrowings

Grammatical structure

The Armenian language is characterized by changes in the system of consonant sounds, that is, in the area of ​​consonantism. As examples of language we will name the following: Lat. dens, Greek o-don, Armenian a-tamn "tooth"; lat. genus, Greek genos, Armenian cin "birth".

Thanks to the shift of stress to the penultimate syllable k, the overstressed syllable fell away: thus, Proto-Indo-European bheret turned into ebhret, which gave in Armenian ebr.

Persian rule over a long period of time gave the Armenian language many Persian borrowings. Thanks to Christianity, Greek and Syriac words appeared in Armenian. Turkish words entered the vocabulary of Armenians during the period when Armenia was part of the Ottoman Empire. Even thanks to the Crusades, it was possible to add several French words to the language.

The grammatical system of the Armenian language has seven cases, two numbers, four types of conjugation and nine tenses. There is no category of gender, like in English. Grammatical gender, as in English, has been lost. Several types of nominal inflection have been preserved.

About the stages of formation of the Armenian language

In the first half of the 5th century, more than 40 different works of literature were created in Armenian literature. All of them are written in Grabar, the ancient Armenian language. This language has much in common with Sanskrit (an ancient Indian language), Latin, Greek, ancient Slavic, and ancient Germanic. The peculiarity of ancient Armenian is its more advanced linguistic system.

Varieties of writing are known. The first letter is “bolorgir” - . This is a letter that uses round uppercase letters and slanted lowercase letters, they are executed with straight horizontal and vertical elements. The second is “notrgir” - slanted cursive writing using rounded elements.

The Middle Armenian language emerged in the 10th century. It developed in parallel with the grabar until the 15th century. In the XIV-XIX centuries. Another version of the language arose - living and popular - “Ashkharabar”, the so-called “secular language”. As a result, Grabar became the language of the church.

Ashkharabar became the basis for the development of the modern Armenian national literary language, which developed since the 50s of the 19th century. Two dialects are distinguished in modern Armenian: eastern, spoken in both Armenia and Iran; the second dialect is Western, it is used in the countries of Asia Minor, Europe and the USA.

The state language of Armenia (Eastern literary) is grammatically similar to the dialect group of the “um” branch. The Western Armenian literary language is grammatically close to the dialect group called the “ke” branch.

What is the difference? In the Western dialect, there is a secondary devoicing of voiced plosives: b, d, g have become p, t, k. The differences between Eastern and Western literary languages ​​are insignificant. And spoken dialects have more significant differences.

All dialects are characterized by the following features: consonance of consonants in a word; 7 cases, 8 types of declension, 5 moods, 2 types of conjugation, 7 participles; 3 voices (active, passive, neuter), 3 persons (including binary), 3 numbers; 3 genders (masculine, feminine and neuter) in the Western dialect; in the eastern dialect there is no category of gender; 3 types of action for verbs (perfect, imperfect, to be committed). In the name paradigm there are synthetic forms of expressing grammatical meaning, and in the verb paradigm there are analytical forms.

The number of speakers of this language is estimated at 7-8 million people. Worldwide. After all, this is one of the oldest languages ​​and belongs to the Indo-European language family. There were versions about the greatest closeness of Armenian to Greek, but they were later refuted by scientists, since Greek is part of the western group of Indo-European languages, and Armenian is classified as eastern, which is also called “satem”. Translated from Avestan, “satem” means “one hundred.” The evolution of the term for the numeral "one hundred" clearly demonstrates the differences that have arisen in the western and eastern groups of Indo-European languages ​​over time.

Armenian came into contact with many ancient and modern dialects in its history: the Urartian language had an important influence on it, since the gene pool of the Armenians was formed long before the arrival of the Indo-European tribes and the Urartian speech was dominant in those early times. Many facts from the history of other languages ​​are discovered due to their connection with Armenian, which is distinguished by a large number of historical layers. The literary form has more than 150 thousand words, while there are a number of dialects, and that's tens of thousands of words more!

The archaic forms of writing were replaced by the modern Armenian alphabet: it was developed in 405 by Mesrop Mashtots, who was later canonized. Thanks to the invention of the alphabet, the Bible was translated and liturgical books, which truly made the language immortal! The Word of God and the preaching of Christianity in their native language saved the people from extinction.

The alphabet in Armenia has practically not undergone any large-scale changes since its invention. Only in the 11th century were 2 more letters added to the original 36. Over the centuries, only the most common fonts changed: if in the Middle Ages luxurious graphic forms and calligraphic variants prevailed, then later more functional fonts came to the fore.

Nowadays, excellent examples of writing from early centuries can be seen in the Matenadaran, a treasury of Armenian culture. More than 18 thousand handwritten books are collected here, which were created in different historical periods in monasteries throughout Armenia and in other countries where Armenians created and created. In the Matenadaran you can look at the Gospels, copied by monks and decorated with amazing miniatures, enclosed in precious frames.

Local dialects in different regions

The classical or ancient Armenian language is called Grabar. It traces its history back to the 4th century - from the time when the process of formation of the Armenian nation ended. Gradually, speech developed and evolved.

Modern Armenian has two main literary forms - Western and Eastern. They mainly differ in the pronunciation of consonants, verb conjugation and spelling. Each of them, in turn, has unique linguistic material from numerous dialects, dialects and dialects.

Dialects of the Western Armenian branch predominate in communities in Europe, America and the Middle East, and are also represented in the Armenian-populated region of Javakhk and partly in the historical Armenian diaspora communities of the south.

Eastern Armenian dialects are represented in the Republic of Armenia, Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh), and most Armenian communities in Iran and Russia. In addition, on the territory of Armenia there are large areas of Western Armenian dialects - the north-west of the country and the areas of the cities of Martuni and Gavar in the lake basin.

Among the Eastern Armenian dialects they stand out for their originality Nagorno-Karabakh and Southern Armenia. Here, almost every village has its own unique dialects, which are sometimes very different from each other. These differences enrich linguistic traditions, become the reason for many funny incidents and incidents, the topic of jokes and anecdotes.

Even in the conditions of unification of literary standards that every schoolchild knows, Armenians never forget the dialect of the region of their origin and pass it on to their children and grandchildren. Dialects are an important part cultural heritage, accumulated over almost 6 thousand years of history of the ancient people.

Russian-Armenian phrasebook

Most Armenians speak Russian well, and many communicate without the slightest accent. But many guests of the country will be interested in trying their hand at the Armenian language, and we decided to compile a small phrasebook - a dictionary of the most common words and expressions.

Hello!

Barev Dzez!

Goodbye

Tstesutyun

How are you (your) doing?

Vonz ek(es)?

I'm fine

Sorry

Shnorakalutyun

They often say instead

Please

What is the price?

Inch argy?

Where is?

Worteh e gtnvum?

Andznagir

Kareli huh?

Hotel

Hyuranots

Dear brother, little brother

Akhper jan

What or what

Delicious

Shat amov e

Could you come over?

Kmotenak?

Could you help me?

Karoh ek okontel?

Do you speak Russian?

Hosum ek ruseren?

I love you, Armenia!

Sirum em kez, Ayastan!

Do you understand me

Haskanum ek indz?

I need a Historical Museum

Indz petk a Patmutyan tangaran

Free? (about taxi)

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