Prof. James Rassell,
Harvard University
Dr. James Russell, Archbishop Mesrob Ashjian & Armen Aroyan in the Old City of Van
At the medeival Fortress of Hromkla (Hromgla)
Dr. Herand Markarian in his ancestral village of Shushants near Van
At the Door of Mher in Van.
The Harvard Team:
Sergio La Porta, James Russell
and Shushan Yenikomshian Teager.
By Prof. James R. Russell
Harvard University
Having just returned from a 2 1/2- week-long expedition to eastern and southeastern Turkey organized by Arrnen Aroyan, my mind and heart are full of powerful impressions that obliterate those of daily life back home. An honest assessment is necessary: the group was rather large and our program was ambitious, combining as it did two separate itineraries; thus long, cramped bus rides and short stays at sites were too often the rule. That being said, I can admit just as honestly that I would go back tomorrow and do it all over again. I can't wait to go back.
The reason the group was large is that some came to hear my lectures on selected sites, while others were in the entourage of Archbishop Mesrob Ashjian. I was at first a bit worried about having to be on best behavior in the presence of so distinguished a figure; but Archbishop Ashjian radiated such warmth that traveling with him was a joyous, spiritually enlightening experience for me - I think, for all of us. We assembled in Istanbul and, after a very fine dinner of lahmajun, flew to Antep, where the real hero of our journey, our intrepid bus driver JemaI, welcomed each of us with a bouquet of flowers. The next day we drove to Hromkla, the castle on the Euphrates where St Nerses Shnorhali lived: we forded a stream, passed through its seven gates, and climbed, and climbed. Abp. Ashjian held a service of prayer. I clutched my burning candle hardly able to believe I had been in Boston two days before. A Turkish farm boy named Mehmet lent me his white horse to ride back to the bus. We were in another world.
After that, we traveled to Musa Dagh and enjoyed tea and baklava at the Armenian village of Vakifli, where the church has just been rebuilt. Abp. Ashjian and some of our group entered it and burst spontaneously into Der Voghormya. I interviewed a native speaker of the Musa Dagh dialect We ate at an outdoor restaurant in Harbiye (ancient Daphne), and the next morning toured Antioch, with its priceless Greek mosaics. It was very stirring to stand where St. Peter and St John Chrysostom, Libanius and the Emperor Julian had lived and studied. Then we headed north to Iskenderun and the plain of Issos, and east back to Aintab, across the Euphrates at Birejik (where we commemorated the martyrs who drowned at the crossing there), and to Urfa and Harran, on the hot Mesopotamian plain. These great centers of Syriac culture and Abrahamic antiquity also feature gastroenteritis - as I and others discovered, though that did not blunt the interest of the visit.
The next stop was Adiyaman and the awesome throne of the gods, Nemrut Dagh - the only surviving temple of Anatolian Zorastrianism. I had longed for years to visit that holy place, but had not expected Commagene (the surrounding region) to be such a paradise of aromatic trees, oleander bushes, intoxicating flowers and singing rivers, all beneath fresh summer thunder- storms - a delight to the senses, the heart, and the soul. Departure after our brief stay was sad, and it was heartbreaking to see how little remained - not little, nothing - of Armenian Malatya, Kharpert, Palu, Havav. In the latter village, only the shell of K'aghts'rahayats' Surb Astvatsatsin (The Holy Virgin of Sweet Vistas) remained; but here, as everywhere, the new inhabitants greeted us as friends.
These were Kurds, mostly, and most of them have at least a drop of Armenian blood. The relationship, as we know, has been equivocal; but it can improve, is improving and must grow. The tension of Turkey's war with the Kurdish separatists is felt nearly everywhere in those parts, of course: there are military roadblocks, and these can be very frightening until you realize that for these young soldiers, too, you are a guest and they do not want to see you come to harm. In some areas, we had military and police escorts: at Kars, our policeman bought me cherry juice, took me on a quick walking tour and invited me to stay at his family's home the next time I visit. You encounter this overwhelming, quite sincere friendship in Turkey - we made no secret of being Armenians, or for me and my student Sergio La Porta, Armenologists - and then compare it to the utter obliteration of Armenian life in the very core of the land. It is an emotional roller coaster. One tries to build on the positive, to make these contacts firm, since for better or worse Turks, Kurds and Armenians will all be living in Anatolia together - and, in the south, Arabs, too.
Diyarbakir is a vast, ancient, walled city on the Tigris, an archeological jewel of the ancient East The strange, seven- altared Armenian church of St. Kirakos stands, but its roof has fallen in: Abp. Ashjian vowed to restore it, and I volunteer to come and help with the work. This town is very tense, though: helicopters clatter overhead day and night; and this is where human rights activists often "disappear." But I would have liked a lot more time to explore Diyarbakir. From there it was north, into the mountains, through Silvan (Maipherkath, Tigranakert) to Prebatman, with Sasun towering, unbelievably; gloriously, on our left. In Diyarbakir I had met a woman at St. Kirakos who knows no Armenian, but whose father was named Haik. She is from Sasun, but didn't react to questions about their traditions until I asked her whether the word Maratuk meant something to her. Her face turned into the sun with delight. Maratuk! Look at it, she said even from far off, and it will cure a scorpion bite. This is the Holy Virgin of Marut'a of the heroes of Sasun!
Bitlis is a dark stone city in a mountainous river gorge; then you come out on the plain opposite Nemrut, at Tatvan. We drove across the plain of Mush, but failed to obtain permission to visit St. Karapet. The road south of Lake Van was now closed, too; so we were forced to go the long way around, through Khlat, Adilcevaz, and Archesh, crawling at the feet of Sipan. But these places were worth the sight, and we got to Van just before midnight.
The next day was Lezk (Ara the Beautiful's rock: I lectured there and the archbishop reclined blissfully in a haystack), the port of Avants, Shahbaghi (where we collected a folktale about Kurkik Jelali and the Van vishap!), Arshile Gorky's native Khorkom and Narek. Abp. Ashjian resolved to find Narekats'i's cave - there ensued wild rides in dolmushes, real rock climbing, and the very cave, with waterfall nearby (as the legends say) and Aghtamar way down below. Getting there was a miracle. We visited also Shushants - the home village of one of our group, Herand Markarian. This was a sad, rainy morning. The Armenian graves are being desecrated still for the gold that villagers imagine must be there, and the church was destroyed not long ago for building stone - the crosses deliberately and maliciously desecrated. At Aghtamar, too, I must report with great sorrow that the Cross on the west wall held by angels, beneath Gagik and Christ, has been utterly destroyed - hacked away - since I was last there, in 1994. Though the placard at the site now identifies the Church of the Holy Cross as Armenian, such vandalism - doubtless the barbaric act of a lone Muslim fundamentalist fanatic - can only be stopped through serious preservation and conservation.
A special plea must be made, in conclusion, for Varak Monastery. This unique monument, of incalculable value to Christians worldwide and to the Armenian heritage, is being brutally desecrated. An ugly concrete mosque is under construction, right up against its front, and what is left of the church is used as a dumping ground for construction materials and garbage. The treatment of this sacred site is unworthy of any country that claims membership in the community of civilized nations. It is in its way a continuation of the Armenian holocaust. Abp. Ashjian, a man not easily moved even to frown, burst into tears of rage at Varak. This monument must be saved. As we were leaving Varak, in silence, to get into the tiny dolmush (minivan-taxi) to negotiate the dubious mountain road back down, the Kurdish driver's young helper came over and took my hand. Urged on by gentle smiles I practiced my little Kurdish the rest of the way. "Heval," said Ahmet. “Friend.”
Eastern Turkey is not heavily populated - most of my Turkish friends have never been there and do not want to go there. It is easier to ignore - to ignore 20 million Kurds with a distinct Iranian culture and language of their own, to ignore the Armenian Holocaust. But there is a better way: let the Kurds be themselves, and remember the Armenians, and Eastern Anatolia can be an archaeological garden, an economic miracle, a multi-cultured paradise. In the faces of the ancient divinities of Nemrut Dagh, the faces of Christ and His Saints and the Armenian kings of Aghtamar, the faces of my Armenian traveling companions, in Ahmet's face most of all, I see a future based upon love, not hatred, in the place to which my life is inextricably bound, that I see always with the inner eye of my heart's delight, in Anatolia.