Sebouh David Aslanian is a historian of the early modern world and Armenian history. [1] He is Professor & Richard Hovannisian Endowed Chair in Modern Armenian History at UCLA. [2]
Born in Ethiopia to Armenian parents whose ancestors fled the Ottoman Empire during the Hamidian massacres in the 1890s, Aslanian spend his adolescence in Dubai. His maternal grandfather, Georges Djerrahian, opened Ethiopia's first commercial printing press in 1931. [3] He obtained BA from McGill University, MA from New School for Social Research and a Ph.D. with Distinction from Columbia University. [2]
The association of Armenians with India and the presence of Armenians in India are very old, and there has been a mutual economic and cultural association of Armenians with India. Today there are about a hundred, most of whom currently live in or around Kolkata.
New Julfa is the Armenian quarter of Isfahan, Iran, located along the south bank of the Zayanderud.
Ronald Grigor Suny is an American-Armenian historian and political scientist. Suny is the William H. Sewell Jr. Distinguished University Professor of History Emeritus at the University of Michigan and served as director of the Eisenberg Institute for Historical Studies, 2009 to 2012 and was the Charles Tilly Collegiate Professor of Social and Political History at the University of Michigan from 2005 to 2015, William H. Sewell Jr. Distinguished University Professor of History (2015–2022), and is Emeritus Professor of political science and history at the University of Chicago.
Movses Baghramian was an 18th-century Armenian writer and activist. He was a collaborator of the Indo-Armenian activists Joseph Emin and Shahamir Shahamirian and played an important role in running the printing press founded by Shahamirian in Madras. He wrote the work Nor tetrak vor kochi hordorak, which calls on Armenians to fight for the liberty of their country. It has been called "the first journalistic-political work" in the Armenian context.
Patma-Banasirakan Handes is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal published by the Armenian National Academy of Sciences. It covers research on Armenian history, art history, literature, and linguistics. The journal also publishes discussions and debates, book reviews and also has special sections devoted to science news and Armenian Diasporan affairs. It occasionally publishes obituaries and biographies and commemorates the lives of noted scholars involved in Armenian studies. It is the Academy's "flagship journal".
Azdarar was the first Armenian language newspaper ever published. It was established on October 16, 1794, in the city of Madras in India by Father Harutyun Shmavonyan. It is also the first non-English newspaper to be published in India. The monthly covered mainly cultural and historical issues.
Voskan Yerevantsi was one of the first Armenian book publishers during the years 1640–1666. He published the first Armenian Bible in Amsterdam in 1668, which is believed to be one of the best samples of old Armenian printing. His printing press was the longest-running Armenian publisher in the seventeenth century. It existed for 26 consecutive years in four different countries, printing nearly 40 works.
Shahamir Shahamirian was an 18th-century Armenian writer, philosopher, and wealthy merchant in Madras. Born in New Julfa, Iran, he moved to India where he became an affluent merchant and an active member of the Armenian community of Madras. In 1771, Shahamirian and his collaborators founded the first Armenian printing press in Madras. In 1787/88, Shahamirian published Vorogayt Parats, which contained a proposed constitution for a future independent Armenian republic. He is thus regarded as the author of the first Armenian constitution.
Simeon I of Yerevan or Simeon Yerevantsi was the Catholicos of All Armenians from 1763 to 1780. In 1771 he founded a printing press at the Etchmiadzin Cathedral, the first in Armenia. According to historian Rouben Paul Adalian, the pontificate of Simeon I of Yerevan marked the reemergence of Etchmiadzin as a "truly important center of Armenian national affairs".
The Society for the History of Authorship, Reading and Publishing (SHARP) formed in 1991 in the United States on the initiative of scholars Jonathan Rose, Simon Eliot, and others.
The Sceriman family, also referred to as the Shahremanian, Shahremanean, Shahrimanian, Shehrimanian, Shariman, or Seriman family, were a wealthy Safavid merchant family of Armenian ethnicity. A Catholic family, they had their roots in early 17th-century New Julfa, and relatively quickly came to preside over branches all over the world, stretching from Italy in the west, to Pegu (Burma) in the east. Apart from being renowned as a trader's family, some Scerimans were high-ranking individuals in the Safavid state, including in its military, religious, and bureaucratic systems. Later, similar positions were obtained abroad, such as in the various Italian city-states and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. They especially became renowned in the Republic of Venice, where they were well integrated into its ruling class. Nevertheless, until their decline in the late 1790s and eventual inactivity in the 19th century, they remained bound to their original base in Iran.
Khvajeh Safar was an Armenian merchant and Safavid official, who served as the first mayor (kalāntar) of New Julfa, from 1605 until his death in 1618. He was of Armenian origin. A member of the influential Shafraz family, he was bestowed with the title by then incumbent king Abbas I in recognition of his father's rank of melik in Old Julfa, and his instant submission to Abbas I when the latter retook the area. The next three subsequent kalantars were all from Khvajeh Safar's family, while the last member of the family that held the post was Khvajeh Haikaz (1656-1660).
Set Khan Astvatsatourian was an Iranian–Armenian businessman, Iran's ambassador to Great Britain, envoy to the Ottoman empire, military advisor to Fath-Ali Shah, the second Qajar shah (king) of Iran. Set Khan played a leading role in the modernization of the Persian military, working with close friend Abbas Mirza, the Crown Prince of Iran, to reform the military during The Great Game. Set Khan is immortalized in stone holding his Ottoman-jeweled dagger within the "Asia Group" statuary at the Prince Albert Memorial in London's Hyde Park.
Anton Bogos Çelebi was an Armenian merchant magnate and Ottoman and later Tuscan official in 17th century. Gonfalonier of Livorno. He was a brother of Hasan Agha.
A Book Called Snare of Glory is an Armenian political and legal treatise written by Armenian merchant and intellectual Shahamir Shahamirian and his son Hakob Shahamirian, and published between 1787 and 1789. It contains a proposed constitution for a future independent Armenian state along parliamentary and republican lines. It was published at the author's printing press in Madras. It is regarded as a landmark in Armenian intellectual and literary history and one of the earliest and most significant expressions of the ideals of the Enlightenment in the Armenian context. It has also been called the first constitution in Asia.
The brothers Petros (Petik) and Sanos were Armenian merchant magnates and Ottoman government tax-farmers from Old Julfa. They played a crucial role in the silk trade in Aleppo during the late 16th and first half of the 17th centuries, operating an extensive commercial network that reached the Dutch Republic and the Indian subcontinent and were important patrons of the Armenian community.
Multanis were an influential merchant diaspora from Indian subcontinent that was widely active in Central and Western Asia between 14th and 19th centuries. They were centered in the city of Multan in the south Punjab. The majority of Multanis were Punjabi Khatris.
From antiquity, Armenian merchants have played a pivotal role in transcontinental trade across Eurasia. Positioned strategically along the vital trade route linking Europe and Asia, Armenia's geographical advantage has sustained its centrality of international trade in the economic life of Armenians until the close of the early modern period. Armenians historically served as merchants at the crossroads of Central Asia, India, China, and the Mediterranean, facing persistent attacks from various quarters vying for control over the pivotal trade routes.
The Indo-Mediterranean is the region comprising the Mediterranean world, the Indian Ocean world, and their connecting regions in the vicinity of the Suez Canal.
Matenadaran, folio 1g, doc. 1288 is a Persian decree (farman) stored in the Catholicosate Archive of the Matenadaran in Armenia. Issued by the Iranian ruler Nader Shah at the request of Armenian merchants from Agulis between December 1742 and January 1743, it is written in Shekasteh Nastaliq script. The decree addresses the taxes imposed on these merchants and the abuses and extortions carried out by Nader Shah's officials. Additionally, it provides a brief review of the historical context, particularly the economic conditions in Nader's empire, including Agulis. The decree was issued in response to a petition by Armenian merchants Hovhannes and Martiros.