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1882
Volume 1, Issue 2
  • ISSN: 3118-3123
  • E-ISSN: 3041-5063
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Abstract

Abstract

This paper seeks to reinscribe the debate regarding the Christianisation of the (bards), from one concerned with an essentialised notion of “Christian-ness” to one which better accounts for the multifarious notions of “Christian” in medieval Armenia. That is, the contrary conceptions of the , in literary and material sources, are surveyed and taxonomised. By way of a close reading of Movsēs Daskhurants‘i’s , supplemented by an exegesis of the in other canonical Armenian histories, the , as a polemical category in clerical literature, is shown to represent the antithesis of Christian piety. However, the spoor of a more general assimilation of the into Christian society, specifically that of the gentry and laypeople, is evidenced by other material sources and texts. The intention of this paper is to offer a new approach with which to think about the , and Armenia’s pre-Christian heritage writ large.

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2024-12-01
2025-12-05

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/content/journals/10.1484/J.MEMAS.5.150240
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A Gusan Gestalt Shift: Differing Perceptions of the Bard in Movsēs Daskhurants‘i’s History of the Caucasian Albanians
https://doi.org/10.1484/j.memas.5.150240
/content/journals/10.1484/J.MEMAS.5.150240
/content/journals/10.1484/J.MEMAS.5.150240
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  • Article Type: Research Article
Keyword(s): Caucasian Albania; Christianisation; gusans, Daskhurants‘i; oral tradition; pre-Christian Armenia.
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