Note 32 — Chapter IX · ERZERUM

The name Erzerum dates from Mussulman times, but its exact derivation is obscure. It may either signify the land (Ard in Arabic, Arz in Turkish) of Rum, or of the Roman Empire; or it may be compounded of this last name and of the name of an unfortified town in the vicinity which was known as Artze or Artsn. It is quite probable that this town was at an early date called Artze of Rum to distinguish it from another Artze in the south of Armenia which lay within the Persian sphere.32 Local tradition places the site of the first of these Artzes close to the present city and on or near the banks of the Kara Su. We know that the place was sacked by the Turks in the middle of the eleventh century;33 and according to Saint Martin the survivors took refuge within the walls of Theodosiopolis, to which they transferred the name of their own populous town.34 However this may be, the ancient Armenian name of Karin is still applied to the present city.35 The monuments of the Eastern Empire have been seen in Erzerum by modern travellers; and the chain of history has not been broken in a manner to disparage the identity of the Roman fortress with this key to the Asiatic dominions of the Ottoman Turks.