Note 4 — Chapter II · Ancient Historical Legends

This oldest of Armenian legends, quaint and simple as it is in accounting for the beginnings of a people, savours of the Old Testament and is suggestive of the Assyrian invasion which took place about the ninth century before Christ. It is significant that the Armenians refused the protection of Bel, and that in the very beginning of their legendary history, they insisted on standing firm and maintaining their independence, for no single quality is more characteristic of this people than a proud, haughty, even at times disdainful independence. It is also suggestive that their patriarchal hero was no saint, but a mighty giant, beautiful as he was strong, whose greatest pride was in the throwing of a spear, for his descendants have not been a peaceful people. To be sure, they were the first nation to be converted to Christianity, which would say little for their firmness and independence, were it not that the priest with the cross was followed by a powerful king with a sword at the head of an army that had learned to fight as the Romans fought.4 The songs that were sung in memory and honor of Haic are seldom sung to-day unless it be in some remote village where the civilization of the Turk has not yet pressed, and there are few such villages if any. For many of them breathe of a national spirit not beseeming a subject nation, and have been suppressed for many years.