Geographical Studies of the Middle Ages

In the 5th-7th centuries, after the invention of the Armenian alphabet, the art of writing starts to develop rapidly. Along with this, develop the geographical studies of the middle ages.

The philosophical Neoplatonic views of David the Invincible (Anhaght) played a great role on the recognition of the world and the development of the geography in Armenia.

“Ashkharhatsuyts” by Shirakatsi

Anania Shirakatsi was the first to create a collection of textbooks in Armenian. This collection also included “Ashkharhatsuyts” – a masterpiece of medieval Armenian geography. The historical part of the book belongs to Movses Khorenatsi (famous Armenian historian), and the geographical part to Shirakatsi. “Ashkharhatsuyts” was composed of 15 maps and broad descriptions and comments. S. Yeremyan has done the analyses of that work in 1963. According to him, mathematical, geographical and astronomical materials from Shirakatsi dominate this work. Some materials are borrowed from the work of Ptolemy “Geography”, where he proved that the world is spherical. He had a great courage to accept it in those days, but he also criticized some of the theories of Ptolemy.

One of Shirakatsi’s contemporaries was Alexander Yerkrachap, whose work “Mghonachap” Shirakatsi added to his “Ashkharhatsuyts”.

“Ashkharhatsuyts” by Vardan Areveltsi

In the middle ages, there were also created other books called “Ashkharhatsuyts”. Stepanos Syunetsi created one of them. We have some information about “Ashkharhatsuyts” that was written in 13th century by Vardan Areveltsi. However, the cartographic part of this work is missing. There are only some references in the book.

We should note that people were taught geography at medieval schools and universities in Armenia. They used many theoretical and practical materials for teaching. People studied the geography of continents and the geography of Armenia.

Geographical studies of the Middle Ages developed thanks to outstanding individuals and travelers such as Nerses Lambronetsi, Martiros Erznkatsi, Karapet Baghishetsi, Grigor Kesaratsi, the author of the geographical dictionary Hovhannes Ankyunetsi, Hakob Karnetsi and Avetik Tigranakertsi.

After the discovery of printing, many works of Anania Shirakatsi, Al. Yerkrachap, Vardan Areveltsi were published. This promoted the development of geographical studies of the middle ages.

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