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BC 585 - BC 34 - Two Kingdoms

The strong compact Kingdom of Urartu [Urardhu, Ararat, included most of Armenia] lies at the dawn of Armenian history like a golden age. It had only existed two centuries when it was shattered by the invaders from the Russian steppes, and the anarchy into which they plunged the country had to be cured by the imposition of a foreign rule. In 585 B.C the nomads were cowed and the plateau annexed by Cyaxares the Mede.

After the Persian had taken over the Medes' inheritance, the great organizer Darius divided this portion of it into two governments or satrapies. One of these seems to have included the basins of Urmia and Van, and part of the valley of the Aras; tbf other corresponded approximately to the Vilayets of Bitlis, Mamouret-ul-Aziz and Diyarbekir, and covered the upper valleys of the Tunis and Euphrates. They were called respectively the satrapies of Eastern and Western Armenia, and this is the origin of the name by which tk Haik and the Haiasdan are now almost universally known to their neighbours. The word 'Armenia' (Armina) first appears in Darius's inscriptions; the Greeks adopted it from the Persian official usage, and from the Greeks it has spread to the rest of the world, including the Osmanli Turks.

About the middle of the fourth century Vahey was upon the throne of the Haigs. He assisted Darius in his war with the Macedonians, but fell in battle in the year B.C. 328. Armenia became a Macedonian province, and was ruled by governors, the first of whom, a Persian, was appointed by Alexander three years after the death of Vahey. Already in the year 317, however, the Armenian chief, Ardwand, or Erwand (Ardoates), headed a revolution against the reigning governor, Neoptolemus, threw off the Macedonian yoke, and maintained himself for thirty-three years as an independent sovereign. After his death the Armenians were obliged to submit for a time to the supremacy of the Seleucidae, until two Armenian nobles, Artaxias and Zariadras, availed themselves of the moment when Antiochus the Great had suffered a defeat from the Romans (b.c. 190), to declare their country free from its allegiance to the Syrian kings.

Armenia was at this epoch divided into two kingdoms, that of Armenia Minor on the western, and that of Armenia Major on the eastern side of the Euphrates. In Armenia Minor the descendants of Zariadras continued to rule till the fall of Mithridates: thenceforward the country became attached to one or the other of the neighboring states, and in the reign of the emperor Vespasian was made a Roman province: subsequently its limits were extended so as to embrace Melitene, Aravene, and part of Cataonia; and under the Byzantine emperors we find it divided into Armenia Prima and Secunda, the former governed by a consul, the latter by a dux.

In Armenia Major the family of Artaxias (the Armenian Arsacidse) maintained itself till the year B.C. 5, and gave eight, or, according to others, ten kings to the Armenian throne. The most important of these is Tigranes I. (BC 95-60). the son-in-law and ally of Mithridates. He rendered nimself master of Armenia Minor, Cappadocia, and Syria, but lost all these conquests after the defeat of Mithridates. Lucullus invaded Armenia, and defeated near Tigranocerta the mixed and numerous army of Tigranes. (Plut. Lucull. 25, &c.) The peace concluded in the year B.c. 63 only left him Armenia. His son and successor, Artavasdes, was perfidiously seized by Marcus Antonius, and delivered as a prisoner into the hands of Cleopatra, the queen of Egypt (B.C. 34).