19-Jul-2019
The tragic events portrayed and commemorated in this complex are still very much a contemporary issue.
As Thomas de Waal explains in his book Great Catastrophe, "The century-old question of the killing and deportation of the Armenians of the Ottoman Empire in 1915 -- the events that have come to be known as the Armenian Genocide -- ranks as the longest and most bitter historical dispute still alive. It helps keep the Armenia-Turkey border closed, parliaments discuss it, and ambassadors are recalled. It largely defines the identity of the worldwide Armenian diaspora... Around half of the current population of Armenia derives from Ottoman Armenians who fled their homeland in 1915-1920."
The subtitle of De Waal's book is "Armenians and Turks in the Shadow of Genocide", and he clarifies his endorsement of that term as follows: "I use the term 'Armenian Genocide' in the book, having, after much reading, respectfully agreed with the scholarly consensus that what happened to the Armenians in 1915-1916 did indeed fit the 1948 United Nations definition of genocide. At the same time, along with many others, I do so with mixed feelings, having also reached the conclusion that the 'G-word' has become both legalistic and over-emotional, and that it obstructs the understanding of the historical rights and wrongs of the issue as much as it illuminates them."
A small part of a large stand of trees in the memorial complex planted by people and organizations backing the "genocide" description
The Memorial consists of 12 basalt slabs (one for each of the "lost" provinces of western Armenia) sheltering an eternal flame, and a spire similarly depicting the split between the Armenia that remains and the Armenia that was. For some of the visiting groups, this was obviously all very personal.
The wall that lists the communities massacred in the attacks
The museum exhibition is of a very high quality. As you work your way round the detailed exhibits, it is impossible not to be horrified by the sheer scale of the killing enterprise, or moved by the individual stories.
I would have liked, though, to see a bit more interrogation of the whole geopolitical situation that fed into this catastrophe. The "cruel Ottoman" narrative surely does not provide all the motivational answers here.
Very easy for France and other colonial powers to wring their hands self-righteously...
Postcards: the social media of their day
The work of Armin Wegner, the German who, despite prohibitions, documented many of the atrocities
The girl on the right was the only survivor from this family group
The 1918 book by Arshaluys (Aurora) Mardiganian, describing her extraordinary survival
The first official use of the term "crimes against humanity"
Soghomon Tehlirian, who took the law into his own hands by assassinating Mehmet Talaat, the former Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire
He was acquitted by a German court
The whole experience -- layering in on top of the monument to the Pontic Greeks we saw in Piraeus, and the memorial to famine victims in Almaty -- was very thought-provoking.
How do you remember these terrible events (because remember them we must) without sowing bitterness and hatred for the generations to come? How do you face them square on, without becoming subsumed by them so that they become your whole identity?
I don't know. But I want to know.
Somehow, against all the odds it might seem, Armenia survives. A little later today we visited the Katoghike Church, the oldest church in Yerevan, and one with an extraordinary history of eclipse and survival. It seems like a metaphor for the whole country...
Tiny and ancient Katoghike, nestled by the side of modern Surp Anna