Bagrat Ulubabyan

Infobox academic
name =Bagrat Ulubabyan
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birth_date = birthdate|1925|12|9
birth_place = Mushkapat, Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast, Soviet Union
death_date = death date and age|2001|11|19|1925|12|9
death_place = Yeghvard, Armenia
field = Medieval Armenia, history of Artsakh, Armenian language, Armenian literature
work_institutions = Armenian Academy of Sciences
alma_mater = Baku Pedagogical Institute
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known_for = -"The Principality of Khachen: From the 10th to 16th centuries"
-"Sardarapat"
-"A History of Artsakh"
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Bagrat Arshaki Ulubabyan ( _hy. Բագրատ Արշակի Ուլուբաբյան; _ru. Баграт Аршакович Улубабян; December 9, 1925 – November 19, 2001) was an Armenian writer and historian, known most prominently for his work on the histories of Nagorno-Karabakh and Artsakh.

Biography

Early life and education

Ulubabyan was born in the village of Mushkapat in the Martuni region of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO) on December 9, 1925. In 1944, he graduated from Shushi's Pedagogical Institute. Two years later, he received his degrees in Armenian language and Armenian literature from Baku's Pedagogical Institute. From 1949 until 1967, he returned to Nagorno-Karabakh and was the head of the province's Writers Union. During those years, he was also a writer for the Armenian language newspaper "Sovetakan Gharabagh" ("Soviet Karabakh") and a deputy to the head of NKAO's executive committee. In 1968, Ulubabyan moved from the NKAO to Yerevan, the capital of the Armenian SSR, and in the following year, became a senior researcher in the history department at the Armenian Academy of Sciences.hy icon Anon. "«Ուլուբաբյան, Բագրատ Արշակի»" (Ulubabyan, Bagrat Arshaki). Soviet Armenian Encyclopedia. vol. xii. Yerevan, Armenian SSR: Armenian Academy of Sciences, 1986, p. 212.]

Works

Ulubabyan's first works were in the field of poetry. In 1952 and 1956, he completed two works, "Songs about Work and Peace" and "This Morning." He, however, shifted his focus and began writing short stories as well as epics: "Aygestan" (1960), "Tartar" (1963), "The Grain Never Dies" (1967), and "Lamp" (1976). He also wrote two novels, "Armenian Land" in 1959 and "The Man" in 1963. One of his most prominent works was the historical novel "Sardarapat".

Many of Ulubabyan's work concern the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh. In 1975, he published "The Principality of Khachen, From the 10th to 16th centuries", a political and cultural history of the medieval principality of Khachen. In 1979, he published "A Gold Chain", a collection of historical essays from the stories of Movses Kaghankatvatsi until the era of the principalities of Karabakh, depicting the role of Nagorno-Karabakh in the history of Armenia. Several years later, in 1981, he published "Studies in the History of the Eastern Provinces of Armenia" and "Gandzasar". More recently, he authored "A History of Artsakh: From the Beginning Until Our Days" (1994). Another work on the region, "The Survival Struggle of Artsakh", was published in the same year and was a study focusing on the Nagorno-Karabakh during the Soviet era (from 1918 until the 1960s). As an expert in Classical Armenian literature, he translated two works from of the fifth century Armenian chronicler Ghazar Parpetsi, "A History of Armenia" and "A Letter to Vahan Mamikonian", into Armenian in 1982.

Later life

In the late 1980s, with the beginning of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Ulubabyan took part in the demonstrations in Yerevan which called on Soviet authorities to turn Karabakh over to the control of Armenia. [ [http://www.armeniaforeignministry.com/fr/nk/nk_file/article/53_b.html Excerpts of a speech delivered by Ulubabyan during Karabakh demonstrations] . Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Armenia. Accessed May 20, 2008.] During the 1960s, Ulubabyan had also been the author and one of thirteen signatories of a letter sent to Moscow, asking that the Soviet Union to consider Karabakh's incorporation into Armenia. [hy icon Janyan, Bogdan. " [http://www.hayastan.com/shrjadardz/04september04.pdf Bagrat’s Widow] ." "Shrjadarts." September 2004. № 4, p. 31.]

On May 7, 2001, in honor of his work in regards to Armenian history, he was decorated with the Order of Saint Gregory the Illuminator by the Nagorno Karabakh Republic's then-president, Arkady Ghukasyan. After suffering from a long bout of lung disease, Ulubabyan died on November 19, 2001. [fr icon Anon. “ [http://www.armenews.com/article.php3?id_article=1279 Mort de Bagrat Ouloubabian, un pionnier de la lutte pour le Karabagh] .” Nouvelles d'Arménie. November 21, 2001. Retrieved July 5, 2008.]

Criticism

Russian historian Viktor Shnirelman accuses Ulubabyan of being one of several scholars who tried to create an Armenian "myth" of the history of Nagorno-Karabakh. Ulubabyan denied the existence of the Caucasian Albanian population on the right bank of the Kura river in the early middle ages, and despite the traditional point of view which identified the Albanian tribe of Utis with the Udi people, claimed that Utis were originally an Armenian people. [ru icon Shnirelman, Viktor A. "Memory Wars: Myths, Identity and Politics in Transcaucasia". Moscow: Academkniga, 2003 ISBN 5-9462-8118-6, pp. 226-228.]

References