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David of Sassoun Studies On The Armenia
David of Sassoun Studies On The Armenia
Dickran Kouymjian
Barlow Der Mugrdechian
Editors
The Press
California State University, Fresno
2013
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface................................................................................................. ix
Index ...................................................................................................199
PREFACE
audience and at the same time allow specialists to assess the work a
hundred years after its first publication. It would also be a way to
encourage more interest and research in this still little explored
literary treasure.
The following collection of essays represents those papers
actually read or prepared for the International Symposium, “David of
Sassoun: The Armenian Folk Epic after a Century.” Some are
exactly as they were presented orally; others have been slightly
revised, some totally changed. After an introductory essay and a
concise summary of the epic, a new variant, discovered in California
because of the publicity generated by the Symposium, has been
added. A Critical Bibliography of David of Sassoun will be found at
the end of the volume to guide those inspired by these studies to
plunge deeper into Armenian epic literature.
Ten years is a long time to wait for the printed results of a
conference, especially for the authors and the hundreds of
participants who attended it. One consequence of this lapse of time
was the publication elsewhere of three other papers submitted for
inclusion in these proceedings by scholars who had not participated
in the Symposium. I would like to list them for the record: “Raven’s
Rock: A Mithraic Spelaeum in Armenian Folklore” by the late John
Andrew Boyle of the University of Manchester; “The Attitude to
War in the Popular Epic of Sassoun,” by Edward Gulbekian of
London; and “The Sacred World of Sasna Tsrer: Steps Toward an
Understanding,” by Leonardo Alishan of the University of Utah (see
the Critical Bibliography at the end of this volume for complete
citations).
Three scholars were unable, at the last minute, to come to
Fresno. The late Aram Ter-Ghevondian from Erevan, Charles
Dowsett from Oxford, and Frédéric Feydit of Paris. Their papers
were, however, duly prepared and sent for publication. The
communication entitled “David of Sassoun: A Great Epic Poem of
World Literature” by Leon Surmelian, was presented at the
Symposium, but never received in written form. Its place has been
taken by a second communication by Chaké Der Melkonian-
Minassian on the image of the woman in the epic presented at a
conference held in Armenia in 1986.
An Armenian minstrel-troubadour, Ashough Hovnani (Hovsep
Onanian), invited from Toronto to open and close the two sessions,
Dickran Kouymjian xi
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Dickran KOUYMJIAN
Paris, April 1988
Dickran KOUYMJIAN
Paris, December, 2012