The Judeo-Armenian sect within Polish Galicia

The location of the kingdom once known as Urartu, or Ararat, is mentioned in the book of Genesis as the place where the ark came to rest after the flood. This land, called Armenia, became the first Christian nation during the time of its king Tiridates, around the year 301. The apostles Bartholomew and Thaddeus were responsible for many secret conversions there among the large Jewish population whose families had been brought from Palestine, Syria, and Mesopotamia by the king Tigranes. The byzantine historian Faustus says that 40,000 of the hellenized Jews had adopted Christianity by the mid 300's. The family Bagratuni, which ruled the country after several periods of foreign control, was itself of Jewish descent[1]. The liturgy of the church there was in Greek and Syriac until the 5th century when the monk Mesrop Mashtots recreated the Armenian language and used it to translate the scriptures. In the year 961, king Ashot III moved its capital to the great city of Ani[2]. Only 97 years later, in 1064, Ani was conquered by the Selucid Turks and some of its inhabitants fled to Angora in Galatia, Cilicia, and the Crimea, regions where Christianity had existed since the time of the apostles[3]. There they adopted the turkish language spoken by the peoples living along the Black Sea[4]. Being involved in trade, some traveled to Rus and were invited to settle in Kiev and in and around the cities of Kamenets in Podolia and Lvov in Galicia, which later became part of the kingdom of Poland. These were soon joined by others desiring to escape the various Mongol invasions. They became a vital part of their new country and many were rewarded for their military service. Some were dealers of persian rugs and oriental goods, while others were expert in the making of furniture, jewelry, and other items. They often lived side by side with the Jews of these regions. In order to better assimilate, many adopted Polish surnames by adding the ending ~owicz, meaning 'son of', to their father's name. Judeo-Armenian surnames can be recognized by the hebrew origin of this first name, as in the names Levon, Moses and Iacob resulting in the surnames Levanowicz, Mojzesowicz and Agopsowicz. They continued their connection to the Armenian Orthodox church, a self governing body in Poland until the 17th century whose cathedral in Lwow[5], built in 1363, still stands today[6]. In 1630, the bishop Nicolas Toroszowicz signed an Act of Union with Rome by which the churches of the Polish Armenians became the property of the Roman Catholic church. Although 5,000 of the Armenians in the diocese of Lvov accepted this union, 45,000 did not and left the city[7]. Some of these sought to escape the divisions among them by establishing small farms in the beauty of the mountains, preferring to practice their religion at home or among the local Orthodox people. The Polish Armenian artist Teodor Axentowicz[8] depicted their surroundings and portrayed himself in the local garb[9]. Intermarriage with Ruthenians and Poles led to decreasing membership in the uniate Armenian parishes, causing some to close, and their clergy often had the faculty of performing the liturgy in the byzantine rite. Although many of the Judeo-Armenian families continued to marry among themselves and to maintain a fairly separate existence, in time their small number gradually seems to disappear among the larger Catholic, Orthodox, and Jewish life of Galicia. During the 19th century, some still lived in places such as Lesko, Przemysl, Berezhany, Stanislawow, and Pokucie. They were often recognizable by their raven black hair; the women wore it in a single braid while the men had spanish style mustaches and beards. Their families regularly numbered ten or more children and spoke a combination of the Slavonic languages of those around them with words borrowed from Armenian, many features of ancient Turkish, and bits of Ladino. While assimilating the customs of their neighbors, they still maintained certain peculiarities of their own, such as ending the observance of Christmas on the eighth day. They were known for arbitrarily adhering to regulations concerning the birth of male children, death, and the preparation of food. In a tale entitled 'A Relation of the Holy Family', found in the book "Studnia Milosci", a Polish Armenian boy excuses his absence by saying that his family had been celebrating the birthday of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, as they were "direct descendants of close relations" of hers. ('Ararat', Autumn 1990, p.41) Such stories are really allusions to very old traditions among them concerning their ancestry, which some families expressed by their strict observance of the custom of naming the first daughter Marya and second Anna. This reverence for the Virgin Mary was also seen in their devotion to the icon of the Matka Boza Laskawa[10]. A handful were part of the late 19th century emigration from Austria-Hungary to North America where they lived in isolation and never founded a parish church of their own. Their relations who remained in Galicia were mostly exterminated by the Germans who also destroyed written proofs of their existence.