Introduction

Armenia emerged immediately after the demise of Urartu (c. 590 BC). she inherited many characteristics of Urartu’s very ancient civilization which had been closely associated with Assyria-Babylonia in the south and the Mitannian-Egyptian-Hittite cultures in the west. Indeed there seems to be evidence of Armenian presence in a number of places within the Urartian empire long before its collapse, and in many areas in and around Togarmah and east of the Euphrates, as far as Lake Van and Lake Urmia, and the western foothills of the Caucasus. (cf. Chapter 20 and references made on the subject in the text of my histories in this work.)