Rafael Ishkhanyan

Rafael Ishkhanyan or Ishkhanian (Armenian: Ռաֆայել Իշխանյան, 19221995) was an Armenian philologist and historian. He was a professor of the Yerevan State University.

Biography

In 1939, Ishkhanyan entered the department of Armenian language and literature of Yerevan State University. He was a participant in World War II. After demobilization, he continued his studies and graduated from Yerevan university in 1949.

His works are generally dedicated to the earliest history of the Armenian people, to the comparative linguistic analysis of ancient languages, and to printing. He is one of the authors of Armenian Soviet encyclopedia.

He was a Deputy to the Supreme Soviet Armenia in 1990-1996.

Publications

Ishkhanyan claims that Armenians "were the aborigines of the Armenian plateau who have been living there continuously since the fourth millennium B.C.E at the latest".[1] Similar claims were promoted in nationalist novels such as those of Sero Khanzadyan, published in the 1970s.[2]

Books

References

  1. Stephan H. Astourian, "In Search of Their Forefathers: National Identity and the Historiography and Politics of Armenian and Azerbaijani Ethnogeneses," in Nationalism and History: The Politics of Nation building in Post-Soviet Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia. p. 47.
  2. Fowkes, Disintegration of the Soviet Union, p. 116.

External links