Ararat - Cradle of Civilization

The Sumerians, an ancient peoples and one of the first civilizations in the world called Ararat, Arrata. In their great epic poems of Gilgamesh and Arrata, they tell of the land of their ancestors, the Arratans in the Highlands of Armenia. The Sumerians also in the epic poems describe the Great Flood and the rebirth of life after the terrible deluge that fell from the Highlands of Armenia unto the lands of Mesopotamia and the Fertile Crescent. The Sumerians had a very close connection with the ancestral Land of Ararat and considered it as their ancestral homeland (many historians and archaeologists are convinced that the Sumerians initially lived in Northern Mesopotamia and Armenian Highland).The Greeks believed that the people who first worked with bronze and iron came from the same area, they called them Khaldi.

The Lord God planted human life twice in the Armenian Highland. As we know the Lord God put the man he had formed in the Garden of Eden and then later helped Noah's Ark to rest on the Mount Ararat.
Armenians are descendants of Japheth (Noah's son), whose family settled in Armenia, and later moved to Babylon. Hayk, a descendant of Japheth-Gomer-Togarmah, who is the legendary Patriarch and founder of the Armenian nation, rebelled against the Titanid Bel, who tried to impose his tyranny upon Hayk's people. He rose up, and led his people back to the land of his forefathers, the land of Ararat. At the foot of the mountains, he built his home, Haykashen. Until now Armenians call themselves Hay and their country Hayastan.

Armenia lies in the highlands surrounding the Biblical mountains of Ararat, upon which Noah's Ark rested after the flood. (Bible, Gen. 8:4). Recent archeological studies have found the world's earliest leather shoe, skirt, and wine-producing facility in Armenia, dated to about 4000 B.C. This points to an advanced early civilization In the Bronze Age; several states flourished in the area of Greater Armenia, including the Hittite Empire (at the height of its power), Mitanni (South-Western historical Armenia), and Hayasa-Azzi (1500--1200 BC). The Nairi people (12th to 9th centuries BC) and the Kingdom of Urartu/Ararat (1000--600 BC) successively established their sovereignty over the Armenian Highland. Each of the aforementioned nations and tribes participated in the ethnogenesis of the Armenian people.

The present-day groundbreaking findings in several leading disciplines such as comparative linguistics, archaeology and genetic engineering place the probable location of the Indo-European homeland in Armenian Highlands. According to this scientific research the Armenian speakers had separated from the Indo-European mother language much earlier than the beginning of the 3rd millennium BC. This in and of itself only come to support the most ancient records that we have found so far (to date we have not found any records written prior to the 3rd millennium BC) that tell us about the indigenousness of the Armenian people in Armenian Highlands.

The Armenian people have forged their history and culture in their native homeland throughout many millennia. Unfortunately, from 1915 to 1923, the greatest part of Armenian Highlands -- Western Armenia -- has lost the overwhelming majority of its native population as a result of the horrific and unprecedented Armenian Genocide which took the lives of more than million and a half men, women and children who prior to this continuously lived on their own soil for countless generations.

Armenia was the first country in the world to adopt Christianity as a state religion in 301 A.D.

Christianity was introduced into Armenia much earlier, during the 1st century (60-68 a.d.) by two of Christ's disciples Bartholomew and Thaddeus. They baptized stately families and common people and are known as the first "Illuminators of the Armenian world".
During the first two centuries, Christians in Armenia were forced to practice their religion secretly amongst pagans. This situation lasted until 301A.D. when Christianity gained support from the state.

Christianity was adopted in Armenia during the reign of King Trdat the 3rd and under the patriarchal leadership of Grigor the Illuminator, who baptized the King and the royal family in the River Arax, and The Armenian Apostolic Orthodox Church was established, with Grigor the Illuminator as its first Armenian Catholicos.