Informace o publikaci
“The House of a Prince Named K'urd”: Strategies of Legitimation and Power of Memory in Thirteenth-Century Armenia
| Autoři | |
|---|---|
| Rok publikování | 2024 |
| Druh | Další prezentace na konferencích |
| Fakulta / Pracoviště MU | |
| Citace | |
| Popis | In 1254, K‘urd I Vach‘utyan hosted King Het‘um I of Cilicia at his castle in Vardenis (Armenia) on his way to the then capital of the Mongol kingdom, Karakorum. K‘urd was married to Khorishah, a princess of the ancient and noble Mamikonian family, and had inherited the title of Ishkanats Ishkan (Prince of Princes) from his father Vach‘e. Vach‘e was of obscure ancestry and had earned the title and territories through military merit in the early thirteenth century, when he fought with Iwane and Zak‘are Zak‘aryan against the Seljuks in order to regain the Bagrationi territories on behalf of the Georgian Me‘pe (sovereign) T‘amar. This father-son duo became prolific patrons, founding large, important monasteries and promoting construction both inside and outside their territory. How was it possible for the Vach‘utyan family to become a widely recognized nobility within the span of only two generations, so much so that they hosted a king and appeared in no less than two chronicles of the time? The paper aims to explore this path to legitimacy by analyzing the possible strategies adopted by the Vach‘utyan family, as exemplified in their architectural patronage. In fact, the buildings they commissioned seem to display some decorative features peculiar to the architecture promoted by the ancient Armenian nobility; in addition, some – such as the gavit of Sanahin – were strategically placed in architectural complexes previously established by such nobility – for example, the ninth- and tenth-century Bagratuni royalty – in a dynamic of renovation and regeneration of spaces linked to the memory of ancient power. |