Hrachia Adjarian

Hrachia Adjarian

Hrachia Acharian in circa 1925
Born (1876-03-08)March 8, 1876
Istanbul, Ottoman Empire
Died April 16, 1953(1953-04-16) (aged 77)
Yerevan, Armenian SSR, USSR
Nationality Armenian
Fields Linguistics, Etymology and Philology
Alma mater University of Paris
University of Strasbourg

Signature

Hr. Atcharian

Hrachia Adjarian (Armenian: Հրաչեայ Աճառեան (classical) Hračʿeay Ačaṙean; Հրաչյա Աճառյան (reformed) Hračʿya Ačaṙyan; March 8, 1876 - April 16, 1953) was an Armenian linguist, lexicographer, etymologist, philologist and academic professor at the Armenian Academy of Sciences. He was also a member of the French Linguistic Association and the Czechoslovakian Institute of Oriental Studies.[1][2]

Adjarian studied at the Sorbonne with Antoine Meillet and at the University of Strasbourg. He worked as a teacher at the Ejmiatsin Gevorkian seminary in Shusha and Tehran.[3] A survivor of the Armenian Genocide, he came to Yerevan in 1923. There, he taught foreign languages, comparative grammar, and the history of the Armenian language at Yerevan State University.[3] He is the author of more than 200 scientific publications on Armenology, Armenian language, and Oriental Languages.[4]

The Armenian State Institute of Linguistics is named after him.[5]

Early life

Adjarian was born on March 8, 1896 in the Samatya neighborhood of Constantinople, part of the Ottoman Empire. His father was a shoemaker.[5]

When Adjarian was less than a year old, he had an accident. On a sunny day, his mother took him to a park. While there, he suddenly burst into tears while staring at the sun. His mother immediately took him home but he cried all night and the next morning he could not open his eyes. Even though doctors made great efforts to cure him, his left eye remained blind for the rest of his life.[1]

However, this did not prevent him from becoming a renowned scholar and the author of dozens of multi-volume studies.

Education

Hrachia was just under seven years old when his father took him to the Armenian School, where he revealed his linguistic ability. While there, he studied Armenian, French, and Turkish, and he completed his studies in only two years. Then, at nine years old, he attended the Sahakian School and, after four years, graduated with honors. After the Sahakian School, Acharian attended the Getronagan School, followed by years of study at the Sorbonne and the University of Strasbourg, where he studied modern languages and also became known for his exceptional research in the field of Armenology.[1]

After many years of education, Hrachia Adjarian worked as a teacher in Ejmiatsin, and later in Shusha, where he met his future wife, a woman named Arusyak. In 1923, as an outstanding educator and scientist, Adjarian received an invitation from the authorities of Soviet Armenia for him and his wife to reside in Yerevan, where he was to teach at the Yerevan State University.[6] For the next thirty years, Yerevan State University was his home.

Personal life

Hrachia Adjarian in his youth

Hrachia met his love and future wife while working as a teacher in Shusha. Neither the First World War, nor the Armenian Genocide, nor the years of wandering, were able to separate Hrachia and Arusyak. Together with 600 Armenians, they miraculously survived the Massacre of Shemakha, with Arusyak moving to Tabriz.

In one of his surviving letters, written in 1924 to one of the Persian relatives of his wife, Adjarian wrote that he was happy with his life. In 1925, in a letter to the same person, Hrachia Adjarian reports the death of his first wife.

After Arusyak's, his friends felt that he changed dramatically and they advised him to remarry. The 60-year-old Adjarian, at first, did not want to even hear about it. However, after some time he married one of his students, Sophiko. They did not have any children but adopted a daughter, Knarik.[5] Together, the Adjarians endured many hardships.[1]

According to his daughter, her father was a deeply religious man. It is known that he prayed four times a day, knotting a handkerchief during prayers per Armenian tradition.[7]

Arrest and imprisonment

In 1937, during the Great Purge, many prominent intellectuals across the country were declared "nationalists," "enemies of the people," and "spies." They were arrested, shot or exiled. Hrachia Adjarian did not escape this persecution. The decision to arrest Hrachia Adjarian was made by a junior lieutenant of the NKVD secret police on 18 September 1937. As a result, on 29 September 1937, Adjarian was arrested. The professor was accused of being an English resident in Soviet Azerbaijan and a spy operating at the University in a counter-revolutionary group of professors. Three times he was taken for interrogation and was beaten. The police assured him that if he admitted his "guilt" and signed a trumped-up confession, then in a few days he would be released. Driven to despair and broken by torture, the scientist, under the dictation of the investigator, wrote a statement addressed to the head of NKVD admitting to all charges against him. His typewriter and manuscripts were confiscated and the doors of the rooms in his apartment were sealed. Hrachia Adjarian, Sophiko and their housekeeper, Palina, were allowed to live in the kitchen. Adjarian's manuscript, which would be seized if found, remained in the living room. Sophiko and Palina considered the works of Adjarian priceless and wished to save the manuscript. They decided to take it out a tiny window from the kitchen into the living room. Sophiko managed to squeeze through the window and rescue part of the materials. However, they had to be hidden in a safe place; Sophiko's brother put the precious manuscripts into an iron box and buried them under a tree in the garden in Nor Butaniya. For two years (1937–1939), he did not water the tree for fear of ruining the papers.[7]

Later, one of Adjarian's cellmates, Rooks, explained how the investigator, Kirakosov, elicited Adjarian's false testimony. When one of the interrogators accused Adjarian in being a German, French, English, Japanese, and Turkish spy, Adjarian replied: "If there are such stupid people who would believe that a scientist, an Armenian linguist, is a spy, and if such a lie can help your career, go ahead and write whatever you want - I'll sign it. But that I, an Armenian scholar Adjarian - is a Turkish spy - this is complete nonsense, unprecedented outrageous insult, and even if I were cut to pieces, I still would not recognize that libel and I are sure that any Armenian who had not lost his dignity will tell you the same thing!"

For these words, the investigator struck the weak and helpless old man in the face. Adjarian looked back at him in the face and disdainfully added: "Yes, this is great heroism for a young, strong guy to hit the sick old man!"

During the subsequent interrogation, the investigator, having failed to wrest a confession from Adjarian, put out a burning cigarette on his forehead. Then, he brutally beat the old man so that he could not walk, and had to be pulled by guards. It was after this that the totally broken and depressed scholar incriminated himself, "confessing" that, in August and September 1915, he had served as a counter-revolutionary agent of the Intelligence Service, as well as to the fact that during interviews at the university he had expressed nationalist and Anglophile sentiments. However, despite the promises, even after his "voluntary recognition" of the charges, Adjarian's case was not reviewed for several months. The court sentenced him to six years' imprisonment. Deceived and disappointed, Acharyan could only say: "Is this your justice?"

Because of a combination of circumstances, Hrachya Adjarian was held in prison for the whole two years, and on 19 December 1939, he was released "for lack of corpus delicti". He regained his position and rights and returned to the university.[7]

Death

Adjarian's bust in Yerevan

Until his death on 16 April 1953,[8] Adjarian taught at the university. On 16 April, as usual, Adjarian lectured, held a training session for the Persian language, went home, shaved, ate dinner, and told his wife: "Sophiko, I'm happy. Thank God, my wife is healthy, my daughter is well, today I also was able to go to university, and classes were a success. The main thing is, I have completed my work, lived 77 years - two magic numbers in a row, I have seen all, seen the days we dreamt about. And now for me it's all over."[7]

These were the last moments of life for the great scientist. That day he bought his wife and daughter tickets to the opera Almast. Seeing them in the theater, he kissed them and pressed them to his chest. Returning home, they found him sprawled in his chair. His eyes were closed, his left hand under his head, and a handkerchief tied with three knots in his right hand.[3]

Legacy

There is a street named after him in the Avan district of Yerevan.[9]

Works

Sources

  1. 1 2 3 4 "http://sussle.org/t/Hrachia_Adjarian?bversion=1&utm_expid=60654875-15.QTnL0_8ARoe1nUtqE9gNdw.1&utm_referrer=https%253A%252F%252Fwww.google.com%252F". sussle.org. Retrieved 2016-04-09. External link in |title= (help)
  2. ↑ Sarkisian, Vahan (1999-01-01). "Elementos vascos en la obra de Hrachia Adjarian". Fontes linguae vasconum: Studia et documenta 31 (82): 367–382.
  3. 1 2 3 Biography
  4. ↑ "Hrachia Ajarian (1876-1953AD) - Armenian History Timeline - Little Armenia". www.littlearmenia.com. Retrieved 2016-04-09.
  5. 1 2 3 "Birth of Hrachia Adjarian". Milwaukee Armenian Community. Retrieved 2016-04-09.
  6. ↑ "Hrachia Ajarian (1876-1953AD) - Armenian History Timeline - Little Armenia". www.littlearmenia.com. Retrieved 2016-04-09.
  7. 1 2 3 4 "Hrachia Adjarian; Biografi; Værker; Karriere og kærlighed; Arrest; Døden". potterager.com. Retrieved 2016-04-09.
  8. ↑ "Hrachia Adjarian - Ovenk". Ovenk. Retrieved 2016-04-09.
  9. ↑ "‘A’ is for Adjarian | ArmeniaNow.com". www.armenianow.com. Retrieved 2016-04-09.

External links

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