Armenia Genealogy

AsiaArmenia

Guide to Armenia family history and genealogy: birth records, marriage records, death records, census records, family history, and military records.

Armenia is a very old country that has experienced many boundary changes. The original kingdom of Armenia is now divided into Turkey, Iran, and the present-day Republic of Armenia. Part of Armenia was also once incorporated in the boundaries of the U.S.S.R. Armenian research not only impacts those who lived in the country of Armenia, but also all those who belonged to the Armenian Apostolic Church, a large denomination that was prevalent in many countries including Eqypt, Austria, Russia, Indonesia, and England, to name a few. The records from these countries may be in the national language, Latin, or Armenian. Armenian research, is much more wide-spread than many realize.



Getting started with Armenian research
The history of Armenia is one of invasion and foreign rule. It was conquered in the pre-Christian era by the Medes, Persians, Syrians, and Romans. In 286 Tiridates III liberated Armenia. Tiridates was converted to Christianity by Saint Gregory and in 301 (recent scholarship says 314) Armenia became the world’s first Christian state. Christianity provided Armenians with a national identity and consciousness that has persisted through the centuries of conquest and division that have followed.

In the Christian era, Armenia was ruled by Byzantium, Persia, the Arabs, Seljuk Turks, Mongols, and Ottoman Turks. A portion fell to the Russian Empire in 1828 while the remainder stayed under Turkish control. Muslim Turks saw the large Christian population in the eastern half of Turkey as a subversive threat. The Turks massacred 300,000 Armenians in 1894-1896, then 1.5 million in1915-1922. A diaspora of Armenians sought refuge in Russia, the U.S., and elsewhere. The Russian portion declared independence in May 1918 but could not defend itself against the Red Army which brought it under Soviet control in 1920. It remained part of the Soviet Union until the union disintegrated in late 1991 and Armenia regained its independence.

Armenia has 3.6 million inhabitants of which 96 percent are ethnic Armenian and the rest are Kurds, Yezidis, Russians, Jews, Assyrians, and Greeks. Beginning in the eleventh century, a long series of invasions, migrations, deportations, and massacres have decimated or disbursed the Armenian population. Today about sixty percent of the world’s Armenians live outside Armenia, one million each in Russia and the United States.

Family history sources are primarily in Armenian, the sole member of a distinct Indo-European language group. Civil records for the period in which Armenia belonged to the Russian Empire are in Russian.

Jurisdictions
11 provinces (marzer, singular - marz)

Historical Record Pages

 * Armenia, Church Book Records (FamilySearch Historical Records) 1838-1929

Family History Centers

 * Gyumri Armenia Family History Center
 * Yerevan Armenia Family History Center
 * Vanadzor Armenia Family History Center

Research Tools

 * Armenia Genweb Project
 * Armenian Genealogy Web Sites
 * Federation of East European Family History Societies (FEEFHS)
 * Research Resources for Armenia by BYU
 * Websites

Featured Content
The Armenian Alphabet - this article will help you learn how to use the 38 letters of the Armenian Alphabet to locate an ancestor's name! Other articles recently added that might be helpful to you with your Armenian research include:


 * Armenian Localities
 * Population Statistics

Did you know?

 * Armenia was the first nation to formally adopt Christianity
 * From April 24th, 1915 until 1921, over 1 million Armenians were killed, totaling almost 80% of the population.

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