Armenian heritage and UNESCO
 
Armenians take pride in quoting famous foreigners who have called Armenia a museum under open skies. Throughout a long and turbulent history, of which at least over 3000 years have been documented to various extent in historical texts and maps and even more in myths and folklore, Armenians have succeeded in building kingdoms and even empires with highly advanced social structures and infrastructure, magnificent religious and secular architecture and arts and crafts that still fascinate, amaze and enchant. Quite a lot of that tangible heritage has been destroyed in wars and natural disasters and much of what remains has been covered in the dust of time and is yet to be unearthed. Even what has survived can still be a testimony to the astonishing talent and skills of a nation that has outlived many formidable hostile empires and hordes of different eras. This book is neither a textbook of Armenian history, nor of Armenian arts, neither is it a study of those realms. This is simply an attempt at a guide to that part of Armenian cultural heritage that has already been recognised and appreciated by the rest of the family of nations. Unlike that of many other nations, Armenian heritage is not limited to the physical boundaries of the state currently representing the nation, the Republic of Armenia. At different times, Armenian kingdoms and empires of the past centuries covered an area several times that of the Republic today, and even as their country continued to reduce in size, Armenians continued to live on their ancestral lands, despite campaigns of massacres and genocide against them. Therefore, monuments of Armenian architecture can be found in abundance in neighbouring countries on historically Armenian lands and in countries where Armenian Diaspora communities have been established.
 
Hardcover: 606 pages
Language: English
Publisher: Antares LTD; 1st edition (2017)