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Timeline • Origins • Etymology
v t e

Nairi (Armenian: Նայիրի in TAO or Նաիրի in RAO) is the Assyrian word rivers, given to a Late Bronze Age to Early Iron Age (13th to 10th centuries BC) nation corresponding in the territory of the later kingdom of Urartu, located around Lake Van, in what is now the East Anatolia Region (between Hakkari to Dersim), southeastern Turkey.

The Nairi were considered a force strong enough to tackle both the Assyrians and Hittites. This nation was mentioned first by the Assyrians in the 13th century BC as 'Nairi' (Land of 'Rivers' in Assyrian).

The Nairi fought against the southern incursions of the Assyrians and would later unite into Urartu. The names of twenty-three Nairi lands were recorded by Tiglath-Pileser II (10th century BC) their southern point was Tumme, known to have been south-west of Lake Urmia, and their northern one Dayaenu.

They may have been a Hurrian tribe, related to contemporary Mitanni (so Götze 1936; skeptically Benedict 1960). The Egyptians referred to the Mitanni "Naharin".

In Armenian nationalism

Since the late nineteenth century rise of nationalism under the Ottoman Empire, Nairi has come to stand as a synonym for Armenia among Armenians, who tend to see Nairi as their remote ancestors. In 1916, Vahan Terian published a bundle of poems entitled Land of Nairi (in Armenian: Yerkir Nairi), in which he uses Nairi in place of Armenia. Likewise in 1923, Yeghishe Charents wrote a satirical novella entitled Land of Nairi, using once again Nairi as a synonym for Armenia. Hayastan Yeghiazarian, interestingly, used Nairi Zarian as his pen-name, replacing his first name, Hayastan (which is what Armenians call Armenia in their own language since the Late Middle Ages) with Nairi.

See also

• Mitanni
• Hayasa
• Bronze Age collapse
• Nairi (disambiguation)

References

1. The Nairi Tac Central
2. Hovick Nersessian "Highlands of Armenia," Los Angeles, 2000.
3. The Armenians - Page 27 by Elizabeth Redgate, A. E. (Anne Elizabeth) Redgate
4. Grayson, IL, 1976 (pp. 12-13)

• Albrecht Götze, Hethiter, Churriter und Assyrer, Instituttet for Sammenlignende Kulturforskning, Serie A: Forelesninger XVII (Oslo, 1936).
• Warren C. Benedict, Urartians and Hurrians. Journal of the American Oriental Society 80/2, 1960, 100-104.
• Ralf-Bernhard Wartke, Urartu Das Reich am Ararat, Verlag Philipp von Zabern, Mainz/Rhein 1993

v t e History of Anatolia

• Anatolia
• Iron Age
• Prehistoric Armenia