A number of linguists maintain that Armenians, together with the Hurrians, Kassites and others, were indigenous Anatolian or Caucasian people who lived in the region of Hayasa in northern #Armenia until the arrival of the Indo-Europeans. 1/5
#History
The Armenians adopted some of the vocabulary of these Indo-European arrivals. This explains why Armenian is a unique branch of the Indo-European language tree and may also explain the origin of the words Hai and Hayastan (“Armenia” in the Armenian language). 2/5
#linguistics
As evidence these scholars point to Hurrian suffixes, the absence of
gender and other linguistic data. Archeologists add that the images of Armenians on a number of sixth-century Persian monuments depict racial characteristics similar to those of other people of the Caucasus. 3/5
Other scholars, also relying on linguistic evidence, believe that Indo-Eur. languages may've originated in Caucasus and that Armenians, as a result of pressure from large empires, merged with neighboring tribes and adopted some of the Semitic, Kartvelian vocabulary & legends. 4/5
They formed a federation called Nairi - part of united state of Urartu. The fall of Urartu allowed Armenian component to achieve predominance & by the 6th c BC, establish a separate entity, which the Greeks and Persians, the new major powers of ancient world, called Armenia. 5/5
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