Mass Destruction of Armenian Cultural Heritage during the Hamidian Massacres (1894-1896)
Parsamyan, Seda A. · 2023
Parsamyan argues that the destruction of Armenian cultural heritage in the Ottoman Empire began with the conquest of Western Armenia and has continued to the present, with Armenian culture repeatedly destroyed outright or 'neutralised' by successive Turkish regimes. The first part reviews how genocide theorists have defined and redefined 'cultural genocide,' including attempts to revise or rename the concept. The second sets out a chronology of the destruction of Armenian cultural heritage. She then gives a detailed account of the demolition policy pursued during the Hamidian massacres of 1894–1896, assessing whether it is best characterized as vandalism or as cultural genocide.
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Parsamyan, Seda A. 2023. Mass Destruction of Armenian Cultural Heritage during the Hamidian Massacres (1894-1896). International Journal of Armenian Genocide Studies, Vol. 8, No. 2, pp. 5–34 (AGMI, Yerevan); DOI 10.51442/ijags.0043. https://doi.org/10.51442/ijags.0043
What this offers a reader
The legal and historical groundwork for treating heritage destruction as a crime rather than as vandalism.
Peer-reviewed; connects cultural-genocide theory to a specific documented campaign.
The same policy that razed our churches in the 1890s is being run in Artsakh today.
When a state destroys a people's churches, is that a crime? The Armenian case, from 1894.
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