Migrations In The Armenian Highland

Abstract

Any discussion of the ethnic and political history of eastern Asia Minor, particularly the Upper Euphrates area after the disintegration of the Hittite Empire should be studied in close relationship with the Mushki problem. Here this ethnic element was considerably active on both sides of the Euphrates during the XII-VIII centuries BC, which is well traced even in Northern Mesopotamia. In the article is discussed the problem of these tribes, their possible impact on the political and cultural history of Asia Minor and the Armenian Highland. These key problems are of utmost importance for the reconstruction of the history of the region. The Mushki had played the same role here as, for example, the so-called "Dorians" in Homeric and Classical Greece, Aramaeans in Neo-Assyrian Empire, etc., which until now remains fairly underestimated. The wide geographical area where in different sources appears the term Mushki (also in Western Asia Minor and in the Balkans) indicates that we deal with different ethnic groups, though probably related to each other culturally and maybe linguistically.