YEREVAN (Realist English). Urartu, the most ancient state on the territory of the former USSR, was an Armenian civilization and a direct predecessor of modern Armenia, said Nikita Shangin, honorary architect of Russia and professor at the International Academy of Architecture.
Speaking as part of an educational series organized by the Armenian cultural movement Ashkharazhokhov, Shangin emphasized the deep historical roots of the Armenian people in the region, contrasting them with the much later emergence of Turkic groups.
“The earliest references to Armenia and Urartu appear in foreign sources from the 6th century BCE,” Shangin noted. “In contrast, the first recorded mentions of the Turkic peoples emerge more than a thousand years later, in the 7th century CE.”
He further pointed out that Armenians are consistently described in ancient sources as a people with a developed material culture and social structure, while Turkic groups are portrayed as a loose confederation of tribes with relatively undeveloped systems of material life.
The Ashkharazhokhov movement has launched a series of livestreams featuring historians and public intellectuals to explore the cultural and historical legacy of the South Caucasus. The initiative seeks to deepen public understanding of the region’s ancient civilizations and their enduring influence on national identity.
