Ara the Beautiful and Shamiram

Legend

Type

Ara the Beautiful and Shamiram

A legend of beauty, unrequited love and royal conflict

After Aram's death, the guardianship of Armenia passed to his son, Ara the Beautiful. At that time Ninos still reigned in Assyria, and he extended to Ara the same royal favour he had shown to his father Aram. Ninos's wife — the lustful and man-loving Shamiram — had for many years heard of Ara's incomparable beauty and burned for him with boundless passion, yet dared not fulfil her desire for fear of her husband.

When Ninos died, Shamiram wasted no time: boldly revealing her passion, she sent envoys to Ara the Beautiful bearing lavish gifts, many entreaties, and promises of rewards, asking Ara to come to Nineveh — either to marry her and reign over all, or to satisfy her ardent desire and return to his own country with great gifts and in peace. Shamiram's envoys came to Armenia, but Ara flatly refused to comply with her will. The embassies were repeated several times — with fresh promises, persuasions, and pleas from Shamiram — yet each time they met with Ara's rejection.

When all these repeated embassies proved fruitless, Shamiram flew into a great rage, broke off negotiations, mustered an army, and set out swiftly for the Armenian land to make war on Ara. But she hastened not to kill him or drive him away, but to capture him, to conquer him, to have her frenzied desire satisfied and her passion appeased.

Shamiram swiftly reached Ara's plain, which was thereafter named Ayrararat after him. Here, before the battle, Shamiram ordered her commanders to do everything possible to keep Ara alive. But in the fighting, Ara's army was routed and Ara himself fell on the battlefield, slain by Shamiram's warriors.

After the victory, Lady Shamiram dispatched body-gatherers to the battlefield to search among the dead for her longed-for beloved. Ara was found slain among a group of valiant warriors. Shamiram ordered Ara's body to be placed in the upper chambers of the palace.

When the aggrieved Armenian army prepared to fight again against Lady Shamiram to avenge Ara's death, Shamiram addressed them, saying:

“I have commanded my gods to lick his wounds, and he will come back to life.”

Shamiram hoped to resurrect Ara through her magical arts. But when the body began to decompose, Shamiram secretly buried Ara, dressed one of her companions in Ara's likeness, and spread the rumour that “the Aralez, having licked Ara, resurrected him and fulfilled our desire. Henceforth they are all the more worthy of our veneration and glorification.”

Shamiram erected a statue in the name of the gods who had resurrected Ara and offered great sacrifices in their honour. By spreading the news of Ara's resurrection throughout the Armenian land and convincing all, Shamiram calmed the turmoil of the people.

The Building of Shamiramakert

After all had been brought to a fortunate conclusion, Shamiram spent several days on the plain of Ayrararat, then ascended to the mountainous province lying to the south. Since it was summer, she wished to take her ease in the cool valleys and flowering fields of the region. Enchanted by the beauty of the land, the purity of the air, the clear and cold springs, and the babbling rivers, Shamiram announced her decision to her entourage:

“In a land of such temperate air and pure waters, we must build a city and a palace, so that in the summer months we may enjoy the coolness of the Armenian land, while in the cooler seasons we shall live in Nineveh.”

Touring various places in the Armenian land, Shamiram reached the eastern shore of the salt lake, along which a long ridge stretched westward — slightly sloping on the northern side and rising on the south as a sheer cliff soaring straight into the sky. South of the ridge spread a broad and elongated valley, which descended from the eastern side of the mountain to the lakeshore as a wide and lovely gorge. Through this valley flowed freshwater streams descending from the mountains, which, flowing down from ravines and valleys, joined at the mountain feet and spread to form beautiful rivers. On both banks of these waters in the valley-shaped gorge a considerable number of villages had been built. To the east of this pleasant ridge rose a small hill.

This place greatly pleased Shamiram, and the impassioned and bold queen commanded that from Assyria and other lands subject to her there be immediately brought forty-two thousand common labourers and six thousand select craftsmen, perfectly skilled in the working of wood, stone, copper, and iron.

The queen's command was at once carried out to her satisfaction: multitudes of labourers and many-skilled, ingenious master craftsmen arrived. Shamiram commanded that first the dam across the river be built — of immeasurable width and height, reinforced with cliffs and great stones, bonded with lime and sand mortar.

This river dam stands to this day, so solidly built that if anyone were to try to break off even a small stone from the structure for a sling, they would never succeed. And the lime mortar is so tightly plastered around it that it seems as if sealed with melted fat.

Having thus built the dam over a great extent, Shamiram brought it to the place designated for the founding of the city. Here the queen ordered the multitude of workers to be divided into various specialist groups, and over each group she appointed the best of the master craftsmen as overseers. By such intensely sustained labour, the marvellous city was completed within a few years — with strong walls and copper-fitted gates. Within the city Shamiram built numerous fine palaces — two- and three-storeyed, adorned with multicoloured stones of every kind, each with windows placed in due order. The quarters of the city were separated from one another by the most beautiful and spacious streets. She also built magnificent bathhouses suited to the city's situation and needs. She divided the river into two branches: one she channelled through the city, surrounding it with a network of canals — to meet the various needs of the citizens and to irrigate the gardens and flowerbeds; the other she directed along the right and left banks of the lake, to water the gardens and lands throughout the city's entire environs. On all sides the city was adorned with estates, with richly leafy and fruit-bearing trees; numerous fertile orchards and vineyards were planted. The walled city was made splendid and magnificent in every respect, and a countless multitude of people was settled within it.

Shamiram enclosed the peak of the rock at the upper end of the city with walls, and within the rock built stone-hewn royal chambers with secret entrances and exits, various rooms, bedchambers, treasuries, and underground vaults — which are reckoned among the foremost and most magnificent of all royal works. The sunny face of the rock she smoothed like wax smoothed by an iron stylus, and had numerous inscriptions cut upon it, whose very sight moves people to wonder and admiration. And not only here, but in many other places in the Armenian land, Shamiram erected statues and had various memorial records about herself inscribed in the same script, and in many places established boundaries with the same characters.

The Deeds of Shamiram and Her End

After Shamiram had built her summer city in Armenia, she made it her custom to come to Armenia every summer to rest in the city she had built. Before departing for Armenia, she would leave in Assyria, as regent and governor of Nineveh, the magus Zradaht, chieftain of the Medes, entrusting her power to him.

One summer, while staying in Armenia, Shamiram went out for a walk in the province of Vaspurakan and saw that in one place children had gathered and found beads in the ground and were examining them closely. The queen instantly divined the value and significance of the beads, generously rewarded the children, and took the beads from their hands.

With these beads Shamiram began to practise sorcery and enchantment, spreading every manner of evil across the land with her corrupt heart. Whomever she desired to fulfil her passionate whims — she would summon at once through the power of the beads; whomever she wished to destroy — this too she accomplished with equal ease and without any effort. All began to fear the queen, and none dared utter a sound.

Shamiram had an old counsellor who enjoyed her trust, knew all her secrets, and had free access to her palace. The queen's wicked deeds greatly troubled the old man, and for a long time he pondered how to free the world from her power or from the magical force of the beads.

One day, when the queen had gone out on a walk with the old man to Artamet, he found a suitable moment, snatched the beads from Shamiram's hands, and fled. The enraged Shamiram pursued him, but seeing that she could not catch up with him, in her fury she twisted her thick and long tresses into a sling, placed an enormous boulder upon them, swung it around, and hurled it after the old man. From the monstrous weight, the hair was torn from her head by the roots, and the giant rock, rolling, fell into a pit near Artamet, where it lies to this day.

The old man, beads in hand, fled and reached the shore of the sea of Datvan, where he cast the beads into the sea, freeing the world from Shamiram's magical sorcery. From this event the saying has remained: “The beads of Shamiram — into the sea.”

Shamiram gave all her treasures and positions to her lovers and took no care at all of her children. When the children came of age, they began to rebuke their mother for her dissolute conduct and her lavish bestowing of treasures and positions upon others. Shamiram fell into a great rage at her children and had them all killed, save for her youngest son, Ninvas.

It came to pass that Shamiram's regent in Assyria, the magus Zradaht, committed a wrong against the queen, and a conflict arose between them. The enmity deepened further when the Median Zradaht resolved to seize all power for himself and extend his tyranny over all. Learning of this, Shamiram went to war against Zradaht. When the war intensified, Shamiram sensed her impending defeat and fled on foot from Zradaht to Armenia. Pursued by enemies, Shamiram on the road, from running and exhaustion, suffered a terrible thirst, reached the Sea of Van, drank water, and quenched her thirst. But seeing that the armed pursuers were drawing near, she cast her magical charms into the sea and was herself instantly turned to stone on that very spot.

According to another tradition, when Shamiram, defeated and pursued by Zradaht, fled to Armenia, her son Ninvas overtook her, killed the dissolute queen in vengeance, and himself became king in Assyria.

Arayan Ara and Anushavan Sosanver

When Ara the Beautiful fell in battle against Shamiram, he already had a twelve-year-old son, born of his beloved wife Nvard.

Shamiram, out of her boundless love for Ara the Beautiful, named the son after him as well. Shamiram loved and trusted Arayan Ara so much that she intimately appointed him overseer of the Armenian land. Arayan Ara likewise remained faithful to Shamiram and perished in battle together with her.

After Arayan Ara's death he left a male child named Anushavan — mighty in deeds, brilliant in speech. He bore the surname Sosanver, because, according to the ancient cult, he was dedicated to the sacred plane trees planted by Aramaneak in the city of Armavir. From the rustling of the leaves of these plane trees — depending on the strength and direction of the wind — the art of casting spells and making prophecies had been practised in the Armenian land from time immemorial.

Anushavan went to Assyria to obtain from Ninvas, son of Shamiram, the right of guardianship over the Armenian land. He suffered long at the royal court, earning only Ninvas's contempt. At last, with the help of friends, he managed to obtain the guardianship over part of the Armenian land — as a tribute-paying vassal — and eventually the right of guardianship over all Armenia.

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