Islam in Armenia

In the beginning of the eighth century, Arab tribes from the Hejaz and Fertile Crescent began migrating to and settling in major Armenian urban centers, such as Dvin, Diyarbekir, Manzikert, and Apahunik'.

Following the Byzantine defeat at Manzikert in 1071, waves of Turkic nomads making their way from Central Asia and northern Iran penetrated and eventually settled throughout the span of Armenia and Anatolia.

[8][9] Most Ethnic Armenians remained Christian during this period when Western Armenia was divided between Muslim states after the Seljuk invasion.

There was an Emir of Van named Ezdin who had Armenian sympathies and was said to be descended from Seneqerim Hovhannes Artsruni, the king of Vaspurakan.

As such, the People of the Book (the Christians and the Jews) had to pay a tax to fulfill their status as dhimmi and in return were guaranteed religious autonomy.

During times of crisis the ones in the remote regions of mountainous often also had to suffer (alongside the settled Muslim population) raids by nomadic Kurdish tribes.

[11] Armenians, like the other Ottoman Christians (though not to the same extent), had to transfer some of their healthy male children to the Sultan's government due to the devshirme policies in place.

[12][13] During the Ottoman period many Armenians were forced to convert to Islam throughout Western Armenia through massacres, social pressure, and harsh taxation.

In the region of Tayk centered around Tortum, a Muslim cleric named Mullah Jaffar was given charge from the Ottoman government to take census of the Erzurum province and to levy taxes.

In the early 1500s, the Ottomans brutally enforced taxation by massacring 10,000 Armenians in Bayburt, Erzincan, Ispir, Erzurum, and forcibly converted another 50,000 to Islam.

[17] Periodic forced conversions created a class of crypto-Christian Armenians called Kes-kes (Half-half) who practiced both Christian and Muslim rituals.

The Iranian Safavids (who had changed from being Sunni to Shia Muslims by then), established definite control over Armenia and far beyond since the time of Shah Ismail I in the early 16th century.

Many Armenians joined the Safavid functions, in the civil administration and the military (the so-called ghulams) since the time of Shah Abbas the Great.

Especially amongst these elite soldier units, the ghulams (literally meaning slaves), many of them were converted Armenians, alongside the masses of Circassians and Georgians.

[20] The Catholic diocese of Nakhichevan reported that in the mid 1600s 130 Armenian families of the villages of Saltaq, Kirne had converted to Islam to avoid losing their belongings.

[21] In the Sharur-Daralayaz uezd, today split across Armenia and Azerbaijan, 20,726 Armenians were likewise outnumbered by the Muslim population, consisting of 3,761 Kurds and 51,560 Tatars.

[22][23] The governance of Armenia was undermined by large-scale Muslim uprisings encouraged by Turkish and Azerbaijani agents, primarily in the Ararat, Kars, and Nakhichevan areas, in 1919–1920.

[30] A significant number of mosques were erected in historical Armenia between the Middle Ages and the Modern age[citation needed], though it was not unusual for Armenian and other Christian churches to be converted into mosques, as was the case, for example, of the Cathedral of Kars, Cathedral of Ani, and Holy Mother of God Church in Gaziantep.

A new translation of the Qur'an in the Eastern Armenian dialect was started with the help of the embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran located in Yerevan.