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17.05.2010

THE GENERATIONS OF THE CONVERTED ARMENIANS IN EUROPE

   

Ruben Melkonyan

1.Ruben Melkonyan (original)While studying the issue of the forcedly Islamized Armenians and their generations new and interesting details about their geographic spread are emerging. Particularly, the issue of generations of the Islamized Armenians living in Europe at present is interesting and peculiar at the same time. It is known that there is scanty information about the current condition of the converted Armenians and if over the recent period some data about the Islamized Armenians in Turkey emerged, there is too little material about those living in Europe. Just recently some foreign and Armenian authors have started referring to that issue and presented some information which is mainly of descriptive character.

Firstly, let us turn to the issue of moving of the converted Armenians to Europe and state that in 1950s in Europe and particularly in Germany the necessity in cheap labour emerged and that is why the agreements on foreign labour use with a number of countries were concluded. Such an agreement was concluded between Germany and Turkey in 1961 which was followed by the emigration of thousands of Turkish citizens to Germany and later on to other European countries. As a result of that process the Turkish community, which numbers several million members, has been formed in Europe. According to some data among those emigrants there were Armenians, both Christian and converted or crypto-Armenians. The converted Armenians and their generations have been emigrating and settling in Germany, Belgium, Holland, Sweden, and France for decades, and today there are communities or community-like structures of converted Armenians in those countries.

After moving to a new environment some processes and phenomena, which are connected with the reclaiming their identity, started taking place among the converted Armenians and their generations. The reconversion, i.e. the re-adoption of Christianity, is the most widespread phenomena among the converted Armenians living in Europe. And today among the converted Armenians in Europe there are many of those who returned to their roots. According to some sources, the reconversion, the process of searching of their roots developed in different ways and today it continues. Particularly, first of all, Christianity was re-adopted by crypto-Armenians who used every occasion for that purpose. In one of the recent issues of “Hooys” biweekly Tamar Gevonian brings a story according to which a group of people who looked like Muslims and who arrived to Germany from Turkey just at the customs office revealed their identity and presented to the officials not their Muslim names mentioned in their passports but their Armenian names. This notable example illustrates the desire to return to their true identity, which had been hidden for decades. As the same source mentions today those Armenians have their own community and church in Germany.

According to different sources Armenians in Europe who reconverted to Christianity are more zealous in the matters of religion. This also has its psychological side, i.e. to prove to their milieu that they are loyal to the Armeniancy. Among the Armenians who reclaimed their identity some psychological and spiritual problems are also observed. Some of them even visited psychologists: according to their diagnoses the traumatic memories about the Genocide, the atmosphere of the fear and threat, in which they had lived for decades, and the fact that they constantly concealed their true identity had a significant and even decisive influence on their state of mind.

Today in different cities of Germany there are groups of Armenians who reconverted to Christianity a part of which has integrated with the local Armenian communities and the other part facing the estrangement of the old community continues its isolated mode of life and stays out of community live.

Kemal Yalcin, the Turkish writer living in Germany, brings many facts about the converted Armenians in Europe and in his letter to us he mentions: “I know many people in Germany who adopt Christianity and are christened at a mature age.” The Head of the German Dioceses of the Armenian Apostolic Church archbishop Garegin Bekchian also touches upon this issue and brings some interesting facts.

According to Hamo Moskofian there is restaurant “Ani” in German Wiesbaden where Armenians gather. In this city the Armenians who reconverted to Christianity live too. One of them, Nureddin Gurden, who changed his name to Simon, states that he descends from the kin of the well-known fedayi Hrayr Djokhq.

An interesting article about the reconverted Armenians in Belgium was presented by David Zeneian. According to him, today Kurdishized and Kurdish-speaking Armenians who arrived from Shrnak and Silop, reclaiming their identity, form the core of the local Armenian community (the adherents of the Armenian Apostolic Church) and are zealous Christians. Their children study Armenian due to which their parents also begin learning their mother tongue. One of the founders and the leader of the Kurdishized and Kurdish-speaking Armenians community in Brussels Mesrop Afshar, speaking about the situation in their motherland, mentions: “The fear and the feeling of depression constantly accompanied us. There were many harassments but our parents reminded us all the time that despite the loss of the language we were Armenians”. Afshar tells some detail about his mode of live which makes it clear that they were crypto-Armenians and they secretly preserved their Christian traditions; they secretly christened their children with the help of the Assyrian priest, performed Christian nuptials and funerals. In Shrnak, as well as in other places, crypto-Armenians had two surnames – one for home and the other for the milieu. Serop Afshar tells about that: “Among our people we were Armenians. While baptizing we gave our children Armenian names – Sargis, Nubar, David, Gevorg and Saro, but for the rest of the environment we were like other townsmen. We had Kurdish surnames – Euz, Yalik, Odemish, Bircin”.

It is worth noting that the serious role in saving and reclamation of that group played the Patriarch of Istanbul Shork Galustian by whose efforts at the middle of the 60s those splinters of the Armeniancy began leaving Shrnak and Silop for Istanbul and then (in 1980s) for Belgium, France, Holland.

As it was mentioned above there are also groups of reconverted Armenians in Sweden. One of such Armenians is Suleiman Faruk, born in Adana. Revealing his true identity he reconverted to Christianity and changed his name to Haik Aramian. He was one of those thousands of assimilated Armenians who lived under the cover of Turk or a Kurd. Since childhood he had doubts about his identity. He was seeking for his roots and in 1983 he was baptized in the Armenian Church in Damascus, and in two years (in 1985) he moved and settled in Sweden. While speaking about his identity he said: “Inwardly I always felt that I am different. I could remain a Kurd but I decided to do in a different way”. Settling in Stockholm Haik Aramian married an Armenian from Diyarbekir and called his children Masis and Ani. Children learned and speak Armenian. The most notable is that returning to his roots Haik Aramian tries to implant in his children the sense of Armeniancy and with that purpose he brought them to Armenia and Artsakh for several times. “I missed a lot and I want my children to grow up knowing who they are. I want my son to be proud of his Armenian descent”, - he said.

Today Aramian is the active member of the Armenian community in Sweden. It should be mentioned that part of Haik’s family stayed in Adana, i.e. there is some concern that they may be persecuted there but this did not keep him away from reclaiming his identity. Even more, several years ago his brother left for Sweden and returned to his roots changing his name to Aram.

Let us mention that those Armenians living in Europe have problems in revealing their identity because their relatives living in Turkey may become a target for persecutions, that’s why sometimes they do not speak openly. There are families, which being concerned about their relatives living in Turkey, do not speak too openly about their identity and live double mode of life. One of such families is the Merdjanian family which moved to Holland from Diyarbekir. Settling in Amsterdam in 1970s they reconverted to Christianity but they have relatives in Diyarbekir. Turkish researcher Urug Ungor mentions: “Today when they visit their relatives in Diyarbekir during the flights from Europe to Turkey you can be the witness of transformation from one religion to the other. Women cover their heads just in the plane and instead of Armenian they use Muslim names and in Diyarbekir they behave like Muslims”.

Summarizing, it should be mentioned that the study of the reconverted Armenians living in Europe is important not only from the point of view of the researches but it is also topical and of practical significance.


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