Yerevan: population and a brief history of the city

The largest city of Armenia and one of the oldest cities in the world today has more than a million inhabitants. Its name was associated with the tribe that once lived on these lands, then with the names of the rulers, and even completely with the legend of the flood. The legend says that the notorious Noah cried out: "Erevan!", Which means "She appeared!", Barely seeing the land and the fact that the flood waters are leaving. The event happened exactly on the spot where the capital of Armenia is now. Whatever it was, the population of Yerevan has been creating the history of the city for more than one thousand years.

The foundation of the fortress of Erebuni

The foundation date of the city-fortress Erebuni on the left-bank part of the Ararat plain (along the Araks River) is 782 BC. The king of Urartu, an ancient state located within the borders of today's Armenia, eastern Turkey, northwestern Iran and the autonomous republic of Azerbaijan, Argishti I founded a new settlement in the fifth year of his reign, which was later used as a springboard for trips to Lake Sevan and Protection of the Ararat plain. The ruins of the fortress, according to the legends that became the refuge of the biblical Noah and his family both before the flood and after, were discovered in the southwestern part of the modern city called Yerevan.

The population of the fortress at the end of the eighth century BC was mainly captive (under another version - the warriors) from the western regions of the Armenian Highlands, which, in fact, were engaged in works related to the founding of the city. A memorable record of this is left in the stone on the hill and in the annals. The population of Yerevan was then 6600 people. After a while, the fortress was defeated, after which there is no written evidence of the city. It is known that in the third century BC Yerevan, whose population belonged to the Christian or Manichaean community, continued to exist under the authority of a certain "ruler".

Mention in the "Book of letters"

Medieval Yerevan found itself in the zone of endless Iranian-Byzantine wars and became a place of periodic uprisings of the local population. At the same time, the first mention of the city in the Armenian sources - "The Book of Letters" - is found. In addition, it is known that in the fourteenth century the population of the city was about fifteen to twenty thousand people, while Yerevan itself was an important cultural center. However, after the defeat of Tamerlane, the number of the local population has significantly decreased, and some buildings that today would have become historical monuments, were destroyed.

Arena of the Ottoman-Safavid wars

The devastating wars between the Ottoman Empire and the Safavids, as well as the nomads, which local rulers used to sow enmity and weaken the local inhabitants, had a serious impact on the demographic situation in the region and the national composition of the population. The Armenian population significantly decreased, and in 1580 Ottoman troops practically destroyed the city and captured 60,000 Muslims and Christians.

The changing power ordered the entire local population to be sent to Persia, so that the Ottomans came to the depopulated country, they simply burned everything on their way, then populated the territory with nomadic tribes. For example, in the sixteenth century, Yerevan (the population was composed of nomadic tribes), Karabakh and Ganja received fifty thousand families, and soon the number of inhabitants multiplied several times.

As a result of protracted wars and general instability in the region in 1804, the city was inhabited by only about six thousand people. However, in twenty years the population was already over twenty thousand people.

Erivan Province

The first documented data on the number and ethnic composition of the population of Yerevan appeared in the first half of the nineteenth century, when the city became the capital of the Armenian region as part of the Russian Empire (Yerevan, or Erivan, a province centered in Yerevan). The population (the nationality of the current residents of the city will be discussed below) was then largely moved to Persia, so the number of local residents decreased to 11.3 thousand in 1833.

According to the national composition of the population of the city (according to data for 1829) was divided as follows:

• Armenians accounted for 36% of the local population;
• Almost 64% of the townspeople were Azerbaijanis;
• Russians, Yezidis and Kurds in the city was not at all.

By the beginning of the twentieth century, the population of Yerevan had increased to almost thirty thousand inhabitants. Significantly changed and the national composition. In 1897, there were 43% of Armenians, 42% of Azerbaijanis, 9.5% of Russians, 0.22% of Yezidis and Kurds, and 4.5% of representatives of other nationalities.

As part of the Russian Empire and with the status of the provincial city, Yerevan retained the appearance of a provincial town. The production facilities were represented by several local factories, brick and brandy factories, and one-and two-story clay houses stretched along narrow streets.

Yerevan in the Soviet Union

With the establishment of Soviet power, Yerevan becomes the capital of the Republic of Armenia. Immediately, a large-scale reconstruction of the city began:

• Electricity, water and sewerage were conducted;
• Almost all the buildings built earlier were destroyed;
• New streets were laid and forest belts were organized, which protected the city from dust storms;
• Cultural objects were erected: theaters, a repository of ancient manuscripts, museums and monuments.

In those years, Yerevan was actively developing. The population, the number of which has grown rapidly, has become nationally oriented. So, if in the beginning of the twentieth century, Armenians constituted 43% of the townspeople, then by 1959 their number had increased to 93%. In the same year, the total population of Yerevan was half a million people.

Current population

Inevitable time did not succeed in erasing the city from the face of the earth - today Yerevan is the capital of independent Armenia. The population of the largest city of the republic is more than one million people, which is one third of all residents of the state. More than 64% of Armenian citizens (the population of Armenia is about three million people) live in large cities (Yerevan, Gyumri and Vanadzor), so there is a high level of urbanization in the country. Half of the urban population lives directly in Yerevan.

National composition

According to the data of the 2001 Armenian population census (and this is the latest actual data), the national composition is represented by such groups:

• Armenians (98.5%);
• Russians (0.5%);
• Yezidi (0.31%);
• Ukrainians (0.06%).

Persians, Greeks, Georgians, Kurds and Assyrians also meet in Yerevan.