XXVm PREFACB*
undertaken by these learned foreigners, must hava proved very arduous to them. It is evident that the real meaning of the author, in several passages, had not been sufficiently understood by the translators, who appear to have been unacquainted with the literary character of the author.
£lish£v the Monk flourished in the fifth century. He was a fellow-scholar of Moses Chorenensis, and a rela* tive of St. Vardan, the famous Armenian general, to whom he was secretary. By desire of that excellent priest David the Maraiconi^n, he wrote in a beautiful stvle an account of the destruction of the country of Armenia by the cruel Hazkert king of Persia, of the memorable martyrdoms of the Vardanian and Levondian Saints, and of the calamities that subsequently befel the Armenian chiefs, the whole extending to the year 463. His work has been published in Constantinople in the year 1764, or the Haican era 1213; in Nakhjuan in the year 1787, and in Calcutta in the year 1816, by Mn Gentloom Aviet.
Lazarus Pharpensis, surnamed the Rhetorician, flourished in the fifth century. In his infancy he was placed under the immediate tuition of St. Isaac and St. Mesrop; and he finished his education under the care of the blessed Alan the Arzrunian. He takes a cursory view of the events recorded in the histories of Agathan- gelus and Phostos Byzandensis. Soon after the period of the extinction of the Arsacidean royalty, Lazarus gave a very detailed account of the martyrdoms of the Varda- nian and Levondian saints, as well as of all the events that occurred in Armenia during his own time. He aim
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