The Role of Mashtots and Ulfila in the Creation of a New Civilizational Identity

Abstract

The article is devoted to two educational movements of the turn of the 4th–5th centuries — Gothic and Armenian. Outstanding enlighteners — Ulfila and Mashtots — were at the origin of these movements and laid the cornerstone in the construction of the national identity of their peoples. In either case, it was a civilizational project designed to put an end to paganism and “latent barbarism” in the periphery of the Roman world, which was rapidly declining. The invention of their own alphabets and the translation of the Holy Scriptures was aimed at organizing a national Church, which in its turn was the main tool for creating a national identity. The introduction of the Goths to the “peoples of the Scriptures” was an initiative, first of all, of Ulfila himself, but his project was actively supported by the Roman authorities. However, there is no indication in the sources that Ulfila’s project was backed by the Gothic elite. In contrast, Mashtots’ educational project from the very beginning met with the approval and active encouragement of all strata of Armenian society, primarily, the church and secular elites, as well as common people. In fact, it was a nationwide project, and the seeds of Armenian enlightenment fell on kindly soil. This explains the surge in Armenian culture in the fifth century.