This Lawcode is the first Armenian legal text to cover secular as well as ecclesiastical matters. Although the Armenians had been concerned with canon law since the fifth century, secular law was not codified until Greater Armenia was under Muslim domination. Mxit'ar Gosh began his work in 1184 in an attempt to provide Armenians with a comprehensive code based on traditional practice. He did not use the Greek and Syrian lawcodes that were being translated into Armenian during his lifetime. Mxit'ar's code formed the basis for all later Armenian lawcodes, both that of Smbat in Cilican Armenia...

This book offers a reevaluation of the character of medieval (12-17th century) Armenian literature and language. It contains a number of contributions by leading Armenologists (Cowe, Russell, Thomson, and Stone) and of a younger generation of scholars who attempt to confront the traditional approach of this period with the new insights gained in modern occidental medieval studies. One may call these papers New because they study the literary highlights not only of Cilician Armenia of the Crusader period, but of all Armenia and put these in a wider cultural context: the authors emphasize both...