L’Ašxarhac‘oyc‘ e il nome medievale degli Alani

Although the Armenians were not the closest neighbors of the Alans, Armenian sources are of considerable importance for Alanian history. It was the comparison between a passage in Movsēs Xorenac‘i’s Patmowt‘iwn Hayoc‘ and Kartlis cxovreba that allowed Julius Klaproth to identify the Ossetians, a population settled in the central Caucasus to the north and south of the mountain range, as the descendants of the Alans mentioned in classical sources and in those of many other peoples. Another Armenian source, Ananias Širakac‘i’s Ašxarhac‘oyc‘, recalls the Alans settled north of the Caucasus and in particular mentions the Aš-Tigor, a tribe of considerable importance for determining the medieval name of the Alans.