Katramide of Kartli, Queen of Armenia - Parents

You are right.

Tagging Tamás Flinn Caldwell-Gilbert if he is available. I think he has a good bit of knowledge on this region.

I think it is best to drop undocumented parents off too, but things get dicey in regional histories.

Thanks, Susanne. Yes, Tamas is really good.

Thanks so much, Tamás Flinn Caldwell-Gilbert

You do amazing work on Geni connections. Your contribution is appreciated.

Again, thanks so much for your help keeping the lines correct.

If I don't chat with you again, Happy Holidays.

Hi - I have been researching Katramide since she is my wife's 32nd great grandmother (this is Andy, her husband writing from Elizabeth's account).

There are quite a number of references to Katramide being the daughter of Vasak of Siounie, and none that I can find which support the Gurgen parentage. Here is a great point of reference with a number of links to recent books on the subject:

https://archive.org/search.php?query=Katramide&sin=TXT

Maybe this will help solve the parentage issue.

Thanks,

Andy Leskowitz (husband of Elizabeth Montgomery)

I added a document to the media section culled from some of the books referenced in my previous post. Tamás Flinn Caldwell-Gilbert I hope this helps provide additional sources which have not previously been discussed.

Andy

One more update from studying the passages in MedLands. The possibility that Gurgen is her father is enhanced by the section that follows her entry - that of YOVHANES-SMBAT (-1041).

The reference from The History of Aristakes Lastivertci (he lived in the 11th century) records that Giorgi, King of Abkhazia arbitrated the dispute over the inheritance of Yovhanes and Ashot (and not Gurgen as was suggested as a possibility in Katramide's entry).

This agrees with the passage from The Chronicle of Matthew of Edessa in Katramide's entry that the arbitration was performed by “le chef Géorgien”, if it refers to Katramide´s supposed nephew King Giorgi [I], who is recorded as ruling Abkhazia at the time of the death of Yovhanes´s father. That timing would make sense.

These two passages taken together from two (almost) contemporary scribes lend credence to the Gurgen as father theory.

Andy

Thank you Tamás Flinn Caldwell-Gilbert for your excellent research updates.

The contemporaneous Cathedral inscription was placed there on behalf of Katramide herself. That seems to be the only 1st hand, direct evidence. All the rest could be subject to the author's interpretation, so it would seem the Vasak parentage theory appears to carry the most weight.

Too bad for confirming Elizabeth's direct ancestral connections, but if Katramide was also Gourgen's niece, at least there could still be some other connection elsewhere yet to be discovered.

Is anything more known about Vasak himself? His entry is very scant on the details, so perhaps there is a familial connection which could be helping to contribute to all the uncertainty.

These early medieval connections are always shifting in the sands. In fact just since yesterday, Katramide moved from 32nd to 33rd great grandmother for Elizabeth.

Thanks again for all your great work!

Thanks Tamás Flinn Caldwell-Gilbert! I find these discussions really enlightening as I seldom wade beyond colonial research.

Kyle Dean Perkey the Cathedral of Ani inscription as posted above by Tamás Flinn Caldwell-Gilbert does seem to put to rest theories about Katramide being the daughter of Gurgen I.

There are some excellent research sources for Ani, most notably http://www.virtualani.org/cathedral/index.htm . The section on Ani Cathedral also repeats Katramide's inscription on the Southern Facade of the cathedral:

"In the year 450 (AD 1001) of the Armenians ... at the time of Sarkis, honoured by God and Katholikos, spiritual lord of the Armenians, and during the glorious reign of Gagik, shahanshah of the Armenians and of the Georgians, I Katranideh, Queen of the Armenians, daughter of Vasak, King of Siunik, entrusted myself to the mercy of God and, by order of my husband Gagik shahanshah, built this holy cathedral, which the great Smbat had founded..."

I would expect that documented and dated physical inscriptions would hold sway over later historical and non-contemporaneous writings such as those of Matthew of Edessa.

Andy

Tamás Flinn Caldwell-Gilbert supposedly she was kidnapped by her future husband, Mendo Alao, while she was accompanying her father (King of Vaspurakan) on a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela from her country, beyond the Black Sea.

According to Manuel Abranches de Soveral, a source: ("Os Braganções", Lisbon 2004, by J. C. L. S. Machado) asserts that she was married around 1025 to D. Mendo Alaniz, and they had Ourroana Menendez when, around 1025, she stayed at the monastery of Castro de Avelãs (Bragança), on a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela.

Mendo Alaniz's Wikipedia entry (I know, I know haha) repeats this story

https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mendo_Al%C3%A3o

Andy

Greetings,

I am not a professional genealogist or a historian, but just someone very interested in history and genealogy. Although according to GENI I am also a supposedly descendant of these historical figures mentioned here (Katramide and Ardzrouri). So there is another reason for my interest in this particular discussion.

It seems to me that the problem building this specific tree derives from the close relationship between History and legend, between facts and myths in the formation of the people of the Iberian Peninsula, right? That is why there are so many conflicts and difficulties building such a tree. The Iberian Peninsula could have received during its formation a wave of migrants from countries like Georgia in the past, right? At least it also existed an Iberia Kingdom in Georgia in the Antiquity or something like that, right? The thing is that this connection between Ierian Peninsula and Iberia Kingdom could be just a myth, right?

Best regards
from Brazil,
Antonio Marques

Hello there! The case of Mendo Alão capturing the Armenian princess is definitely an interesting one ;)

I was fiddling in the Libro Velho de Linhagens because it is supposedly mentioned there, there seems to exist a manuscript partial copy from 1737, and I was trying to find the mention there, if anyone is interested here is the link:
https://digitarq.arquivos.pt/viewer?id=6041555

Katramide, queen of Armenia is my 27th great grandmother.

Ardzrouri Artsruni is my 25th great grandmother.

https://www.geni.com/discussions/253311?msg=1580027

Antonio Silveira Marques

Iberian peninsula was inhabited by Celts, Romans, Visigoths, Goths, Normands, Semitics (Akkadians, Phoenicians, Hebrews, Arabs...) and much more.

Royals and nobles used to marry each other during centuries and this started from the Ancient Age. And of course during Middle Age too. And also the same type of marriage arrangements were done by descendants in every ex-colony of Europe.

Aldo Javier I guess they do not speak Spanish or Portuguese. By the way, I do not notice the several curators native speakers of Spanish or Portuguese been called to the discussions.

Discovered an app that automatically translates texts from images. Translation of the source attached to Vasak, king of Siwnik' reads:

CHAPTER LIV Bishops of Siounie, installed after Ter Vahan.

After Vahan ¹) the episcopal seat was occupied by a widowed priest, named Achot, of great austerity and wisdom, much loved by princes and known throughout the country. He was consecrated by the Catholicos Vahan.

This bishop Achot had a son, Hovhannès, brought up by him with great care, who, having arrived at the virile age, chaste and of holy morals, endowed with talents and an advantageous exterior, was also crowned bishop of Siounie.

For his father, Ter Achot, after occupying the seat for 17 years, he entrusted it to his son Hovhannès, and devoted himself solely to prayer. Hovhannes being dead, after having sat for six and a half years, violence was done to his father Achot, to reinstate him, and he himself died five and a half years later. His successor was Ter Samouel, a gentle and good man, who sat for three years and was struck down by death.

They therefore chose a virtuous and very experienced man, nurtured in holiness and continence, named Hacob, who was placed on the episcopal see of Siounia. 2)

In his time died Sembat, lord of Siounie, son of Sahac, who was deposited in the episcopal residence of Tathev. Sembat had taken the crown and the title of king ³).

His pious wife, the holy queen Chahandoukht, and their sons Vasac and Sévada, gave to the holy church, for the soul of the pious and religious king Sembat, 6000 drams and the village of Tegh, canton of Hanband, established by Chahandoukht herself in a moor, and so that no one dared to cancel her donation, she wrote an act, in these terms:

"In the name of God, I wanted, Chahandoukht, daughter of Sévada), to give the village of Tegh, canton of Hanband, with all the limits that surround it, with its mountains, with its plains and its revenues, of which my king Sembat made me a present, and which I established in a moor after the departure from this world of my venerable king, I offered it for his soul, to the holy metropolis of Tathev and to the Holy Sign, through Hacob, bishop of Siounie.

From now on we are no longer its masters, me and my sons Vasac and Sévada, because we have handed it over to God and to the Holy Sign ³). We must annually celebrate about forty masses for the soul of my king, at the feast of the Transfiguration, and every day recite, during the quarantine, the psalm: “Blessed are those whose sins are forgiven; now, holy pontiffs who accede to this seat, you must accomplish this without opposition and [manage/control/administrate] this village, free of all taxes. God bless it!

https://translateimages.site/

https://archive.org/details/toumanoff-1976-genealogie/page/109/mode...

https://archive.org/details/1980-hewsen-the-meliks-of-eastern-armen...

Have yet to find the primary sources, but something is better than nothing. I accept that Katramide was the daughter of Vasak VI.

I have to apologize for being too quick to reach a conclusion. I was trying too hard to be agreeable toward what I saw as the authority on the subject. After further investigation, I now retract my previous statement. I am not at all convinced that Katramide's father was Vasak. The primary evidence is more compelling for Gurgen as her father.