Armenia within Russia

After the war of 1826-1828 the Khanate of Erivan went from Persia to Russia, and in 1828, according to the Turkmanchy Agreement, Armenian Region was formed in Russia. On February 27 1833 its coat of arms was adopted (ПСЗ-2. т.8, №6064).

No specific flags existed in the Russian Empire for Armenia.

In Karl Halyard’s famous book “New Dutch Shipbuilding” (1707) one may find the flag of the “Vice King of Moscow” – a cloth consisting of red, blue and yellow stripes, bearing two crossed sabers of Oriental shape and accompanied by 11 white eight-point stars. Russian sources do not mention such a flag, neither the post of a “Vice King” is known. A. Usachev supposes that this referred to the flag of the Armenian tsarevitch (prince) Issrael Orí (1658-1711), the leader of the Armenian national liberation movement.

In 1706 Issrael Orí was sent to Amsterdam as a colonel of the Russian army to recruit military specialists, to get arms, ammunition and equipment. Issrael Orí stayed in Amsterdam several months and, as A.A. Usachev believes, this is when he could have met Karl Halyard and told him about his Armenian flag. As A.A. Usachev writes in this article, a tricolor flag with red-blue-yellow stripes seems to have existed back in the Cilician Kingdom (1080-1393) during the reign of the Ribenids and its stripes symbolized King Levon VI and his two brothers – the Patriarch and the commander-in-chief of the army. The two crossed sabers stood for the armed struggle against Turkey and Persia. The eleven eight-point stars embodied the number of Armenian lords who had gathered for a secret meeting in Angeghakot (Karabakh) in 1699 to prepare the upheaval.

The materials are taken from A.A. Usachev’s article in the Czech “VEXICOLOGIE 24”.