Azhdahak (mythology)

Azhdahak (Armenian: Աժդահակ) is a men-vishap (men-dragon) in Armenian mythology. Vishaps, live in high mountains, in big lakes, in the sky and in the clouds. Ascending on the sky or going down, especially on lakes, they make roar and sweep away everything on their way. A thousand year old vishap can absorb the whole world.

According to Movses Khorenatsi, Azhdhak was a king of the Marrs (the Medes), the grandfather of Cyrus. Movses Khorenatsi wrote that Azhdhak was killed by Armenian king Tigran the Great^[1]. Khorenatsi wrote: "Azhdahak means dragon in our language".

^ Vahan M. Kurkjian. "Chapter XXXIV - Armenian Mythology". A History of Armenia. Retrieved 2010-09-25.
Tigran the son of Erouand, is said to have killed Azhdhak, the king of the Medes, the grandfather of Cyrus, carried away his wife, Anoush and children into Armenia, and settled them at the foot of Mount Ararat.
This family was known in popular songs of the ancient era as Vishabazounk — the issue of dragons, because "Azhdahak means dragon in our language" says Khorenatsi. The progeny of the dragon, as related in the songs of the Goghten Canton, stole the child Artavazd, an implacable enemy of the Vishabazounk, now represented as demons, persecuted them relentlessly, to the point of extermination of the race.
Yeznik, the Armenian erudite and theologian of the fifth century, relates that, according to old tales, Artavazd was "detained by demons and is still alive, and that he will some day come out and dominate the world." Yeznik adds, "the infidels (the idolators of Armenia) cling to the superstitious hopes, like the Jews, who are bound to the expectation that David is to come, to construct Jerusalem, to gather together the Jews, and to reign over them."
Artavazd, a killer of dragons and their race, could not have been a person of vicious or demented type. His wars against the Mar people, or the dragons, remind us of the struggle which Feridun wages against the demons of Mazandaran, whose people, like the Mari colony of Ararat, were the issue of a foreign and savage tribe.
p308 The Avesta mentions Ahavazdah (= Artavazd), an "immortal" personality, fighting a wild tribe of Touranian origin. J. Darmesteter referring to this says that in the Armenian legend-songs, there is a king, Artavazd, who cannot die. Could not the immortal Ashavada have been adopted in Armenia? Patriarch Tourian answers the question of the French orientalist, by stating that Artavazd can positively be identified with the Ashavazd of the Avesta, who, as one of the undying souls, will wake from his sleep, to re-organize the world, and to carry out the work of Salvation, the miraculous work of Frashokereti (hrashakert in the Armenian).
The Avesta has also the tale of Azhidahaka, the evil spirit, killed by Thraetaona (Feridoun). From this story their springs the one of Zohak, the tyrant, the same Azhdahak finally became identified with Azhdahak (of Khorenatsi), the grandfather of Cyrus who was killed by our Tigran Erouandian in the fifth century B.C. According to Khorenatsi, "Persian worthless and foolish fables relate that a certain Feridoun (Hrouten) bound Purask-Azhdahak in bronze fetters and carried him to the Demavend mountain (in Tabaristan); that Feridoun fell asleep on the road and was dragged by Pursab to the hill; that Feridoun, awakening, carried Purasb into a cave of the mountain, chained him and placed himself before him as a barrier, where he still remains, with no power to devastate the world. A similar tale existed about Artavazd, with the addition that watchmen incessantly strike at the anvil, in order to remind us of the assurance that ironmongers harden the links of the chain.

[1] Vahan M. Kurkjian. "Chapter XXXIV - Armenian Mythology". A History of Armenia. Retrieved 2010-09-25.
Tigran the son of Erouand, is said to have killed Azhdhak, the king of the Medes, the grandfather of Cyrus, carried away his wife, Anoush and children into Armenia, and settled them at the foot of Mount Ararat.
This family was known in popular songs of the ancient era as Vishabazounk — the issue of dragons, because "Azhdahak means dragon in our language" says Khorenatsi. The progeny of the dragon, as related in the songs of the Goghten Canton, stole the child Artavazd, an implacable enemy of the Vishabazounk, now represented as demons, persecuted them relentlessly, to the point of extermination of the race.
Yeznik, the Armenian erudite and theologian of the fifth century, relates that, according to old tales, Artavazd was "detained by demons and is still alive, and that he will some day come out and dominate the world." Yeznik adds, "the infidels (the idolators of Armenia) cling to the superstitious hopes, like the Jews, who are bound to the expectation that David is to come, to construct Jerusalem, to gather together the Jews, and to reign over them."
Artavazd, a killer of dragons and their race, could not have been a person of vicious or demented type. His wars against the Mar people, or the dragons, remind us of the struggle which Feridun wages against the demons of Mazandaran, whose people, like the Mari colony of Ararat, were the issue of a foreign and savage tribe.
p308 The Avesta mentions Ahavazdah (= Artavazd), an "immortal" personality, fighting a wild tribe of Touranian origin. J. Darmesteter referring to this says that in the Armenian legend-songs, there is a king, Artavazd, who cannot die. Could not the immortal Ashavada have been adopted in Armenia? Patriarch Tourian answers the question of the French orientalist, by stating that Artavazd can positively be identified with the Ashavazd of the Avesta, who, as one of the undying souls, will wake from his sleep, to re-organize the world, and to carry out the work of Salvation, the miraculous work of Frashokereti (hrashakert in the Armenian).
The Avesta has also the tale of Azhidahaka, the evil spirit, killed by Thraetaona (Feridoun). From this story their springs the one of Zohak, the tyrant, the same Azhdahak finally became identified with Azhdahak (of Khorenatsi), the grandfather of Cyrus who was killed by our Tigran Erouandian in the fifth century B.C. According to Khorenatsi, "Persian worthless and foolish fables relate that a certain Feridoun (Hrouten) bound Purask-Azhdahak in bronze fetters and carried him to the Demavend mountain (in Tabaristan); that Feridoun fell asleep on the road and was dragged by Pursab to the hill; that Feridoun, awakening, carried Purasb into a cave of the mountain, chained him and placed himself before him as a barrier, where he still remains, with no power to devastate the world. A similar tale existed about Artavazd, with the addition that watchmen incessantly strike at the anvil, in order to remind us of the assurance that ironmongers harden the links of the chain.

[1]