{{Short description|Armenian diaspora in Austria}} {{More citations needed|date=August 2017}} {{Infobox ethnic group |group=Armenians in Austria |popplace=[[Vienna]] |image=Wien - Mechitharistenkirche (1).JPG |image_caption=''Mechitaristenkirche'': the [[Mekhitarist Monastery, Vienna|Mechitarist Armenian Catholic Church]] in [[Vienna]], [[Austria]] |pop=6,000 |langs=[[Armenian language|Armenian]], [[German language|German]] |rels=[[Armenian Apostolic Church]] |related=[[Armenians in Germany]], [[Armenians in Hungary]], [[Armenians in Switzerland]] }} {{Armenians}} '''Armenians in Austria''' ({{Langx|hy|Հայերն Ավստրիայում|translit=Hayern Avstriayum}}; {{Langx|de|Armenier in Österreich}}) refers to ethnic Armenians living in [[Austria]]. They number around 6,000<ref>[http://www.armeniadiaspora.com/population.html ArmenianDiaspora website] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130511084353/http://www.armeniadiaspora.com/population.html |date=2013-05-11 }}</ref> and mainly live in [[Vienna]]. There is also the very important presence of the [[Mekhitarist Order]] in [[Vienna]] that plays a major role in the country as well as worldwide.

== History == === Early history ===

The history of Armenians in Austria dates back to the time of Vienna's liberation from the Turkish siege at the end of the 17th century, when several Armenian merchants found a new market in the Habsburg empire.

In fact, the city's characteristic [[coffee culture]] was established and run for a long time in its early decades by Armenian merchants. The very first documented coffee house in Vienna was opened on 17 January 1685, by Johannes Deodat (or Diodato, known in Armenian as Owanes Astouatzatur – Յովհաննէս Աստուածատուր – some sources claiming him to be Greek).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.werbeka.com/krog/cafee.htm|title=COFFEE|website=Werbeka.com|access-date=28 August 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.cafe-wien.at/en/cafe-wien/history-of-the-viennese-coffeehouse/|title=Café Wien :: History of the Viennese Coffeehouse|website=Cafe-wien.at|access-date=28 August 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170829040130/http://www.cafe-wien.at/en/cafe-wien/history-of-the-viennese-coffeehouse/|archive-date=29 August 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.wien-vienna.com/coffee.php |title=Coffee - Viennese institution - coffeehouse |access-date=2012-09-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120509034045/http://www.wien-vienna.com/coffee.php |archive-date=2012-05-09 }}</ref>

=== After the 1770s Austrian annexations of Galicia and Bukovina === {{unreferenced section|date=February 2023}} [[File:Evropa (Europe), a literary and scholarly journal.JPG|thumb|left|220px|''Evropa'' (Europe), a literary and scholarly journal, 1847]]

In 1772–1774, the Austrian Empire annexed [[Galicia (Eastern Europe)|Galicia]] (see [[Austrian Partition]], as part of the late-18th century [[Partitions of Poland]]) and especially the formerly [[Moldavia]]n [[Voivodeship]] of [[Bukovina]] (see [[Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca]]; today a part of [[Ukraine]]), which at the time held the largest area contiguously settled by Armenians in Europe, and the Bukovian and Galician Armenians automatically became subjects to the Empire. In 1775, Maria Theresa gave official permission to the [[Mechitarists|Mechitarist]] Congregation of the [[Armenian Catholic Church]] to settle in the Habsburg Empire. The Mekhitarian congregation in Vienna contributed to the spread of Armenian culture in central Europe through its printing, its library and its college for Armenian boys.

By the end of the 18th century, the Austrian authorities dissolved Armenian church schools for children in the annexed areas of Poland and the Armenian Collegium in [[Lwów]], with only one Armenian school active until the 1860s in [[Kuty]].<ref>{{cite magazine|last=Krzyżowski|first=Tomasz|title=Nauczanie języka ormiańskiego na Uniwersytecie Lwowskim w latach 1904–1939|magazine=Lehahayer. Czasopismo poświęcone dziejom Ormian polskich|language=pl|issue=7|year=2020|pages=260–261}}</ref> By the end of the 19th century, proficiency in Armenian among the Armenians of the Austrian Partition of Poland had almost completely disappeared.{{sfn|Osiecki|2020|p=240}}

At the beginning of the 19th century, the Austrian Armenians enjoyed officially recognized status as an autonomous religious community. The Armenian community in Vienna grew constantly, so that already in 1896 the first efforts were made to found an Armenian-Apostolic community. In 1912, a small chapel was established in Vienna.

=== World War I and its aftermath === {{unreferenced section|date=February 2023}} [[World War I]] and its aftermath transformed the Austrian Armenian community: The area of the [[Bukovina Armenians]] was lost during the war, but a wave of immigrants came to Austria as a result of the [[Armenian genocide]] perpetrated by the Ottoman Turks in 1915. Austria as an [[Central Powers|ally]] of the Ottoman Empire was hostile towards attempts of Armenian Catholic Archbishop of Lwów [[Józef Teodorowicz]] to bring several thousand Armenian survivors of the genocide to Lwów.{{sfn|Osiecki|2020|p=241}} After 1918, Galicia became part of a re-established Poland again, while the Bukovina region and much of its Armenian population became part of Romania (and in 1945 was turned over to the USSR and today Ukraine, which prompted most of its Armenian population to leave to Poland and Czechoslovakia after 1945).

After the appointment of the first Armenian pastor in Vienna in the 1920s, the number of Armenians in Austria continued to grow, also boosted by refugees from [[Lebanon]], [[Syria]], [[Iraq]], [[Iran]], as well as migrant Armenian workers from [[Turkey]] and more recently from [[Armenia]].

=== After 1945 === {{unreferenced section|date=February 2023}} In 1968, the [[Saint Hripsime Church of Vienna]] was consecrated, giving a new impetus to the ever growing Armenian community in Austria. There is also a Saturday Armenian School named [[Hovhannes Shiraz]].

Both countries established diplomatic relations in 1996. Armenia has an embassy in [[Vienna]] and Austria is represented in Armenia through its embassy in [[Moscow]] ([[Russia]]).

== Mechitarist Order in Vienna (1810–present) == {{unreferenced section|date=February 2023}} Although the monastic headquarters of the [[Mekhitarist Order]] founded by Mekhitar da Pietro(1676–1749), an [[Armenian Catholic Church|Armenian Catholic]] monk is on the island of St. Lazarus in [[Venice]] (San Lazzaro Monastero Armeno in [[Italian language|Italian]]), the [[Mechitarists]] have kept an important presence in [[Vienna]] since 1810.

Even much before, actually in 1775, Maria Theresa had already given the official permission to the [[Mechitarists]] congregation of the [[Armenian Catholic Church]] to settle in the Habsburg Empire and they had established in [[Trieste]].

By 1810, they established a new monastic center in [[Vienna]] using a Franciscan church. When in 1835, the church the Order was using burnt down completely, the Mechitarists hired the services of one of the most famous architects of Vienna of the time [[Josef Kornhäusel]] for constructing a new church.

Due to financial issues, the construction of the designed church failed to materialize for a few decades. When the church was finally built, a new architect called Fritz Sitte had already altered the designs considerably. He, and later his son [[Camillo Sitte]] finished building the church in 1874.

Vienna Congregation is not just a religious center, but a veritable cultural center for Armenians as well. The monks especially cultivated the [[Armenian language]], [[Armenian history]] and [[Armenian literature]] and published all of the old [[Armenian writer]]s' works with commentaries under the title of "National Library". [[Aydinian]] of Vienna wrote the fundamental textbook of modern Armenian grammar in 1866; [[Mikayel Chamchian|Tschamtschian]] (1738–1823) published a 3-volume history in Venice (which then belonged to Austria), and in Vienna [[Garagaschian]] (1818–1903) wrote a 4-volume history of Armenia.

The Vienna branch has been publishing ''[[Handes Amsorya]]'', a scholarly publication on Armenian linguistics and philology, since 1887.

The library of the Mechitarist Congregation, founded in 1773, owns a special collection of Armenian and Oriental manuscripts (approx. 153,000 vols., 2,000 manuscripts, numismatic collection). The Library has recently announced the formation of the digital list of the Library's books and manuscripts available online.

An association was formed for the propagation of good books worldwide to all Armenian communities, and a high-quality printing press that published average of six new works each year.

A herb liquor called "[[Mechitharine]]" and produced by the monks is said to contain 43 herbs and 12 fruits – the precise ingredients and recipe remains is a secret and known by only two monks at a time. The Mechitharine is still produced today and sold commercially by the monks.

== See also == {{Portal|Armenia|Austria}} * [[:Category:Austrian people of Armenian descent]] * [[Armenia–Austria relations]] * [[Armenian diaspora]] * {{interlanguage link|Johannes Diodato|de|Johannes Theodat|display=1|vertical-align=sup|}} ({{interlanguage link|Johannes Deodat|de|Johannes Theodat|display=1|vertical-align=sup|}}, {{interlanguage link|Johannes Theodat|de|display=1|vertical-align=sup|}}, {{interlanguage link|Owanes Astouatzatur|de|Johannes Theodat|display=1|vertical-align=sup|}}) (1640, Istanbul{{ndash}}1725, Vienna) * [[Mechitarists]] * [[Armenians in France]] * [[Armenians in Germany]] * [[Armenians in the Czech Republic]] * [[Armenians in Poland]] * [[Armenians in Slovakia]] * [[Armenians in Hungary]] * [[Armenians in Romania]] * [[Armenians in Moldova]] * [[Armenians in Ukraine]] * [[Armenians in Serbia]] * [[Armenians in Croatia]] ([[Armenia–Croatia relations]]) * [[Armenians in Finland]] ([[Armenia–Finland relations]]) * [[Armenians in Albania]] * [[Armenians in North Macedonia]] * [[Armenians in Bulgaria]] * [[Armenians in Greece]] * [[Armenians in Turkey]] * [[Armenians in Italy]] * [[Armenians in Spain]] * [[Armenians in the Netherlands]]

==References== {{Reflist}}

==Bibliography== *{{cite magazine|last=Osiecki|first=Jakub|title=Towarzystwo Polsko-Ormiańskie we Lwowie (1920–1922)|magazine=Lehahayer. Czasopismo poświęcone dziejom Ormian polskich|language=pl|issue=7|year=2020}}

==External links== * [http://www.mechitharistenbibliothekwien.com/ The Mechitarian Library in Vienna] * {{cite journal|title=Une curiosité ethnographique: Les Arméniens d'Autriche |journal=[[Servet-i Fünun|Servet-i-Funoun Partie Français]]|pages=[https://archives.saltresearch.org/bitstream/123456789/129372/560/PFSIF9180718B001.jpg 1], [https://archives.saltresearch.org/bitstream/123456789/129372/562/PFSIF9180718B003.jpg 3]–[https://archives.saltresearch.org/bitstream/123456789/129372/563/PFSIF9180718B004.jpg 4] |volume=LIV|issue=1402|date=1918-07-18|language=fr}} {{Immigration to Austria}} {{Armenian diaspora}}

[[Category:Austrian people of Armenian descent|*]] [[Category:Ethnic groups in Austria]] [[Category:Armenian diaspora by country|Austria]]