The original of the "Interpretation of the calendar" by YovhannẼs Kozern (the problem of "What is the year?")

Abstract

To conclude, we would like to note that, following our goal, in this article we presented the handwritten legacy of the famous calendar expert of the 10th-11th centuries Yovhannẽs Kozern Taronetśi, whose legacy has been preserved in the manuscripts of the Mashtots Matenadaran. We have stated that the author's "Interpretation of the Calendar" is included in eleven manuscripts of the Matenadaran. Yovhannẽs Kozern is also the author of other works: the work "Tesil", "The history of the House of Bagratuni", speeches, sermons and other interpretations.

In the article we touched on the question "What is the year?" according to the work of Yovhannẽs Kozern "Interpretation of the calendar". To study the issue, we used both the already published originals and two new manuscripts that were not used in the preparation of examination and comparative originals. Once again, these manuscripts of the Matenadaran No. 5809 and No. 8716, which the researchers did not refer to, contributed to the clarification of all the figures given in the calendarial entity of "What is the year".

The article also discusses the idea of the beginning of the Armenian first year. Yovhannẽs Kozern showed the correspondence of this year to 552/553 of the Julian calendar, comparing 1 Navasard with various periods of the reign of the kings and Catholicoses of Armenians. 

We also hope that the idea of the "immobility" of the Armenian calendar put forward by us will allow to look at various issues of the Armenian calendar from a new angle.

During the research of the topic, we adopted a new calendar method, and also used historical-analytic, historical-comparative and analytic methods.