Richard G. Hovannisian

Richard Hovannisian (Armenian: Ռիչարդ Հովհաննիսյան, November 9, 1932 – July 10, 2023) was an American historian and professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is known mainly for his four-volume history of the First Republic of Armenia.

Richard G. Hovannisian

November 9, 1932

Tulare, California, U.S.

July 10, 2023(2023-07-10) (aged 90)

Los Angeles, California, U.S.

American

UC Berkeley
UCLA

Republic of Armenia (4 vols.)

Vartiter Hovannisian (née Kotcholosian)

Armenian, Russian, and Near Eastern history

UCLA

Raymond H. Fisher

George Bournoutian, Levon Marashlian

Richard G. Hovannisian UCLA Homepage

Biography[edit]

Background[edit]

Hovannisian was born and raised in Tulare, California, into a family of Armenian genocide survivors. His father, Kaspar Gavroian, was born in 1901 in the village of Bazmashen (Pazmashen; now Sarıçubuk, Elâzığ), near Kharpert in the Ottoman Empire.^[1] Surviving the Genocide of 1915, he moved to the United States by 1920 and changed his last name from Gavroian to Hovannisian, after his father's name, Hovhannes.^[2] In 1927, Kaspar married Siroon (Sarah) Nalbandian, born in Kesserig, Kharpert.^[3] Their oldest sons were born in 1928 (John) and 1930 (Ralph). Richard G. Hovannisian was born on November 9, 1932.^[4] His younger brother, Vernon Hovannisian was born in 1947.

Personal life and death[edit]

Hovannisian married Vartiter Kotcholosian in 1957 at the Holy Trinity Armenian Church of Fresno. They had four children: Raffi, Armen, Ani, and Garo. Raffi became the first Foreign Minister of Armenia and is currently an opposition politician.

Hovannisian died in Los Angeles on July 10, 2023, at the age of 90.^[11]

Political views[edit]

In a 2006 interview Hovannisian criticized the Armenian government of then President Robert Kocharyan for its authoritarian nature and added that Armenia "must not become a failed state."^[12] Hovannisian partook in the protests following the 2013 presidential election in Armenia in which his son, Raffi, came in second according to official results.

(1967). Armenia on the Road to Independence, 1918. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 978-0520005747. OCLC 1028172352.

Hovannisian, Richard G

(1971). The Republic of Armenia: The First Year, 1918–1919. Vol. 1. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 978-0520019843.

Hovannisian, Richard G.

(1982). The Republic of Armenia: From Versailles to London, 1919–1920. Vol. 2. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 978-0520041868.

Hovannisian, Richard G.

(1996a). The Republic of Armenia: From London to Sèvres, February–August 1920. Vol. 3. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 978-0520088030.

Hovannisian, Richard G.

(1996b). The Republic of Armenia: Between Crescent and Sickle: Partition and Sovietization. Vol. 4. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 978-0520088047.

Hovannisian, Richard G.

The Armenian Holocaust, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Armenian Heritage Press (1980)

The Armenian People from Ancient to Modern Times, 2 vols. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997 (editor)

Remembrance and Denial: The Case of the Armenian Genocide. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1998 (editor)

(2010). Family of Shadows: A Century of Murder, Memory, and the Armenian American Dream. New York: HarperCollins. ISBN 978-0-06-1-79208-3. (the author is a grandson of Richard Hovannisian)

Richard G. Hovannisian