PART 4
THE LAND OF NOAH
NOVEMBER 11, 2026 | BY KEVIN MCFARLAND
Let us now turn our attention away from the advancements of humanity that we see evidenced around Aragats and look to the land that Noah lived. The biblical record of the post-flood world is surprisingly brief. When Noah, his three sons, and their wives descended the slopes of the "mountains of Ararat" (of which Aragats remains the strongest candidate), they stepped onto an earth wiped clean. Yet, Scripture records only four tangible events from the 350 years Noah lived after the deluge. These are four specific actions that left a physical footprint on the earth, markers we can actually search for. Astonishingly, a compelling case can be made that all four of these footprints are concentrated in a small geographical area directly on Mount Aragats and the first villages of its lower slopes.
The first two footprints relate to the immediate aftermath of the flood: the landing spot of the Ark itself and the first altar Noah built. Genesis 8:20 records, "Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and, taking some of all the clean animals and clean birds, he sacrificed burnt offerings on it." Because the physical evidence for the landing site and this primeval altar is so overwhelming, we will dedicate the entirety of Part 5 to them.
For this current section, our focus rests on the soil Noah cultivated, the tent he lived in, and the place where he died. We will limit our search to what the biblical text explicitly states, keeping extra-biblical sources to an absolute minimum. Genesis 9 summarizes the final three and a half centuries of Noah's life in just three verses:
"Noah began to be a man of the soil, and he planted a vineyard. He drank of the wine and became drunk and lay uncovered in his tent."
GENESIS 9:20-21
"After the flood Noah lived 350 years. All the days of Noah were 950 years, and he died."
GENESIS 9:29
A vineyard and a grave. Aside from his tent, which shouldn't leave any trace, these are the final, indelible marks the patriarch left on the post-flood world, and they are exactly what we will look for next.
THE VINEYARDS
SECTION 4.1
"Noah began to be a man of the soil, and he planted a vineyard. He drank of the wine and became drunk and lay uncovered in his tent."
GENESIS 9:20-21
The vast and fertile Ararat Plain, as seen from Aragats with a view towards Ararat.
A GOOD LAND
Why should we look there? Geographically and ecologically speaking, the vast basin just below Aragats, known today as the Plain of Ararat, is the epicenter of the first civilizations and stands as one of the most ideal landscapes on Earth for early settlement. It provides a perennial supply of fresh water fed by heavy mountain snowmelt and the surrounding highland hydrology. The volcanic soil is very fertile, recognized by agronomists as where agriculture first spread from [4]. In fact, high-altitude petroglyphs found across the Armenian Highlands depict some of the world's earliest known evidence of yoked oxen and agricultural plowing [5].
The German traveler and naturalist Friedrich Parrot surveyed the plain during his famous 1829 expedition. He marveled at the sheer agrarian abundance of the valley, describing its boundless grain fields, irrigated orchards, and lush vineyards thriving in the crisp mountain air [6].
Moreover, the topography creates a natural fortress, ringed on all sides large volcanic massifs. This was combined with an elevation gradient perfectly suited for transhumance. The early settlers cultivated fertile orchards and grain fields on the plains, while utilizing the endless green alpine pastures rolling up the slopes of Aragats for cattle and sheep during the summer. The question one should ask is why would anyone leave? It is a reasonable assumption that Noah stayed close to the mountain of his descent, seeking out a flat, fertile, well-watered piece of land to settle.
THE ARENI-1 CAVE
As Genesis 9 expounds, Noah became a man of the soil, planted a vineyard, and drank wine. The first natural place we should look, then, is the earliest evidence of viticulture. Over the past fifteen years, it has become widely recognized by the archaeological community that the Armenian Highlands, specifically in the Republic of Armenia, hold the origins of wine [1]. About a two-to-three-hour drive south of Mount Aragats lies a modest cave on a sharp precipice in the Vayots Dzor province. In the early 2000s, an international team of archaeologists made astonishing discoveries inside this cavern, known as Areni-1, including the world’s oldest leather shoe and the oldest preserved human brain tissue [2]. In 2011, they uncovered a vast winemaking facility with in-situ vats, fermentation basins, and desiccated grape seeds. Radiocarbon dating traced the installation back to around 4100 B.C. Just over 6,000 years ago, the very first known winemaking processes in the world were happening here.
This does not mean Noah lived in this cave, besides the obvious that the Word says he dwelt in a tent. Areni-1 is located in one of the driest micro-regions of Armenia. It was an enclosed, dark environment that was eventually sealed by roof collapses and left largely untouched for millennia. Because it lacked continuous human habitation, the organic material was remarkably preserved by the dry cave air [3]. This level of preservation rarely happens to viticulture evidence left out in the open fields. Genesis states that Noah lived in a tent and worked the earth, so it is natural to assume that after descending he found an open, fertile place to settle and homestead. Even though the arid canyon of Vayots Dzor does not fit this profile, it does lie along a southern migration corridor. As early post-flood generations migrated south toward Mesopotamia and Egypt, they would have carried this viticulture knowledge with them. Areni-1 is simply the earliest surviving enclosed winery, but for Noah’s actual homestead, we should look closer to the slopes of Aragats.
Steps are built to approach the Areni-1 Cave, now a popular tourist spot in Vayots Dzor.
Numerous in-situ remains of its wine-making facilities are exposed in the cave
The lower slopes of Aragats, seen from Byurakan village. I believe Noah would likely have lived where the mountains meet the plains.
THE NAME REMEMBERS
Numerous ancient villages are spread across the southern slopes of Aragats, a region archaeologists say "have been inhabited since at least the 6th millennium BC ."[7] So where exactly should one look for Noah’s homestead? I first did an extensive search of local legends and traced the etymology of every single village name on the mountain to see if anything lined up with the biblical narrative. An incredible convergence emerges in one specific area, exactly where the geography suggests it should be.
In the Ararat region, there are two distinct local legends regarding settlements named by Noah himself. The first is Yerevan, the capital and largest city of Armenia. According to folk tradition noted by scholars such as the Bollandist historian Paul Peeters, the name derives from the Armenian word Yerevats, meaning "it appeared" [8]. The legend claims this was the patriarch's exclamation when the floodwaters receded and the dry peak of the land appeared.
The second is Oshakan. Breaking down its ancient linguistic roots, the name translates to "behold, my eye" or "light to my eyes." According to generations of villagers and early historical accounts, local tradition holds that when Noah first descended and looked out at the new, dry land, he saw this specific area and exclaimed those exact words [9, 10]. While folk claims cannot be verified archaeologically, they should not be ignored. It is somewhat expected that a major capital like Yerevan would naturally accrue this legend over time. But when a small, seemingly unassuming village holds onto the exact same type of legend, it lends a different, quieter credence. Furthermore, looking down from the likely landing spot higher up (which we will discuss in Part 5), Oshakan and its surrounding ridge truly form the first viable, flat plateau that appears before your eyes.
When we look at the villages immediately surrounding Oshakan, the etymolgies perfectly match that of Genesis. Adjoining Oshakan to the northwest is the village of Voskevaz, which translates to "The Golden Vine." Adjoining it to the west is Voskehat, meaning "The Golden Berry" or "The Golden Grape." Voskehat is also the name of a famous, indigenous variety of grape often called the "Queen of Armenian grapes." Ampelographers recognize it as one of the oldest cultivated varieties in the world, with ancient genetic roots that tie back to the same early viticulture seen in the Areni-1 cave. [11]
Finally, in this same small cluster of land just north of Voskehat, and only a ten-minute drive south of Byurakan where I live, lies the ancient village of Agarak. According to the official dictionaries of the ancient language, Agarak literally translates to "landed property" or "cultivated farm" [12]. This definition has been firmly established in the lexicon of Classical Armenian (Grabar) since the alphabet was invented in the fifth century.
This is amazing when we put it all together. Within a radius of just a few miles, we have Oshakan ("Behold, my eye"), surrounded by Voskevaz ("The Golden Vine"), Voskehat ("The Golden Grape"), and Agarak ("The Landed Property"). These are not recent villages names too. In fact, these villages have held these names since before the first recorded history of Armenia, long before they were officially written in stone in the fifth centuries. The name remembers.
A map of the four villages in relation to Mount Aragats and the other villages.
The view from the southern slopes of Aragats, looking down to where Oshakan lies
AGARAK - THE LANDED PROPERTY
Among those four villages, an amazing candidate emerges. Three years ago, in the summer of 2023, my family and I spent one month exploring every province of Armenia, scouting out the country we felt God was pulling us towards. While staying in Ashtarak for two nights, we hired a taxi one morning to visit a site just ten minutes west of the city, just past Oshakan. It was a little-known Bronze Age site, but the archaeological reports had truly captivated me, and I had to see it for myself. We pulled up to Agarak, an ancient settlement carved directly into the stone and literally cut in half by a modern road.
Remember that Agarak means “landed property” or “cultivated farm.” Here, scattered in a field just next to the modern village of the same name, lies a site that stretches back 6,000 years. As the World History Encyclopedia notes, “The site contains some of the oldest large man-made structures carved into stone.” [13] According to Dr. Pavel Avetisyan, one of the lead excavators of the site, nearly the entire surface of the volcanic tuff bedrock was carved by human hands. [14]
Archaeologists have uncovered evidence that this ancient "farm" was first settled around 3,500 B.C. [15]. It was during this early period that many of the rock-cut structures first appeared, alongside a carved street and a complex settlement featuring both round and rectangular building foundations [16]. Many of these buildings and street layouts, which survived up to 2,800 to 2,600 BC, are still remarkably preserved. The site also has a long history of continuous habitation, with Urartian kings and late medieval Armenians utilizing and building upon the exact same bedrock for millennia.
As we clambered around a landscape filled with square and circular basins, small drainage channels, and rock-cut chambers, we really had no idea what we were looking at. A dilapidated sign greeted us at the entrance, saying the complex of structures "were used for carrying out ritual ceremonies... for blood and holy water sacrifices... for performing ritual mating and other acts." I read it in disbelief. I knew there had to be a more to this site than that. When archaeologists do not know a structure's true function, they often just label it “ritualistic.” Ancient humans were more than just "ritual creatures" as what anthropologists want us to think. The lost history of this site stayed with me, and I kept turning it over in my mind as I visited the ruins a couple more times after we moved to Armenia in 2024.
Agarak sits exactly on the lower slopes of Aragats, where the mountain meets the plains.
Dozens of these comet-like troughs are carved into the rock at Agarak, dated to nearly 6,000 years old.
Above: Agarak
Below: A recently discovered, 5,000 year old Canaanite winery in Megiddo, Israel
Comparing a typical wine-press in Israel (below, from Logos Bible Software) to that found in Agarak (above)
Above: An aerial view of Agarak
Below: An iron-age winery in Tel Jezreel
(phot0 by biblewalks.com)
AN ANCIENT WINERY
This past winter in February 2026, we spent a month camping and exploring Israel from north to south. We visited around forty archaeological sites mentioned in the Bible and came across too many ruins to count. In Israel, numerous sites feature ancient viticulture, winemaking basins, and olive presses, so we became quite familiar with what to look for in the bedrock. Upon returning to Armenia, I visited Agarak once more. To my absolute surprise, I looked out across the carved landscape and finally understood it. The entire rocky outcropping was a massive, ancient wine press.
I am not the first to make this connection. Archaeologists unanimously agree that the site functioned as a viticulture complex, though they generally date the winemaking phase much later, to the fourth century B.C. As one university-backed historical survey of Armenia notes, "The large number of wine grapes discovered in the excavated surfaces proves that viticulture and winemaking occupied a special place in the life of the Agarak people." [15]
Yet, when it comes to the Early Bronze Age carvings, which make up the vast majority of the site, mainstream anthropologists hesitate. Rather than attributing these 6,000-year-old structures to industry, they label them as vague "ritualistic" or sacrificial areas. This hesitation often stems from a modern assumption that early man was too primitive for organized viticulture. Genesis tells a different story. The first post-flood generations were incredibly capable, and Noah’s very first recorded act of agriculture was planting a vineyard. As the Areni-1 cave has already shown us, standing as one of the greatest archaeological discoveries of the 21st century, early humanity was more than capable of large-scale, sophisticated industry.
I have compiled photos comparing the bedrock features at Agarak to confirmed ancient wine presses in Israel. [17, 18, 19] The similarities are striking. I will concede that the rectangular basins with drainage holes leading to smaller collection vats likely belong to the later constructions. However, the sweeping, comet-like troughs, the gravity-fed channels running through solid rock, and the perfectly circular basins date back 5,000 to 6,000 years. They point directly to an ancient winery.
Quite possibly, the first in the world.
A road was constructed right through the Agarak site, severely damaging the site.
THE TRUE VINE
That ancient tradition of winemaking never actually left the shadow of Mount Aragats. If you explore the province of Aragatsotn today, you'll find dozens of some of Armenia's largest vineyards. I spoke with the vintner at Stork Nest, a local winery, and he explained to me that the combination of the rich volcanic soil, the elevation, and the amount of sun and rain creates a perfect recipe to grow grapes. The people working here are also aware of the history carved into the rock around them. The winemakers at Van Ardi note that their work "was inspired by the existence of a 5,000-year-old complex of basalt winemaking vessels discovered in Agarak." [20] ArmAs even brings people to the Agarak excavations, pointing to the site as a strong candidate for the world's oldest winery. I find it beautiful that this landscape is still producing harvest today.
But the profundity is even greater than this. When Noah came down from the mountain and planted that first vineyard, it was an act of rooting humanity back into the earth. A fresh start after the flood. Yet, the fruit of that vine also led to Noah's sinfulness as he lay naked in his tent from his drunkeness. The new world was still broken.
A few thousand years later, Jesus used the imagery of the vineyard by calling himself the "true vine." Jesus was telling us that he is where we need to be planted. Where the wine of Noah’s harvest led to nakedness and shame, the wine of the Last Supper - the blood of Jesus' sacrifice - was poured out to cover that shame, bringing true restoration to a broken world.
A map of the wineries in Armenia. Notice most of the wineries are situated just south of Mount Aragats. (Created by getwine.am)
THE TOMB
SECTION 4.2
"After the flood Noah lived 350 years. All the days of Noah were 950 years, and he died."
GENESIS 9:29
Let’s get one thing out of the way first: I do not believe I have found Noah’s tomb (yet). However, the evidence I’ve uncovered here, just a few miles from Agarak, suggests we might be getting close.
THE "SHIP" TOMBS
Everyone dies. Even Noah at an incredible 950 years of age. Genesis 9:29 provides the minimum, stating nothing beside the fact that he does succomb to the pains of the world, the result of his ancestor's sin in the Garden. Despite the lack of biblical detail related to his death, we can still search. And the most logical place to start looking is the immediate surroundings of Agarak, "The Landed Property."
Early in the summer, I came across an article online by Tigran Mirzoyan [21] detailing a site "on the lower slopes of Aragats" that goes by the name Nerkin Naver, which means "ship" or "boat." I confirmed this statement, as the Armenia word for boat or ship is "nav" and its plural is "naver." Well this is surely interesting... Furthermore, the article stated that the " "ships” revealed to the world such an abundance of unknown facts that it simply stunned researchers," dating the burial mounds back to 3,000 to 2,000 BC. Even more striking, the site features, as the article claimed, eight royal mounds. The biblical parallels hit me immediately: an ancient site named "ships," featuring eight distinct tombs, perfectly mirroring the eight people who walked off the Ark. It is far from any proof at the moment, but it is such a fascinating lead.
Naturally, I dug deeper. I found that this burial field sits directly between Oshakan and Ashtarak - meaning it lies right next to the ancient vineyards of Agarak. There were no modern maps pinpointing the exact coordinates, but by cross-referencing archaeological files with aerial photography, I finally located the actual tombs.
In a moment of sheer irony, I realized they sit directly off the main road we’ve driven a hundred times on our way to Ashtarak or Yerevan. Once again, history was hiding in plain sight, a recurring theme of this entire journey.
MAP: NOT YET FINISHED
One of the two tombs found in the largest kurgan at Verin Naver
An aerial view of the largest kurgan at Verin Naver - "Upper ships"
The wall foundations of the ancient temple found at Nerkin Naver
THE "PATRIARCH" MOUNDS
I dug even deeper. Scouring every research paper I could find, I noticed a recurring phrase: researchers frequently referred to these structures as "Patriarchal Mounds." In the biblical narrative, the era from Adam to Noah to Abraham is known as the age of the Patriarchs. To see modern archaeology independently using this exact terminology for this specific site is quite interesting.
Hakob Simonyan, head of the Cultural Inheritance Research Center, first excavated part of the site in 2009 and proposed a bold historical connection. He suggested that one of these tombs could belong to Aramanyak. For context, Aramanyak is the son of Hayk, the great-great-grandson of Noah and the legendary founding father of the Armenian nation. Simonyan said “According to the chronological calculations of Ghevont Alishan, the battle between Hayk and Bel is estimated to have occurred in 2492 BC Radio-carbon dating analyses in Germany and America have resulted in a amazing match with this date. Naturally, much more needs to be done to arrive at a final result and much more material needs to be collected, but we have already come up with these interesting parallels,” [22] Simonyan also noted that a temple structure was excavated at the site as well, an architectural find entirely unique within the Republic of Armenia. He also hinted that an even older, undiscovered tomb could still lie hidden deep beneath its ancient walls.
The same team of researchers also said that these "Group of kurgans (burial mounds), sometimes forming large funerary field not associated with substantial settlements, have led scholars to conclude that they represent sites of mobile pastoralists." [23] In other words, the people buried here did not congregate in dense urban centers; they lived off the land, moving their livestock across the landscape. God commanded Noah and his descendants to spread out, multiply, and fill the earth. While we know from Genesis 11 that a large portion of humanity rebelled against this by instead choosing instead to cluster together to build a great city and a tower, the pastoralist "Patriarchs" buried at Verin Naver seem to reflect a different path. They lived exactly like the biblical patriarchs, moving their tents and large flocks from place to place just as Abraham did.
All of this left me wondering. If this area holds the lineage of the biblical patriarchs, is it possible that the oldest tombs of all have simply yet to be found, like Simonyan hinted? Just 1.3 kilometers to the northeast of this site, I came across a clue that makes that idea hard to ignore.
An aerial view of one of the tombs at Nerkin Naver, the "lower ships"
IMAGES OF GENESIS
Just across the field from Nerkin Naver (Lower Ships) lies another cluster of ancient mounds known as Verin Naver, or the "Upper Ships." The largest of these is a massive, oval-shaped kurgan measuring 50 meters across and 2 meters high. Inside, archaeologists uncovered two burial chambers enclosed by large tuff blocks and ringed by heavy, rounded boulders. This single mound yielded some of the most unique artifacts in the Near East, several of which carry striking biblical connections.
One such was "the oldest known depiction of a six-pointed star," or the Star of David. [24] Dated between the 3rd and 2nd millennium BC, this artifact predates the earliest known Stars of David in ancient Israel by over a thousand years. Here in Armenia, the hexagram (Star of David) carries a long history rooted in ancient geometry. It is a recurring symbol across the country’s oldest sites and woven into the architecture of monasteries through its foundational stonework and dome supports, such as seen in the 4th-century Etchmiadzin Cathedral. [25]
Furthermore, the official 2012 excavation reports, published by UCLA’s Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, highlighted two iron artifacts of "special interest." [25] The researchers noted "how outstanding it could be" if these items could force a rethinking of ancient metallurgy, as they were dated to between 2340 and 2030 BC. This is a millennium before the supposed start of the "Iron Age." But this should come at absolute no surprise to those who adhere to the Word of God as the absolute truth, and archaeology should, and is starting to, ultimately verify. These findings found in this tomb, and the first metallurgical center at Metsamor, are already proving this point.
The "most unique discovery" [23], and my personal favorite, was a collection of five medallions made from bitumen. Let's pause here for a moment. Bitumen might sound like an unusual material to find in the Armenian Highlands, yet this proves it was present and utilized here several thousand years ago. Bitumen is mentioned in the early chapters of Genesis: it was the mortar used by the builders at Babel (Genesis 11:3), and some consider the "pitch" Noah used to waterproof the ark (Genesis 6:14). Returning to the medallions, they were framed in copper, plated in gold foil, and each depicted an older, bearded man. Four of the five were nearly identical, measuring 50 millimeters in diameter and 15 millimeters thick. The largest one, at 80 mm in diameter, was decorated with a "circle of animal figures, including pairs of rams lying on both sides of a tree of life." [23] I could hardly believe it when I first heard it, as the coincidences keep stacking up. Or are they?
Two other bitumin objects were found next to the medallions. One trapezoidal shaped object was decorated with "snake-shaped images and a tree of life." The second, rectangular object contains four pictorial fields. The top layer and the third layer depicts a "pair of laying ibexes facing one another." [26] The second row depicts "images of sacred trees." The bottom row depicts a "sacred tree on both sides of which lays an argalis (a ram), the body is which is positioned in a direction away from the tree, but the head is turned back with eyes gazing at the tree." [26]
In a single tomb, we are looking at some of the foundational images of Genesis. The serpent, the Tree of Life, pairs of animals and the ram. The posture of that ram - physically separated from the tree but casting its gaze back toward it - I think beautifully captures the state of humanity after the fall. We are expelled from the Garden, but we are always looking back in anticipation of divine provision. And one day, there will be a new Eden made perfect through Jesus.
All of these findings come from the official 2012 excavation. But since this discovery, the tombs have been forgotten and neglected, sitting on the side of a road in silence. I don't believe the tomb of Noah has been found yet, but the memory of Eden, the Flood and the Patriarchs are all preserved in the tombs here.
One of the two tombs found in the largest kurgan at Verin Naver
An image of the hexagram found at Verin Naver, considered the earliest Star of David ever found.
Images and drawings of four of the five medallions found at Verin Naver (Photo: H. Simonyan, drawings: T. Hmayakyan)
Images and drawings of other bitumen objects found. Above is the trapezoidal shaped one, below is the rectangular one.
A CONCLUSION TO PART 4
Let us take a broader look at everything we have uncovered here. Genesis lays the framework for the life of Noah, but admittedly it doesn't give us much to build on. The vineyards that produced wine, his tent, and his death. We have already made a strong case for Aragats being the mountain of Eden as well as the landing place of the ark. We have also seen how the very first evidence of human civilization were anchored right here on its southern slopes.
Now we also find evidence of the very land Noah may have spent his last 350 years. To recap:
1. The Areni-1 cave proves Armenia is the ancient birthplace of wine. Older grape seeds found on the southern slopes and plains of Aragats suggest this specific region is the true origin.
2. The southern slopes of Aragats constitutes some of the best landscape to live on earth, with perennial water, rich soil, and multiple elevation zones for both farming and pastoral living.
3. A cluster of four ancient villages share profound patriarchal memories in their names. Oshakan holds the legend that Noah named it himself, while right next door sit Voskevaz (Golden Vine), Voskehat (Golden Grape), and Agarak (Landed Property or Cultivated Farm).
4. Found in Agarak itself, archaeologists have uncovered some of the oldest rock-hewn structures on earth. They strongly point to a wine-making facility, possibly from 3,000 to 4,000 BC.
5. Today, modern wineries operating on the slopes of Aragats still point to Agarak as one of the oldest viticulture centers in the world.
6. Just 1.5 miles (2.5 km) east of Agarak lies an ancient complex of burial mounds called Naver, a name that translates to "Ships" or "Boats."
7. One report mentions eight royal mounds in this complex. Eight people were saved in the ark to repopulate earth.
8. Archaeologists have labeled these "Patriarchal Mounds," suggesting they belong to the earliest patriarchal leaders of the region, possibly the direct descendants of Noah.
9. Archaeologists concluded these specific tombs belonged to mobile pastoralists rather than city-dwellers, perfectly matching the tent-dwelling lifestyle of the biblical patriarchs.
10. One mile east of this complex lies another ancient burial mound containing the oldest known depiction of a six-pointed star (the Star of David) ever discovered.
11. Inside this tomb, bitumen objects were uncovered, proving it was found and used in ancient Armenia. Bitumen was used in Babel and possibly the construction of the ark.
12. These bitumen objects had the face of an old, bearded man, and decorated with images of pairs of animals, a serpent, a tree of life, and a ram.
Now this leads us to the final question. Where did the ark land? And is there evidence of the landing place and the ark?
The layers of evidence are more staggering than I could have ever imagined. It all points to a God who is infinitely perfect and purposeful in His design. When you tie it all together, the history and the geography flow together. Astonishingly, the "Landed Property" of Agarak is literally the very first flat plateau you reach when descending from the place the ark came to rest.
I hope you are ready for Part 5.
GO TO PART 5
Exploring a high-altitude site on Aragats that contains a staggering case for the landing spot.
5
REFERENCES
[1] Barnard, H., et al. (2011). "Chemical evidence for wine production around 4000 BCE in the Late Chalcolithic Near Eastern highlands." Journal of Archaeological Science, 38(5), 977-984.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0305440310004115?via%3Dihub
[2] Pinhasi, R., et. al. (2010). “First Direct Evidence of Chalcolithic Footwear from the Near Eastern Highlands.” PLoS ONE, 5(6), e10984.
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0010984
[3] Wilkinson, K. N., et al. (2012). "Environment and antiquity of the earliest wine-makers." Journal of Archaeological Science, 39(1), 165-176.
[4] Melinda A. Zeder (2008). Domestication and early agriculture in the Mediterranean Basin: Origins, diffusion, and impact
[5] Martirosyan, H. A. (1981). The Rock Art of Armenia. Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography, Yerevan.
[6] Parrot, F. (1846). Journey to Ararat (W. D. Cooley, Trans.). Harper & Brothers.
[7] Bobokhyan, A., Hnila, P., Gilibert, A., Shakhmuradyan, M., Hovhannisyan, A., Hovsepyan, R., Hakhverdyan, A., Ananyan, A., Petrosyan, A., & Gabrielyan, R. (2026). The Twelve Bander irrigation system of Mount Aragats, Armenia. Rural History, 1–36. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0956793326100272
[8] Peeters, P. (1920). Le Tréfonds Oriental de l'Hagiographie Byzantine.
[9] Avdalbekyan, T. (1969). Armenian Local Traditions. Yerevan.
[10] "Oshakan Monastery, Ashtarak, Armenia." Allinnet (Armenian Antiquities and Culture), https://allinnet.info/antiquities/oshakan-monastery-ashtarak-armenia/.
[11] "Armenian Wine: Voskehat." Wine Origins, https://wineorigins.co.uk/armenian-wine-voskehat/.
[12] Martirosyan, Hrach. (2010). Etymological Dictionary of the Armenian Inherited Lexicon. Brill Academic Publishers, Leiden/Boston, p. 4.
[13] "Prehistoric Agarak in Armenia." World History Encyclopedia, https://www.worldhistory.org.
[14] Avetisyan, P. (2008). "Recently Found Archaeological Sites of Armenia (Agarak)." Aramazd: Armenian Journal of Near Eastern Studies, 3(2).
[15] "Agarak." Armenia Hidden Gems, American University of Armenia (AUA), https://armeniahiddengems.aua.am/monument/agarak/.
[16] Tumanyan, G.S. (2012). Agarak I, Early Bronze Age settlement (2001-2008). Archaeological excavations in Armenia N25, Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography, Yerevan.
[17] Anderson, Sonja. "A 5,000-Year-Old Canaanite Wine Press Has Been Discovered in Israel." Smithsonian Magazine, November 10, 2025. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/a-5000-year-old-canaanite-wine-press-has-been-discovered-in-israel-180987669/.
[18] "WinePresses in the Holy Land." BibleWalks. Last modified April 27, 2026. https://www.biblewalks.com/winepresses/.
[19] Faithlife / Logos Bible Software. "[A Winepress in Ancient Israel]." Logos Bible Software. Bellingham, WA: Faithlife Corporation.
[20] https://hetq.am/en/article/183003
[21] Mirzoyan, Tigran. "Unique Finds During Excavations in Armenia – Shengavit." Translated by Vigen Avetisyan. Art-A-Tsolum, September 11, 2023. https://allinnet.info/archeology/unique-finds-during-excavations-in-armenia/
[22] Avagyan, Sona. "“Nerkin Naver” – Ashtarak Burial Site Reveals Its Ancient Treasures." Hetq, July 4, 2009. https://hetq.am/en/article/37962
[23] Simonyan, H. "New Discoveries at Verin Naver." Backdirt: Annual Review of the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA.
[24] "Ancient Iconic Armenian Wheel of Eternity Depicted Inside a Six Pointed Star." Ancient Pages, 27 February 2017.
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[26] Simonyan, H. "Symbols of Power: Portraits of Hero-Kings and a Battle Chariot from the Royal Tomb of Verin Naver, Armenia."
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