Images of the Historical Disaster in Eyewitness Testimonies (on the Example of the Reflection of the Events of the Armenian Genocide in 1915)

Abstract

The article deals with the problem of the role of ego-documents in the formation of image of historical catastrophe and the events that marks it. To the author’s way of thinking the personal narratives should be considered as a means of constructing historical trauma and victimization of historical past. Appeal to the experience of understanding the events of the Armenian Genocide of 1915 showed the expediency of studying from the standpoint of intellectual history the texts of witnesses and eyewitnesses of the events, but not the victims themselves. Appeal to the experience of understanding the events of the Armenian Genocide of 1915 showed the expediency of studying from the standpoint of intellectual history the texts of witnesses and eyewitnesses of the events, but not only the victims themselves. The texts of G. Morgenthau, G. Firbucher and R. de Nogales have been used in the research. All three historical personalities were foreigners who turned up in the Ottoman Empire during the First World War on duty. Precisely these three texts were included in the arsenal of documents of victimization and criminalization of the Armenian-Turkish relations. The representation of a historical catastrophe in these narratives has the features of both typicality and uniqueness. A common feature was the understanding of responsibility, a distinctive feature - a different degree of blame that was put on the Young Turks and the German authorities. One of the means of victimization is orientalism, which involves assessing events not only as a political and humanitarian catastrophe, but also as a cultural conflict.