The Saracenic policy was quite different from that of the Persians. The latter were not so intensely cruel, and were anxious to unify the two peoples by the enforcement of their religion upon the Armenians. But the Saracens were the very prototype of the Turks in cruelty and in oppression. They kept on their regular incursions and inroads into the country at short intervals, and spread death and destruction, and carried many away as captives or hostages; these captives and hostages were often forced to become Mohammedans, or they were massacred. A picture drawn by the wildest imagination will fall far below the suffering of the people and the atrocities of the followers of Mohammed. The Armenians were often willing to let everything else go if they were left with their preferred faith, the religion of Christ. Even then they were not left alone. They often, compelled to do so, took arms to defend their religion and rights and perished, sword in hand. Thus it was and is since the introduction of Christianity into Armenia: “The history of Armenia presents but a melancholy picture to the friend of humanity. Rapacious neighbors, the enemies of Christianity, found a theater for their unheard-of cruelties and oppressions in that beauteous land, the inhabitants of which were equally exposed to the outrages of Paganism and Islam.” The condition of the provinces of Armenia governed by the Greeks was hardly better. The Saracens were pushing their way northward and westward. The Greeks were becoming unbearable on account of their prejudices and persecutions occasioned by such comparatively trifling differences from the Greek Church, in the rituals and ceremonies of the Armenian Church. The state of things, indeed, was in a most deplorable condition. The Armenians were subdued and ruled over with a rod of iron, by the Saracens, but they were by no means completely conquered or crushed. The love for independence and self government was still rife in them. They made several attempts at different times to revolt. Their attempts failed and they paid dearly for them. But towards the middle of the ninth century the reign of the Caliphs of Bagdad was weakened by dissensions. A prince of the Pagradit family had proved himself very prudent as a governor of Armenia, so much so that he had received from the Caliph the title of “Prince of Princes,” in 859, and in 885 he was crowned as King of Armenia. Ashdod I the King of Armenia was the first of the Pagradit (Pagradeonian) dynasty.