After the reign of Haig the thread of Armenian annals continues without break or hitch; it must be admitted that no people, not even the Jews, boast a history which "begins with the beginning" in a more thorough way, nor does the work of any chronicler proceed in a more methodical and circumstantial manner than that of Moses of Khoren, the Herodotus of Armenia. As is well known, Moses, writing in the fifth century, founded his chronicle upon a work undertaken about five hundred years before by one Marabas Cattina, a Syrian, at the request of the great Armenian monarch Vagshaishag. Marabas stated that his record was based upon a manuscript he had discovered in the archives of Nineveh which bore the indorsement, "This book, containing the annals of ancient history, was translated from the Chaldean into Greek, by order of Alexander the Great." Whatever may be the precise amount of credence to which the Chronicle of Moses is entitled, all will agree that it narrates the story of a high-spirited and intelligent people whom the alternating domination of Greek and Persian could not cower into relinquishing the substance of their liberties, and whose efforts, in the main successful, on behalf of their cherished independence, were never more vigorous than at times when their triumph seemed farthest off. For nearly a thousand years after the date of Moses of Khoren, his people maintained their autonomy, and whether we look before or after the flight of the last Armenian king before the soldiers of the Crescent, we must acknowledge that few nations have fought more valiantly for their political rights, whilst yet fewer have suffered more severely for their fidelity to their faith. It is the pride of the Armenians that theirs was the first country which adopted the Christian religion; it may well be their pride also, that they kept their Christianity in the teeth of persecutions which can only find a parallel in those undergone by the Hebrew race.