Arizona republican., 1917-01-09
KHARPUT WILL BE
 IMPORTANT PART
 OF RUSS CA|NPA|GN
Special to The Republican,

WASHINGTON. D. C. Jan 7.--r
 'Kharput a flourishing city of S0,00D
 inhabitants. beautifully situated on a hill terrace few miles ,soulh oi the aiurad Su. or Eastern Euphrates, and
 lear the head waters of the Tigris,
 rems destined to play an important
 art in the Russian campign in Asia Minor during the next few weeks.
 according to todays val geography bulletin. issued from the Washington headquarters of the National Geo
 ,raphic Society.
 "'rhe suategIc importance of the town is due to its situation on the great highway artery running from .Samsun on the Black Sea. to Diar- bekr Si-as, another strategic city on the same road. is some l50 miles northwest of Kharput. and Diarbekr, .s 50 miles to the southeast. To the northeast lies Erzerurn. n distance of 10 miles and a seven days journey
 Y a fatiguing bridle path. Mezere,
 he capital of tho vilayet or province
 f which kharput IS the chief city.
 8 only three miles to the south. frzngaH is 90 miles due north.
 "Kharput is widely known to Amer
 icans as the center of missionary ac- tiyities in Armenia. A college. q theological seminary and a boys and
 girls school are located here. This colony of Christians suffered terribly
 4 the hands of Kurds some twenty years ago when, after burning many of the populace Armenian villages which dotted the fertile plain stretch- ing far to the soCth. the wild tribes men succeeded in entering the town itself putting to the sword Gregorian and protestant Armenian clergymen and converts and footing the monas- teries and missions.
 The history of Kharput goes back to the cloudy obsecurity of the years which marked the decay of the Seleucid Empire. in which period it
 was known as Carathiocerta in the kingdom of Sophene. founded by ! Zariadris. Ii was ono of the towns visited by the Roman general CorbulD .n the course of his famous campaign
 against Tiridates, who had been crowded king os' Armenia by his brother. the Parthian Vologaeses ~orbulo. after having forced Tiridates to lay his diadem at the feet of a statue of the Roman emperor and to swear never to resume 1t until he re- ceived 1t at the hands of the sov- ereiSn in Rome, was ordered home by tue jealous Nero W hen the herc who was the idol of his soldiers and who might easily have attained the imperial crown i,self, reached the port of Corinth he was met by mes seDgcr from Nero who commanded him to commit suicide Without q moments hestitation the intrepid gen. ernl oheyed the order. saying as he expired, I have deserved it.
 'Kharput was one of the cities captured bv the illustrious and pow erful Seliuk prince Kaikobad during his war against 16 princes of Syria and Mesopotamia led by the Egyptian Malik al-kamil. His triumph was short lived however for two years after tEe fall of this city and the triumph of his arms he was poisoned ny his own sen.
 During the first quarter of the twelfth century Kharput was the place of Imprisonment of Baldwin H. king of Jerusalem. who had fallen into the hands of the Amir Balak of Mardin. The historian William ol Tyre has preserved the fictitious legend that while trying to make his escape Baldwin was apprehended and that in punishment for this he was east from | nearby cliff and dashed to death on the rocks below
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