Ravished Armenia

A reminder of the pivotal role one woman played in our early apprehension of the Armenian genocide

Ravished Armenia is a book written in 1918 by Aurora Mardiganian about her experiences in the Armenian genocide. It records the brutal rapes and murders of the Armenian people by the forces of the old Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1918. The book, also known as Auction of Souls, was first published in 1918, shortly after Aurora Mardiganian's arrival in the United States. It was subsequently filmed in 1919, and both the book and the movie created a considerable stir.

Ravished Armenia (full title: Ravished Armenia: The Story of Aurora Mardiganian, the Christian Girl, Who Survived the Great Massacres) is a book written in 1918 by Arshaluys (Aurora) Mardiganian about her experiences in the Armenian Genocide. The story starts in 1915 when Arshaluys was 14 years old. She personally witnessed the murder of her father, mother, brothers and sisters. She was taken to the harem of a number of Turkish pashas, but had remained attached to her Christian Armenian faith despite being tortured repeatedly at the hands of her captors. She found refuge with Frederick W. MacCallum, a Canadian doctor and missionary stationed with the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM), who safely returned her to Erzurum, which had come under Russian control. She later moved to Tbilisi (Tiflis) in the Caucasus and, through the mediation of General Andranik Ozanian and orders of the Russian military leadership in the Caucasus, was sent to the United States for recovery and to bear witness to the sufferings of the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.

An extraordinary portrait of a young woman, terrorized in her own country, brought to the U.S. and mercilessly exploited by the film industry.

In Ravished Armenia Aurora Mardiganian, a survivor of the Armenian genocide of 1915–1923, recalls sixteen young Armenian girls being "crucified" by their Ottoman tormentors. The story starts in 1915 when Arshaluys was 14 years old. She personally witnessed the murder of her father, mother, brothers and sisters. She was taken to the harem of a number of Turkish pashas, but had remained attached to her Christian Armenian faith despite being tortured repeatedly at the hands of her captors.

"Ravished Armenia" and the Story of Aurora Mardiganian is the real-life tale of a teenage Armenian girl who was caught up in the 1915 Armenian genocide, the first genocide in modern history. Mardiganian (1901-1994) witnessed the murder of her family and the suffering of her people at the hands of the Ottoman Empire. Forced to march over fourteen hundred miles, she was sold into slavery. When she escaped to the United States, Mardiganian was then exploited by the very individuals whom she believed might help. Her story was published in book form and then used as the basis for a 1918 feature film, in which she herself starred. The film Ravished Armenia, also known as Auction of Souls, is a graphic retelling of Aurora Mardiganian's story, with the teenager in the central role, supported by Anna Q. Nilsson and Irving Cummings and directed by Oscar Apfel. Only twenty minutes of the film--the first to deal with the Armenian genocide--is known to survive, but it proves to be a stunning production, presenting its story in newsreel style. This revised edition of Anthony Slide's "Ravished Armenia" and the Story of Aurora Mardiganian also contains an annotated reprint of Mardiganian's original narrative and, for the first time, the full screenplay. In his introduction, Slide recounts the making of the film and Mardiganian's life in the United States, involving a cast of characters including Henry Morgenthau, Mrs. George W. Vanderbilt, Mrs. Oliver Harriman, and film pioneer William Selig. The introduction also includes original comments by Aurora Mardiganian, whom Slide interviewed before her death. Acclaimed Armenian Canadian filmmaker Atom Egoyan, who created a video art installation about Mardiganian in 2007, provides a foreword.

This book tells Aurora Mardiganian's life story as she relays it to a movie director and screen writer prior to the making of the movie, "Auction of souls." It is written as a cartoon, with color sequences displaying her life story from the past, interspersed with black and white sequences displaying her dialogue with the movie director and screen writer.

A New York Times bestseller, The Burning Tigris is “a vivid and comprehensive account” (Los Angeles Times) of the Armenian Genocide and America’s response. Award-winning, critically acclaimed author Peter Balakian presents a riveting narrative of the massacres of the Armenians in the 1890s and of the Armenian Genocide in 1915 at the hands of the Ottoman Turks. Using rarely seen archival documents and remarkable first-person accounts, Balakian presents the chilling history of how the Turkish government implemented the first modern genocide behind the cover of World War I. And in the telling, he resurrects an extraordinary lost chapter of American history. Awarded the Raphael Lemkin Prize for the best scholarly book on genocide by the Institute for Genocide Studies at John Jay College of Criminal Justice/CUNY Graduate Center. “Timely and welcome. . . an overwhelmingly convincing retort to genocide deniers.” —New York Times Book Review “A story of multiplying horror and betrayal. . . . What happened to the Armenians in Turkey was a harbinger of the Holocaust and of the waves of modern mass murder that have swept the world ever since.” —Boston Globe “Encourages America to tap into a forgotten well of knowledge about the genocide and to revive its powerful impulse toward humanitarianism.” —New York Newsday