{"database": "deitydb", "table": "periods", "rows": [["PER_ARM_PAGAN", "Armenian", "Pre-Christian Armenian", -500, 301, "Period of documented pre-Christian Armenian religious practice, from the earliest traces of the Zoroastrian-derived divine court (c. 500 BCE, corresponding to the Orontid dynasty's Iranian connections) through Armenia's formal conversion to Christianity as the state religion in 301 CE under King Tiridates III and Gregory the Illuminator \u2014 making Armenia the first nation to adopt Christianity officially. The canonical Armenian pantheon (Aramazd, Anahit, Vahagn, Nane, Tir, Astghik) is primarily attested in two 5th-century CE texts that look back on the pre-Christian period: Agathangelos's History of the Armenians and Movses Khorenatsi's History of Armenia. The Artaxiad dynasty (189 BCE \u2013 1 CE) represents the peak of organized cult practice; the Arsacid dynasty (52\u2013428 CE) continued the Iranian religious inheritance until conversion. Russell (1987) is the standard scholarly reference for the Iranian substratum."]], "columns": ["period_id", "tradition", "period_name", "start_year", "end_year", "notes"], "primary_keys": ["period_id"], "primary_key_values": ["PER_ARM_PAGAN"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.7911309999144578, "source": "jebboone/deitydb", "source_url": "https://github.com/jebboone/deitydb", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://opensource.org/licenses/MIT"}