Paroyr Skayordi

Paroyr Skayordi (also Paruyr, ) or Paroyr, son of Skayordi, was an Armenian king mentioned in the history of Movses Khorenatsi in the context of events of the 7th century BC. Khorenatsi describes him as a descendant of the Armenian patriarch Hayk who helped the Median king "Varbakes" defeat the Assyrian king "Sardanapalus" and received the crown of Armenia in return, becoming "the first to reign in Armenia." Different theories exist about the possible historical identity of Paroyr Skayordi, whose second name is sometimes interpreted as meaning "son of a Saka/Scythian" or "of Saka lineage." According to one view, he is identifiable with the Scythian king Partatua, who lived in the first half of the 7th century BC. Other scholars believe that he was the ruler of Arme-Shupria (according to one theory, an early polity of the Armenians) and allied with the Medes against Assyria around 612 BC. Others believe that he was the ruler of a Scythian land within the Etiuni confederation, which, according to one hypothesis, was the early polity of the Armenians.

Name Hrachia Acharian derives the name Paroyr (Paruyr in modern Armenian pronunciation) from the identical Armenian word 'circle, spiral'. Acharian derives Skayordi, the name of Paroyr's father according to Movses Khorenatsi, from the words 'giant' and 'child, son'. Grigor Ghapantsyan derives the word from the ethnonym of the Saka or Scythians and thus interprets Skayordi as meaning 'son of a Saka' or, more precisely, 'of Saka lineage; a Scythian'. Correspondingly, Ghapantsyan considers the name Paroyr to be a cognate of Partatua/Protothyes, the name of a 7th-century BC Scythian king known from Herodotus and Akkadian sources. Igor Diakonoff has pointed out that the connection of Paroyr with Partatua/Protothyes poses certain difficulties: Paroyr is an Armenian development of a Parthian form, , which cannot be derived from the same Old Iranian origin as Partatua (*). Thus, it is not clear how a similar sounding but different Parthian name came to replace the Scythian original, since the memory of Partatua the Scythian king could not have been transmitted to the Armenians through the Parthians. Martin Schwartz rejects any connection between Paroyr and Partatua, instead deriving the former from Old Iranian * via Middle Parthian * 'tall', thus interpreting Paroyr Skayordi as "Tall, son of Giant."