Hashteank' (Հաշտեանք) was a historic canton of

Armenia Armenia (), , group=pron officially the Republic of Armenia,, is a landlocked country in the Armenian Highlands of Western Asia.The UNbr>classification of world regions places Armenia in Western Asia; the CIA World Factbook , , and ''Ox ...

, in the province of

Sophene Sophene ( hy, Ծոփք, translit=Tsopkʻ, grc, Σωφηνή, translit=Sōphēnē or hy, Չորրորդ Հայք, lit=Fourth Armenia) was a province of the ancient kingdom of Armenia, located in the south-west of the kingdom, and of the Ro ...

. Called Asthianene ( el, Ἀσθιανήνη) by the Greeks and Romans, it consisted of what is now the

Bingöl Bingöl ( diq, Çolig; ku, Çewlik; hy, Ճապաղջուր, translit=Chapaghjur) is a city in Eastern Turkey and the capital of Bingöl Province. Etymology One of the historical names for the city, ''Bingöl'' literally means ''thousand lak ...

plain, near the sources of the

Tigris The Tigris () is the easternmost of the two great rivers that define Mesopotamia, the other being the Euphrates. The river flows south from the mountains of the Armenian Highlands through the Syrian and Arabian Deserts, and empties into the ...

. The district of Khordzean (Greco-Roman ''Chorzene'' or ''Chorzanene''), centered on Kiği (Armenian ''Kogoberd''), was generally politically subordinate to Hashteank. Hashteank was primarily a rural district, with larger towns at Bingöl and Genç. The Byzantine fortress of

Citharizum Citharizum (from el, Κιθαριζων) was a town and fortress on the south arm of the Euphrates in the Roman province of Armenia III. According to Procopius of Caesarea, the city was located in the Asthianene region. The fortress was separa ...

, which was of great strength and was built by

Justinian Justinian I (; la, Iustinianus, ; grc-gre, Ἰουστινιανός ; 48214 November 565), also known as Justinian the Great, was the Byzantine emperor from 527 to 565. His reign is marked by the ambitious but only partly realized ''renovat ...

, was in the province.Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), Citharizon
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History

In 387, along with that of Balahovit the principality of Hashteank became a

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...

vassal, extending the Byzantine sphere of influence eastward, with the new border with the

Sasanian Empire The Sasanian () or Sassanid Empire, officially known as the Empire of Iranians (, ) and also referred to by historians as the Neo-Persian Empire, was the History of Iran, last Iranian empire before the early Muslim conquests of the 7th-8th cen ...

being the hills east of the Bingöl plain. In either 528 or 529, the military administration of Byzantine Armenia was reorganized. Under the new system, the fortress of Kitharizon (modern Bingöl) in Hashteank became the seat of one of the two "dukes" of Byzantine Armenia, with the other ruling from Martyropolis (

Silvan Silvan may refer to: * Saint Silvan, Christian martyr * Silvan (illusionist), Italian magician * Silvan Byggemarked, Danish chain store that sells building materials * Silvan Elves, woodland elves of J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth legendarium * ...

(both were subordinate to the

magister militum (Latin for "master of soldiers", plural ) was a top-level military command used in the later Roman Empire, dating from the reign of Constantine the Great. The term referred to the senior military officer (equivalent to a war theatre commander, ...

ruling in Theodosiopolis, modern

Erzurum Erzurum (; ) is a city in eastern Anatolia, Turkey. It is the largest city and capital of Erzurum Province and is 1,900 meters (6,233 feet) above sea level. Erzurum had a population of 367,250 in 2010. The city uses the double-headed eagle as ...

References

{{reflist Sophene Early medieval Armenian regions