art European Ararat was depicted in the books of European, including many British, travelers in the 18th–19th centuries who visited Armenia. Armenian According to one source, the first Armenian artist to depict the mountain was Ivan Aivazovsky, who created a painting of Ararat during his visit to Armenia in 1868. Other major Armenians artists who painted Ararat include Yeghishe Tadevosyan, Gevorg Bashinjaghian, Martiros Saryan, and Panos Terlemezian. In literature Rouben Paul Adalian suggested that "there is probably more poetry written about Mount Ararat than any other mountain on earth." Travel writer Rick Antonson described Ararat as the "most fabled mountain in the world." Armenian Mount Ararat is featured prominently in Armenian literature. According to Meliné Karakashian, Armenian poets "attribute to it symbolic meanings of unity, freedom, and independence." According to Kevork Bardakjian, in Armenian literature, Ararat "epitomizes Armenia and Armenian suffering and aspirations, especially the consequences of the 1915 genocide: almost total annihilation, loss of a unique culture and land [...] and an implicit determination never to recognize the new political borders." The last two lines of Yeghishe Charents's 1920 poem "I Love My Armenia" (Ես իմ անուշ Հայաստանի) read: "And in the entire world you will not find a mountaintop like Ararat's. / Like an unreachable peak of glory I love my Mount Masis." In a 1926 poem dedicated to the mountain Avetik Isahakyan wrote: "Ages as though in second came, / Touched the grey crest of Ararat, / And passed by...! [...] It's now your turn; you too, now, / Stare at its high and lordly brow, / And pass by...!" Mount Ararat is the most frequently cited symbol in the poetry of Hovhannes Shiraz. In collection of poems, Knar Hayastani (Lyre of Armenia) published in 1958, there are many poems "with very strong nationalist overtones, especially with respect to Mount Ararat (in Turkey) and the irredentism it entailed." In one such poem, "Ktak" (Bequest), Shiraz bequeaths his son Mt. Ararat to "keep it forever, / As the language of us Armenians, as the pillar of your father’s home." The first lines of Paruyr Sevak's 1961 poem "We Are Few..." (Քիչ ենք, բայց հայ ենք) read: "We are few, but they say of us we are Armenians. / We do not think ourselves superior to anyone. / Clearly we shall have to accept / That we, and only we, have an Ararat" In one short poem Silva Kaputikyan