KARTVELIAN ORIGIN OF ARMENIAN SURNAMES

The trademark and highly popular Armenian -ian-ending is, in fact, Karvelian -iani. The final -i (Kartvelian nominative case ending) was removed, but the same nominative case ening, added to the root (the starting 'i' in '-ian') was forgotten to be removed. Thus, we have -ian-ending surnames instead of -an-ending. 

ОРБЕЛЯН / ORBELIAN

Wikipedia surprises us claiming this is an 'Armenian noble surname': 

https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Орбелян

While etymologically it's not Orbelian, but Orbeliani, because it totally consists of Karvelian morphemes: 

ORB(I) + EL(I) + AN(I)

The root is 'orbi' which is 'eagle' in Kartvelian. Then 'orbeli' is a substantivized adjective meanin 'eagle-like' or 'eagle-belonging' or 'eagle-tamer', etc.

МГЕРЯН / MGERIAN

Armenians say that the surname comes from an Armenian personal name Mger, which Armenians themselves try to intepret as 'sunny', but with no proofs. 

But if we spell it the Kartvelian way, we'll get an impeccably Kartvelian adjective 'mgeriani', which comes from 'mgeri' root meaning 'wolf' in Laz. Thus, Mgerian(i) becomes wolfish, not sunny. 

АЗНАВУРЯН / AZNAVURIAN

This famous surname is claimed to be Armenian. But it derives from a Kartvelian adjective 'aznavuri', which translates as noble and, in its turn, comes from a Kartvelian root 'azna' meaning 'aristocracy', which already had been mentioned within Between Two Iberias project in "знать" entry. 

МЕЛКОНЯН (МЕЛИКЯН) / MELKONIAN (MELIKIAN)

These two popular Armenian surnames come from the same root 'melik' which means 'king' in many languages, including Assyrian, Akkadian, Arabic etc. It allegedly has Semitic origin.

But the Kartvelian word მელიქი (meliki) represents the trademark Kartvelian personificating costruction, with the help of which names of professions are formed in Kartvelian language. For example, მესაკრავე (mesakrave) means 'musician' and is derived from 'sakravi' - 'musical instrument'. 

If so, then the root of 'meliki' must be some verb having 'lik' as its root. 

A quick search in the dictionary astonishingly gives exactly such archaic verb ლიქ(ვ)ნა (lik(v)na), which has exactly 'lik' as its root. Thus, 'meliki' would be someone who does the 'likna' action. What action is that?

The verb 'likna' is translated as 'deceipt' and 'hypocrisy'. Isn't that a bullseye definition for a king?

АСТВАЦАТУРЯН / ASTVATSATURIAN

This rich surname is a combination of Armenian and Kartvelian morphemes and interpets very interestingly.

The morphemic breakdown would be as follows:

ASTVA + TS + AT + UR + IAN

The last three morphemes are Kartvelian. The last two are adjectives suffxes. Two suffixes in a row shouldn't scare away. The Armenians don't know that -ur is Kartvelian adjective suffix and treat it as a noun, being sure that 'Astvatsatur' is a name (which, in fact, is an adjective) and forming another adjective out of it by adding -ian-suffix. 

So, both 'Astvatsaturian' and 'Astvatsatur' are adjectives. 

The next step would be singling the Astvatsat-root out. The -at suffix, as we know, is the Zan suffix of place, with the help of which the names of countries are formed. Thus, Astvatsat would mean 'the land of Astvats'.

In its turn, the -ts-suffix is an Armenian possessive (genitive case) suffix, kind of English 's. So, Astvats = Astva's. This time it's Kartvelians who don't know about it, because indirect cases forms of nouns don't take part in words forming. Only nominative case forms do.

Finally, we found out the true root of this difficuclt but rewarding surname - Astva. There may be great deal of possible interpretations, but first let's look up Herodotus' History, where the same root is present in the name of a key person in ancient history, the Midian king Astyages. Since the ypsilon in Ancient Greek used to be pronounced as [u], there was no Astyages, but Astuages. Or, greeklessly, Astuag. There's no problem to remove the Ossetian/Scythian -ag-suffix to be left with the same Astua/Astva-root. The difference between 'v' and 'u' is disregardable. 

Now we can interptret it from varuous angles. It may be the Ossetian 'eight' - 'ast'. It may be something like Kartvelian 'as(i)tva(li)' - 'thousand of eyes'. It may be the interesting ast-root that preserved in the Engslih word 'astute'. The origin of the word is allegedly Latin. 

But it may be even simpler. The word 'astua' in its pure form is present in the magic Basque language where it means 'heavy'. 

This, Astva is a name of a nickname 'Heavy'. Astvats is 'Heavy's'. Astvatsat - 'Heavy's' land'. Astvatsatur is 'Heaviland's, Heavilander'. And, finally, Astvatsaturian is 'Heavilander's'.

Heavy's land should be Midia.