The Forty Days of Musa Dagh - Historical Notes

Historical Notes

The Armenian resistance on Musa Dagh lasted, contrary to the book's title, for 53 days. The change of the days by Werfel "called up biblical associations: the flood lasted forty days and nights; Moses spent forty days and nights on Mount Sinai; Israel's time in the wilderness was forty years."

Werfel’s account of the French navy's role in the evacuation of Musa Dagh in September 1915 is based on official French diplomatic and naval archives that he secured through contacts at the French embassy in Vienna. Those ships that took part are accurately named, and included the French protected cruiser Guichen and the armored cruiser Jeanne D'Arc, as well as others under the command of Vice-Admiral Louis Dartige du Fournet, who received a posthumous medal from the French government in October 2010 for his role in transporting the 4,000 people left on the Damlayik to Port Said, Egypt.

Werfel’s Bagradian was inspired by the town's defense leader, Moses Derkalousdian. Unlike Bagradian, however, he survived the siege and moved to Beirut, Lebanon several years after the war ended and lived there for the next 70 years, serving in Lebanon's government for several decades as a quiet and shy member of Parliament. Derkalousdian died at the age of 99 in 1986.