Background
A layman of the princely Pahlavuni family that claimed descent from the dynasty established by Saint Gregory the Illuminator, he was the son of the military commander Vasak Pahlavuni.
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Gregory Magistros
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Education
He studied both ecclesiastical and secular literature, Syriac as well as Greek.
Career
After the Byzantine Empire annexed the Kingdom of Ani, Gregory went on to serve as the governor (doux) of the province of Edessa. He collected all Armenian manuscripts of scientific or philosophical value that were to be found, including the works of Anania Shirakatsi, and translations from Callimachus, Andronicus of Rhodes and Olympiodorus. He translated several works of Plato — The Laws, the Eulogy of Socrates, Euthyphro, Timaeus and Phaedo.
Many ecclesiastics of the period were his pupils.
Foremost among his writings are the "Letters," which are 80 in number, and which shed light upon the political and religious problems of the time. His poetry bears the impress of both Homeric Greek and the Arabic of his own century.
His chief poetical work is a long metrical narrative of the principal events recorded in the Bible. Grigor was almost the first poet to adopt the use of rhyme introduced to Armenia by the Arabs.
Muradyan, Gohar, "Greek Authors and Subject Matters in the Letters of Grigor Magistros," Revue des Études Arméniennes 35 (2013): pp.
