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Towards the north, probably, the route most used was that which is thought by many to be the line followed by Xenophon, first up the valley of the Tigris to Til or Tilleh, and then along the Bitlis Chai to the lake of Van and the adjacent country.

This town is almost certainly represented by the modern Fynyk, on the left bank of the Tigris, a little above Jezireh. The province whereof it was the capital may perhaps have adjoined Arzanene, reaching as far north as the Bitlis river. If these two tracts are rightly placed, Cordyene must also be sought on the left bank of the Tigris.

This advance was the direct result of the defeat which the Russians had inflicted on a Turkish division at Bitlis as early as April 15, 1916. By April 23, 1916, the Turks had again gathered some strength and were able to report that they had repulsed Russian attacks south of Bitlis, west of Mush, east of Baiburt, and south of Trebizond.

Bitlis, 110 miles south of Erzerum, in Armenian Tamos, is one of the most important trade centers, and commands a number of important roads.

This left still the larger part of the entire road in possession of the Turks, and especially that part from which another road branched off to Erzingan. In the Mush and Bitlis region the Russians had made satisfactory progress in the meantime. On April 19, 1916, progress was reported to the south of Bitlis toward Sert, although the Turks fought hard to hold up this advance toward Diarbekr.

From then on, however, the Russians again advanced to the south of Bitlis as well as in the direction of Erzingan. By the beginning of May, 1916, the Russian official statements do not speak any longer of the "region south of Bitlis," but mention instead "the front toward Diarbekr."

Their reappearance, now so close to the road between Bitlis and Erzerum, presented a serious menace both to the center and to the left wing of Grand Duke Nicholas's forces, for if the Turkish troops were in large enough force, the Russians were in danger of having their center and left wing separated.

At Bitlis and Mush, in the Lake Van district, it is reported that 12,000 were killed and several Armenian villages entirely wiped out. As has been pointed out, the Armenians of some districts did not sit still and wait to be massacred. At Shaben Karahissar in northeastern Anatolia, within a hundred miles of Trebizond, the Armenian population held the town for a short time against Turkish troops.

In the south, between Mush and Bitlis, an engagement which was begun on May 10, 1916, concluded with the loss of one Turkish gun, 2,000 rifles and considerable stores of ammunition. In the Chorok sector the Turks succeeded on May 13, 1916, in driving the Russian troops out of their positions on Mount Koph and in forcing them back in an easterly direction for a distance of from four to five miles.

This important town is about 100 miles southwest of Bitlis, and apparently had become, after the fall of Trebizond, together with Erzingan, one of the immediate objectives of the Russian campaign.