Mkhitar Sebastatsi was an Armenian Catholic Church figure and Armenologist born in 1676 in Sebastia who founded the Mekhitarist Congregation. He studied at various monasteries in Armenia before traveling to Aleppo in 1693 where he met Catholic missionaries and was ordained a priest. In 1701, he founded the Mekhitarist Congregation in Constantinople and in 1705 obtained approval to build a monastery in Athens. He moved the congregation to Venice in 1715 to escape Turkish attacks. On St. Lazarus Island, he opened a school, translated works, and published books to educate Armenians while directing philological research. He died in 1749 having enriched Armenian