Family background Gulbenkian's family are believed to be descendants of the
Rshtunis, a
noble Armenian family—
Amira—centred on the
Lake Van region in the 4th century AD. In the 11th century, the Rshtunis settled in Caesarea (now
Kayseri), taking the name Vart Badrik, a
Byzantine title. With the arrival of the
Ottoman Turks, the Turkish equivalent of the name, Gülbenk, was adopted. The family had established themselves in the town of
Talas and lived in the region until the mid-19th century, when they ultimately moved to
Constantinople (present day
Istanbul). Their property in Talas was ultimately
confiscated and is currently owned by the Turkish Government. Gulbenkian's family established close relations with the House of Osman. By 1860, his father Sarkis Gulbenkian was an
Armenian oil importer and exporter already heavily involved in the oil industry. Sarkis was an owner of several oil fields in the
Caucasus, mainly in
Baku, and was a representative of
Alexander Mantashev's oil company. Sarkis Gulbenkian also provided oil to the
Sultan of the
Ottoman Empire. During
Hagop Pasha's Directorship, and, subsequently, Ministry of the Privy Treasury under Sultan
Abdulhamid II in 1879, Sarkis acquired the lucrative collection of taxes for the Privy Purse of
Mesopotamia. He was a brilliant student and graduated in 1887 at the age of 18 with a
first-class degree in engineering and applied sciences. A year later, he went to
Baku to examine the
Russian oil industry and to further his knowledge of the oil industry. Gulbenkian later wrote an article entitled ''La Transcaucasie et la péninsule d'Apchéron; souvenirs de voyage
("Transcaucasia and the Absheron Peninsula – Memoirs of a Journey") which appeared in the Revue des deux Mondes'', a French language monthly literary and cultural affairs magazine. The article described his travels to Baku and the state of the
oil industry in the region. It was eventually published as a book in 1891 in Paris. After Hagop Pasha's appointment as the
Ottoman Minister of Finance in 1887, he had Calouste prepare an oil survey of Mesopotamia. His policy of retaining five per cent of the shares of the oil companies he developed earned him the nickname "Mr Five Per Cent". After the royalist
countercoup of 1909, Gulbenkian became a financial and economic adviser to the Turkish embassies in London and Paris, and later, chief financial adviser to the Turkish government. In 1938, before the beginning of
World War II, Gulbenkian incorporated a Panamanian company to hold his assets in the oil industry. The collection includes objects from antiquity to the 20th century. Some of the works in the collection were bought during the
Soviet sale of Hermitage paintings. While Gulbenkian's art collection may be found in many museums across the world, most of his art is exhibited at the
Calouste Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon, Portugal. The museum was founded according to his will, to accommodate and display his collection, now belonging to the
Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation. Of the roughly 6,000 items in the museum's collections, a selection of around 1,000 is on permanent display.
Philanthropy Throughout his life, Gulbenkian donated large sums of money to churches, scholarships, schools, and hospitals. Many of his donations were to Armenian foundations and establishments. He required that proceeds from his 5% share of profits from oil should go to Armenian families. He also demanded that 5% of his workers in his oil production for the Iraq Petroleum Company should be of Armenian descent. , Kensington, London, built by Gulbenkian and in the grounds of which he is buried He established and built the
St Sarkis Armenian church in
Kensington, central London, England, built in 1922–23 as a memorial to his parents, to the design of the architect
Arthur Davis. Gulbenkian wanted to provide "spiritual comfort" to the Armenian community and a place of gathering for "dispersed Armenians," according to a message that he wrote to the
Catholicos of All Armenians. In 1929, he was the chief benefactor to the establishment of an extensive library at the
St. James Cathedral, the principal church of the
Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem. The library is called the Gulbenkian Library and contains more than 100,000 books. Among many of his significant donations was to the
Surp Pırgiç Armenian Hospital located in Istanbul. A large property called the
Selamet Han was donated to the Surp Pırgiç foundation in 1954. The property was confiscated by the state in 1974, but returned to the foundation in 2011. He also helped establish a nurses' home at the hospital after selling his wife's jewellery. He was president of the
Armenian General Benevolent Union (AGBU) from 1930 to 1932, resigning as a result of a
smear campaign by
Soviet Armenia, an Armenian newspaper based in
Armenia SSR. He was also a major benefactor of
Nubarashen and
Nor Kesaria, which were newly founded settlements consisting of refugees from the
Armenian genocide.
Later life and death In 1937, Gulbenkian purchased a property near
Deauville and called it
Les Enclos. It was a place of repose for him. Nobel prize-winning writer and friend
Saint-John Perse nicknamed him the
Sage of Les Enclos and remarked in a letter to Gulbenkian that Les Enclos was "the cornerstone of your work, because it is the most alive, the most intimate and sensitive, the best guarded secret for your dreams." By the onset of the Second World War, having acquired
diplomatic immunity as the economic adviser of the Persian legation in Paris, he followed the French government when it fled to
Vichy, where he became the minister for Iran. In consequence, he was, despite his links to the UK, temporarily declared an enemy alien by the British Government, and his UK oil assets sequestered, though returned with compensation at the end of the war. He left France in late 1942 for Lisbon and lived there until his death, in a suite at the luxurious Aviz Hotel, on 20 July 1955, aged 86. In 1952 he refused being appointed as
Knight Commander, and therefore the possibility of being styled as
Sir, to the
Order of the British Empire. In this same year his wife Nevarte died in Paris. They had two children, a son
Nubar and a daughter Rita, who would become the wife of Iranian diplomat of Armenian descent Kevork Loris Essayan. His ashes were buried at
St Sarkis Armenian Church in London. ==Legacy and fortune==