These events are known by the Armenians as the "Great Massacres". The Armenians believed the Hamidian measures showed the extension of the Turkish state to do a systematic policy of murder and plunder against a small population. The Armenian revolutionary groups started around the end of the Russo-Turkish War of 1878 and grew with the first introduction of Article 166 of the Ottoman Penal code 166, and the raid of Erzerum Cathedral. 