Mount Ararat after these had vanished from the popular mind, that the Armenian theologians ventured to locate on its eternal snows the resting-place of Noah's ark." The 13th century Franciscan missionary William of Rubruck is usually considered the earliest reference for the tradition of Mount Ararat as the landing place of the ark in European literature. The 14th century English traveler John Mandeville is another early author who mentioned Mount Ararat, "where Noah's ship rested, and it is still there." Most Christians identify Mount Ararat with the biblical "mountains of Ararat," despite the fact that six other landing places have been proposed,
Ararat, Victoria Ararat, Victoria Ararat is a city in south-west Victoria, Australia, about west of Melbourne, on the Western Highway on the eastern slopes of the Ararat Hills and Cemetery Creek valley between Victoria's Western District and the Wimmera. Its urban population according to 2016 census is 8,297 and services the region of 11,752 residents across the Rural City's boundaries It is the largest settlement in the Rural City of Ararat local government area and is the administrative centre. The discovery of gold in 1857 during the Victorian gold rush transformed it into a boomtown which continued to prosper until the turn