The Catholic Armenian community formed under Latin missionary influence in Aleppo, Constantinople and Cilicia from the seventeenth century, and the Ottoman authorities long refused to recognise it as separate from the Apostolic millet, which put its members in a difficult legal position until an Armenian Catholic millet was granted in 1830. Apostolic Armenian historiography treats the union as a wound inflicted on a small nation by outsiders; Armenian Catholic historiography treats it as a legitimate choice made under persecution from both sides. The two churches are not in communion and are not at war. Their bishops appear at each other's funerals and their laity intermarry freely.