The ancestral indigenous lands that form the Assyrian homeland are those of ancient Mesopotamia and the Zab rivers, a region currently divided between modern-day Iraq, southeastern Turkey, northwestern Iran, and northeastern Syria.[57] A majority of modern Assyrians have migrated to other regions of the world, including North America, the Levant, Australia, Europe, Russia and the Caucasus. Emigration was triggered by genocidal events throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, as well as religious persecution by Islamic extremists.
The emergence of the Islamic State and the occupation of a significant portion of the Assyrian homeland resulted in another major wave of Assyrian displacement due to events such as the 2003 invasion of Iraq by the United States and its allies, and the Syrian civil war, which began in 2011. Of the one million or more Iraqis who have fled Iraq since the occupation, nearly 40% were indigenous Assyrians, even though Assyrians accounted for only around 3% of the pre-war Iraqi population.[58][59]
Assyria is the homeland of the Assyrian people, located in the ancient Near East. The earliest Neolithic sites in Assyria belonged to the Jarmo culture c. 7100 BC and Tell Hassuna, the centre of the Hassuna culture, c. 6000 BC.
The history of Assyria begins with the formation of the city of
Semitic-speaking peoples, including the Assyrians, and the Sumerians of Mesopotamia under the Akkadian Empire (2335–2154 BC). The cities of Assur and Nineveh (modern-day Mosul), which was the oldest and largest city of the ancient Assyrian Empire,[62] together with several other towns and cities, existed as early as the 25th century BC. They appear to have been Sumerian-ruled administrative centres at this time rather than independent states. The Sumerians were eventually absorbed into the Akkadian (Assyro-Babylonian) population.[63] An Assyrian identity distinct from other neighboring groups appears to have formed during the Old Assyrian period, in the 21st or 20th century BC.[64]
In the traditions of the Assyrian Church of the East, they are descended from Abraham's grandson, Dedan son of Jokshan, progenitor of the ancient Assyrians.[65] However, there is no other historical basis for this assertion. The Hebrew Bible does not directly mention it, and there is no mention in Assyrian records, which date as far back as the 25th century BC. What is known is that Ashur-uballit I overthrew the Mitanni c. 1365 BC and the Assyrians benefited from this development by taking control of the eastern portion of Mitanni territory and later annexing Hittite, Babylonian, Amorite and Hurrian territories.[66] The rise and rule of the Middle Assyrian Empire (14th to 10th century BC) spread Assyrian culture, people and identity across northern Mesopotamia.[67]
Despite the influx of foreign elements, the presence of Assyrians is confirmed by the worship of the god Ashur. References to the name survive into the 3rd century AD.[70] The Greeks, Parthians, and Romans had a relatively low level of integration with the local population in Mesopotamia, which allowed their cultures to survive.[71] Semi-independent kingdoms influenced by Assyrian culture (Hatra, Adiabene, Osroene) and perhaps semi-autonomous Assyrian vassal states (Assur) sprung up in the east under Parthian rule, lasting until conquests by the Sasanian Empire in the region in the 3rd century AD.[72]
Language
Modern Assyrian derives from ancient
Turoyo), the successor of the ancient Aramaic created by the ancient Assyrians, is still spoken by modern Assyrians, unlike Western Aramaic, which the modern Arameans speak. The Akkadian language has influenced the Aramaic that the modern Assyrians speak.[74][75][53]
The Kültepe texts, which were written in Old Assyrian, preserve some loanwords from the Hittite language. Those loanwords are the earliest attestation of any Indo-European language, dated to the 20th century BC. Most of the archaeological evidence is typical of Anatolia rather than of Assyria, but using both cuneiform and the dialect is the best indication of Assyrian presence. Over 20,000 cuneiform tablets have been recovered from the site.[76][77]
From the 1st century BC, Assyria was the theatre of the protracted Roman–Persian Wars. Much of the region would become the Roman province of Assyria from 116 AD to 118 AD following the conquests of Trajan. Still, after a Parthian-inspired Assyrian rebellion, the new emperor Hadrian withdrew from the short-lived province Assyria and its neighboring provinces in 118 AD.[79] Following a successful campaign in 197–198, Severus converted the kingdom of Osroene, centred on Edessa, into a frontier Roman province.[80] Roman influence in the area came to an end under Jovian in 363, who abandoned the region after concluding a hasty peace agreement with the Sassanians.[81]
The Assyrians were Christianized in the first to third centuries in
Roman Assyria. The population of the Sasanian province of Asoristan was a mixed one, composed of Assyrians, Arameans in the far south and the western deserts, and Persians.[82] The Greek element in the cities, still strong during the Parthian Empire, ceased to be ethnically distinct in Sasanian times. Most of the population were Eastern Aramaic
In 410, the Council of Seleucia-Ctesiphon, the capital of the Sasanian Empire,[83] organised the Christians within that Empire into what became known as the Church of the East. Its head was declared to be the bishop of Seleucia-Ctesiphon, who in the acts of the council was referred to as the Grand or Major Metropolitan and who soon afterward was called the Catholicos of the East. Later, the title of Patriarch was also used. Dioceses were organised into provinces, each of which was under the authority of a metropolitan bishop. Six such areas were instituted in 410.
Mor Mattai Monastery (Dayro d-Mor Mattai) in, Bartella, Nineveh, Iraq. It is recognized as one of the oldest Christian monasteries in existence. It is famous for its magnificent library and a considerable collection of Syriac Christian manuscripts[84]
Another council held in 424 declared that the
Catholicos of the East
was independent of "Western" ecclesiastical authorities (those of the Roman Empire).
Soon afterward, Christians in the Roman Empire were divided by their attitude regarding the Council of Ephesus (431), which condemned Nestorianism, and the Council of Chalcedon (451), which condemned Monophysitism. Those who for any reason refused to accept one or other of these councils were called Nestorians or Monophysites, while those who accepted both councils, held under the auspices of the Roman emperors, were called Melkites (derived from Syriac malkā, king),[85] meaning royalists.
All three groups existed among the Syriac Christians, the East Syriacs being called Nestorians and the West Syriacs being divided between the Monophysites (today the Syriac Orthodox Church, also known as Jacobites, after Jacob Baradaeus) and those who accepted both councils, primarily today's Eastern Orthodox Church, which has adopted the Byzantine Rite in Greek, but also the Maronite Church, which kept its West Syriac Rite and was not as closely aligned with Constantinople.[86]
Roman/Byzantine and Persian spheres of influence divided Syriac-speaking Christians into two groups: those who adhered to the Miaphysite Syriac Orthodox Church (the so-called Jacobite Church), or West Syrians, and those who adhered to the Church of the East, the so-called Nestorian Church. Following the split, they developed distinct dialects, mainly based on the pronunciation and written symbolization of vowels.[87] With the rise of Syriac Christianity, eastern Aramaic enjoyed a renaissance as a classical language in the 2nd to 8th centuries, and varieties of that form of Aramaic (Neo-Aramaic languages) are still spoken by a few small groups of Jacobite and Nestorian Christians in the Middle East.[88]
One significant Assyrian woman who lived centuries after Christ is worth mentioning.
Miaphysites, which she succeeded in 533 A.D.[89][90]
Indigenous Assyrians became second-class citizens (dhimmi) in a greater Arab Islamic state. Those who resisted Arabization and conversion to Islam were subject to severe religious, ethnic, and cultural discrimination and had certain restrictions imposed upon them.[96] Assyrians were excluded from specific duties and occupations reserved for Muslims. They did not enjoy the same political rights as Muslims, and their word was not equal to that of a Muslim in legal and civil matters. As Christians, they were subject to payment of a special tax, the jizya.[97]
They were banned from spreading their religion further or building new churches in Muslim-ruled lands, but were expected to adhere to the same laws of property, contract, and obligation as the Muslim Arabs.[98] They could not seek the conversion of a Muslim, a non-Muslim man could not marry a Muslim woman, and the child of such a marriage would be considered a Muslim. They could not own an enslaved Muslim and had to wear different clothing from Muslims to be distinguishable. In addition to the jizya tax, they were required to pay the kharaj tax on their land, which was heavier than the jizya. However, they were protected, given religious freedom, and to govern themselves according to their own laws.[99]
From the 7th century AD onwards, Mesopotamia saw a steady influx of Arabs, Kurds and other Iranian peoples,[101] and later Turkic peoples. Assyrians were increasingly marginalized, persecuted and gradually became a minority in their homeland. Conversion to Islam was a result of heavy taxation, which also resulted in decreased revenue from their rulers. As a result, the new converts migrated to Muslim garrison towns nearby.
Assyrians remained dominant in Upper Mesopotamia as late as the 14th century,[102] and the city of Assur was still occupied by Assyrians during the Islamic period until the mid-14th century when the Muslim Turco-Mongol ruler Timur conducted a religiously motivated massacre against Assyrians. After, no records of Assyrians remained in Assur according to the archaeological and numismatic record. From this point, the Assyrian population was dramatically reduced in their homeland.[103]
From the 19th century, after the rise of nationalism in the
Being culturally, ethnically, and linguistically distinct from their Muslim neighbors in the Middle East—the Arabs,
Persians, Kurds, Turks—the Assyrians have endured much hardship throughout their recent history as a result of religious and ethnic persecution by these groups.[106]
Mongolian and Turkic rule
Further information:
Kara Koyunlu
Tamerlane
in the 14th century
After initially coming under the control of the
fall of Baghdad in 1258. The Mongol khans were sympathetic with Christians and did not harm them. The most prominent among them was probably Isa Kelemechi, a diplomat, astrologer, and head of the Christian affairs in Yuan China. He spent some time in Persia under the Ilkhanate
.
The 14th century massacres of Timur devastated the Assyrian people. Timur's massacres and pillages of all that was Christian drastically reduced their existence. At the end of the reign of Timur, the Assyrian population had almost been eradicated in many places. Toward the end of the thirteenth century, Bar Hebraeus, the noted Assyrian scholar and hierarch, found "much quietness" in his diocese in Mesopotamia. Syria's diocese, he wrote, was "wasted."[citation needed]
The region was later controlled by the in Iran-based Turkic confederations of the
Kara Koyunlu. Subsequently, all Assyrians, like with the rest of the ethnicities living in the former Aq Qoyunlu territories, fell into Safavid hands from 1501 and on.[citation needed
The Ottomans secured their control over Mesopotamia and Syria in the first half of the 17th century following the
Ottoman–Safavid War (1623–39) and the resulting Treaty of Zuhab. Non-Muslims were organised into millets. Syriac Christians, however, were often considered one millet alongside Armenians until the 19th century, when Nestorian, Syriac Orthodox and Chaldeans gained that right as well.[107]
The Aramaic-speaking Mesopotamian Christians had long been divided between followers of the
Monastery of Mar Mattai (still belonging to the Syriac Orthodox Church) and thus not far from the residence of the Eliya line of Patriarchs of the Church of the East. From 1533, the holder of the office was known as the Maphrian of Mosul, to distinguish him from the Maphrian of the Patriarch of Tur Abdin.[108]
In 1552, a group of bishops of the Church of the East from the northern regions of
Amid and Salmas, who were dissatisfied with reservation of patriarchal succession to members of a single family, even if the designated successor was little more than a child, elected as a rival patriarch the abbot of the Rabban Hormizd Monastery, Yohannan Sulaqa. This was by no means the first schism in the Church of the East. An example is the attempt to replace Timothy I (779–823) with Ephrem of Gandīsābur.[109]
By tradition, a patriarch could be ordained only by someone of archiepiscopal (metropolitan) rank, a rank to which only members of that one family were promoted. For that reason, Sulaqa travelled to Rome, where, presented as the new Patriarch elect, he entered communion with the Catholic Church and was ordained by the Pope and recognized as Patriarch. The title or description under which he was recognized as Patriarch is given variously as "Patriarch of Mosul in Eastern Syria";[110] "Patriarch of the Church of the Chaldeans of Mosul";[111] "Patriarch of the Chaldeans";[112][113][114] "Patriarch of Mosul";[115][116][117] or "Patriarch of the Eastern Assyrians", this last being the version given by Pietro Strozzi on the second-last unnumbered page before page 1 of his De Dogmatibus Chaldaeorum,[118] of which an English translation is given in Adrian Fortescue's Lesser Eastern Churches.[119][120]
Mar Shimun VIII Yohannan Sulaqa returned to northern
The Shimun line eventually drifted away from Rome and in 1662 adopted a profession of faith incompatible with that of Rome. Leadership of those who wished communion with Rome passed to the Archbishop of Amid Joseph I, recognized first by the Turkish civil authorities (1677) and then by Rome itself (1681). A century and a half later, in 1830, headship of the Catholics (the Chaldean Catholic Church) was conferred on Yohannan Hormizd, a member of the family that for centuries had provided the patriarchs of the legitimist "Eliya line", who had won over most of the followers of that line. Thus the patriarchal line of those who in 1553 entered communion with Rome are now patriarchs of the "traditionalist" wing of the Church of the East, that which in 1976 officially adopted the name "Assyrian Church of the East".[123][124][125][126]
In the 1840s many of the Assyrians living in the mountains of Hakkari in the south eastern corner of the Ottoman Empire were massacred by the Kurdish emirs of Hakkari and Bohtan.[127]
Another major massacre of Assyrians (and Armenians) in the
Hasankeyef, Sivas and other parts of Anatolia, by Sultan Abdul Hamid II. These attacks caused the death of over thousands of Assyrians and the forced "Ottomanisation" of the inhabitants of 245 villages. The Turkish troops looted the remains of the Assyrian settlements and these were later stolen and occupied by Kurds. Unarmed Assyrian women and children were raped, tortured and murdered.[128][129]
The Assyrians suffered a number of religiously and ethnically motivated massacres throughout the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries,[127] culminating in the large-scale Hamidian massacres of unarmed men, women and children by Muslim Turks and Kurds in the late 19th century at the hands of the Ottoman Empire and its associated (largely Kurdish and Arab) militias, which further greatly reduced numbers, particularly in southeastern Turkey.
The most significant recent persecution against the Assyrian population was the
Assyrian genocide which occurred during the First World War.[132]
Between 275,000 and 300,000 Assyrians were estimated to have been slaughtered by the armies of the Ottoman Empire and their Kurdish allies, totalling up to two-thirds of the entire Assyrian population.
This led to a large-scale migration of Turkish-based Assyrian people into countries such as Syria, Iran, and Iraq (where they were to suffer further violent assaults at the hands of the Arabs and Kurds), as well as other neighbouring countries in and around the Middle East such as Armenia, Georgia and Russia.[133][134][135][136]
During World War I (
Paris Peace Conference of 1919 after the War had ended. The representatives aimed to free Assyria, so they wanted to influence the victorious powers to free it under one mandatory power. Although many felt sympathy for the Assyrians, nothing they demanded was implemented. The Assyrians failed because of geographical and denominational differences between the Assyrians and because the major powers, Britain and France, had plans for the territories where the Assyrians lived.[137]
Assyrian troops led by Agha Petros (saluting) with a captured Turkish banner in the foreground, 1918
In reaction to the
Assyrian Genocide and lured by British and Russian promises of an independent nation, the Assyrians led by Agha Petros and Malik Khoshaba of the Bit-Tyari tribe, fought alongside the Allies against Ottoman forces known as the Assyrian volunteers or Our Smallest Ally. Despite being heavily outnumbered and outgunned the Assyrians fought successfully, scoring a number of victories over the Turks and Kurds. This situation continued until their Russian allies left the war, and Armenian resistance broke, leaving the Assyrians surrounded, isolated and cut off from lines of supply. The sizable Assyrian presence in south eastern Anatolia which had endured for over four millennia was thus reduced significantly by the end of World War I.[138][139]
The Assyrian rebellion was an uprising by the Assyrians in Hakkari that began on the 3rd of September 1924 and ended on the 28th of September. The Assyrians of Tyari and Tkhuma returned to their ancestral land in Hakkari in 1922, shortly after World War I without permission from the Turkish government. This led to clashes between the Assyrians and the Turkish army with their Kurdish allies that grew into a rebellion in 1924, it ended with the Assyrians being forced to retreat to Iraq.
Modern history
Assyrian refugees on a wagon moving to a newly constructed village on the Khabur River in Syria
The majority of Assyrians living in what is today modern Turkey were forced to flee to either Syria or Iraq after the Turkish victory during the
in 1941.
Three Assyrian Iraqi Levies, who volunteered in 1946 for service as ground crew with the Royal Air Force, look over the side of the ORBITA as it pulls into the docks at Liverpool. Left to right, they are: Sergeant Macko Shmos, Lance Corporal Adoniyo Odisho and Corporal Yoseph Odisho.
However, this cooperation with the British was viewed with suspicion by some leaders of the newly formed
The period from the 1940s through to 1963 saw a period of respite for the Assyrians. The regime of President
Abd al-Karim Qasim
in particular saw the Assyrians accepted into mainstream society. Many urban Assyrians became successful businessmen, others were well represented in politics and the military, their towns and villages flourished undisturbed, and Assyrians came to excel, and be over represented in sports.
The
Iraq and Syria in 1963, introducing laws aimed at suppressing the Assyrian national identity via arabization policies. The giving of traditional Assyrian names was banned and Assyrian schools, political parties, churches and literature were repressed. Assyrians were heavily pressured into identifying as Iraqi/Syrian Christians. Assyrians were not recognized as an ethnic group by the governments and they fostered divisions among Assyrians along religious lines (e.g. Assyrian Church of the East vs. Chaldean Catholic Church vs Syriac Orthodox Church).[143]Celebration at a Syriac Orthodox monastery in Mosul
, early 20th century
In response to Baathist persecution, the Assyrians of the
Zowaa movement within the Assyrian Democratic Movement took up armed struggle against the Iraqi government in 1982 under the leadership of Yonadam Kanna,[144] and then joined up with the Iraqi-Kurdistan Front in the early 1990s. Yonadam Kanna in particular was a target of the Saddam Hussein
Ba'ath government for many years.
The
Anfal campaign of 1986–1989 in Iraq, which was intended to target Kurdish opposition, resulted in 2,000 Assyrians being murdered through its gas campaigns. Over 31 towns and villages, 25 Assyrian monasteries and churches were razed to the ground. Some Assyrians were murdered, others were deported to large cities, and their lands and homes then being appropriated by Arabs and Kurds.[145][146]
de-Baathification".[147] This process became an object of controversy, cited by some critics as the biggest American mistake made in the immediate aftermath of the Invasion of Iraq, and as one of the main causes in the deteriorating security situation throughout Iraq.[148][149]
Social unrest and chaos resulted in the unprovoked persecution of Assyrians in Iraq mostly by
Pope Benedict XVI Islam controversy, have resulted in Muslims attacking Assyrian communities. Since the start of the Iraq war, at least 46 churches and monasteries have been bombed.[151]
In recent years, the Assyrians in northern Iraq and northeast Syria have become the target of extreme unprovoked
Assyrian Homeland of northern Iraq, together with cities such as Mosul and Kirkuk which have large Assyrian populations. There have been reports of atrocities committed by ISIL terrorists since, including; beheadings, crucifixions, child murders, rape, forced conversions, ethnic cleansing
, robbery, and extortion in the form of illegal taxes levied upon non-Muslims. Assyrians in Iraq have responded by forming armed militias to defend their territories.
Democratic Federation of Northern Syria. In August 2016, the Ourhi Centre in the city of Zalin was started by the Assyrian community, to educate teachers in order to make Syriac an optional language of instruction in public schools,[161][162] which then started with the 2016/17 academic year.[163] With that academic year, states the Rojava Education Committee, "three curriculums have replaced the old one, to include teaching in three languages: Kurdish, Arabic and Assyrian."[164] Associated with the SUP is the Syriac Military Council, an Assyrian militia operating in Syria, established in January 2013 to protect and stand up for the national rights of Assyrians in Syria as well as working together with the other communities in Syria to change the current government of Bashar al-Assad.[165] However, many Assyrians and the organizations that represent them, particularly those outside of Syria, are critical of the Dawronoye movement.[166][167]
A 2018 report stated that Kurdish authorities in Syria, in conjunction with Dawronoye officials, had shut down several Assyrian schools in Northern Syria and fired their administration. This was said to be because these schooled failed to register for a license and for rejecting the new curriculum approved by the Education Authority. Closure methods ranged from officially shutting down schools to having armed men enter the schools and shut them down forcefully. An Assyrian educator named Isa Rashid was later badly beaten outside of his home for rejecting the Kurdish self-administration's curriculum.[167][166]
The Assyrian Policy Institute claimed that an Assyrian reporter named Souleman Yusph was arrested by Kurdish forces for his reports on the Dawronoye-related school closures in Syria. Specifically, he had shared numerous photographs on Facebook detailing the closures.[167]
Demographics
Maunsell's map, a Pre-World War I British Ethnographical Map of the Middle East showing "Chaldeans", "Jacobites", and "Nestorians"The Assyro-Chaldean Delegation's map of an independent Assyria, presented at the Paris Peace Conference 1919
Iraqi cities to the south. Though many also immigrated to neighbouring countries in and around the Caucasus and Middle East like Armenia, Syria, Georgia, southern Russia, Lebanon and Jordan.[169]
In ancient times,
Syrian citizenship and title to their established land until late the 1940s.[173]
Sizable Assyrian populations only remain in Syria, where an estimated 400,000 Assyrians live,[174] and in Iraq, where an estimated 300,000 Assyrians live.[175] This is a decline from an estimate of 1,100,000 Assyrians in the 1980’s, following instability caused by the American invasion of Iraq in 2003. [176] In Iran and Turkey, only small populations remain, with only 20,000 Assyrians in Iran,[177][178] and a small but growing Assyrian population in Turkey, where 25,000 Assyrians live, mostly in the cities and not the ancient settlements.
There are three main Assyrian subgroups: Eastern, Western, Chaldean. These subdivisions are only partially overlapping linguistically, historically, culturally, and religiously.
With its many historic churches & monasteries, Tur Abdin is considered the spiritual centre of the Syriac Orthodox Assyrians.A map depicting Assyrian relocation after Seyfo in 1914
Persecution
Due to their Christian faith and ethnicity, the Assyrians have been persecuted since their adoption of Christianity. During the reign of Yazdegerd I, Christians in Persia were viewed with suspicion as potential Roman subversives, resulting in persecutions while at the same time promoting Nestorian Christianity as a buffer between the Churches of Rome and Persia. Persecutions and attempts to impose Zoroastrianism continued during the reign of Yazdegerd II.[192][193]
During the eras of Mongol rule under Genghis Khan and Timur, there was indiscriminate slaughter of tens of thousands of Assyrians and destruction of the Assyrian population of northwestern Iran and central and northern Iran.[194]
More recent persecutions since the 19th century include the
Syriac Christians of the Middle East and diaspora employ different terms for self-identification based on conflicting beliefs in the origin and identity of their respective communities.[213] During the 19th century, English archaeologist Austen Henry Layard believed that the native Christian communities in the historical region of Assyria were descended from the ancient Assyrians,[214][215] a view that was also shared by William Ainger Wigram.[216][217] Although at the same time Horatio Southgate[218] and George Thomas Bettany[219] claimed during their travels through Mesopotamia that the Syriac Christians are the descendants of the Arameans.
Below are terms commonly used by Assyrians to self-identify:.
Assyrian, named after their ethnicity as the descendants of the ancient Assyrian people,[223] is advocated by followers from within all Middle Eastern based East and West Syriac Rite Churches. (see Syriac Christianity)[213][224]
Chaldean is a term that was used for centuries by western writers and scholars as designation for the
Aramaic language. It was so used by Jerome,[225] and was still the normal terminology in the nineteenth century.[226][227][228] Only in 1445 did it begin to be used to designate Aramaic speakers who had entered communion with the Catholic Church. This happened at the Council of Florence,[229] which accepted the profession of faith that Timothy, metropolitan of the Aramaic speakers in Cyprus, made in Aramaic, and which decreed that "nobody shall in future dare to call [...] Chaldeans, Nestorians".[230][231][232] Previously, when there were as yet no Catholic Aramaic speakers of Mesopotamian origin, the term "Chaldean" was applied with explicit reference to their "Nestorian" religion. Thus Jacques de Vitry wrote of them in 1220/1 that "they denied that Mary was the Mother of God and claimed that Christ existed in two persons. They consecrated leavened bread and used the 'Chaldean' (Syriac) language".[233] Until the second half of the 19th century, the term "Chaldean" continued in general use for East Syriac Christians, whether "Nestorian" or Catholic.[234][235][236][237] In 1840, upon visiting Mesopotamia, Horatio Southgate reported that local Chaldeans consider themselves to be descended from ancient Assyrians,[218] and in some later works also noted the same origin of local Jacobites.[238][239]
This version of the name took hold in the Hellenic lands to the west of the old Assyrian Empire, thus during
Aramea to the west which had been an Assyrian colony, and from this point the Greeks applied the term without distinction between the Assyrians of Mesopotamia and Arameans of the Levant.[253][254]
When the Seleucids lost control of Assyria to the Parthians they retained the corrupted term (Syria), applying it to ancient Aramea, while the Parthians called Assyria "Assuristan," a Parthian form of the original name. It is from this period that the Syrian vs Assyrian controversy arises.
The question of ethnic identity and self-designation is sometimes connected to the scholarly debate on the
etymology of "Syria". The question has a long history of academic controversy, but majority mainstream opinion currently strongly favours that Syria is indeed ultimately derived from the Assyrian term Aššūrāyu.[255][256][257][258] Meanwhile, some scholars has disclaimed the theory of Syrian being derived from Assyrian as "simply naive", and detracted its importance to the naming conflict.[259]
Rudolf Macuch points out that the Eastern Neo-Aramaic press initially used the term "Syrian" (suryêta) and only much later, with the rise of nationalism, switched to "Assyrian" (atorêta).[260] According to Tsereteli, however, a Georgian equivalent of "Assyrians" appears in ancient Georgian, Armenian and Russian documents.[261] This correlates with the theory of the nations to the East of Mesopotamia knew the group as Assyrians, while to the West, beginning with Greek influence, the group was known as Syrians. Syria being a Greek corruption of Assyria. The debate appears to have been settled by the discovery of the Çineköy inscription in favour of Syria being derived from Assyria.
The Çineköy inscription is a
Etymology of Syria
).
The object on which the inscription is found is a monument belonging to Urikki,
Hiyawa (i.e., Cilicia), dating to the eighth century BC. In this monumental inscription, Urikki made reference to the relationship between his kingdom and his Assyrian overlords. The Luwian inscription reads "Sura/i" whereas the Phoenician translation reads 'ŠR or "Ashur" which, according to Rollinger (2006), "settles the problem once and for all".[263]
The modern terminological problem goes back to colonial times, but it became more acute in 1946, when with the independence of Syria, the adjective Syrian referred to an independent state. The controversy is not restricted to
exonyms like English "Assyrian" vs. "Aramaean", but also applies to self-designation in Neo-Aramaic, the minority "Aramaean" faction endorses both Sūryāyēܣܘܪܝܝܐ and Ārāmayēܐܪܡܝܐ, while the majority "Assyrian" faction insists on Āṯūrāyēܐܬܘܪܝܐ but also accepts Sūryāyē.[citation needed
Assyrian culture is largely influenced by Christianity.[264] There are many Assyrian customs that are common in other Middle Eastern cultures. Main festivals occur during religious holidays such as Easter and Christmas. There are also secular holidays such as Kha b-Nisan (vernal equinox).[265]
People often greet and bid relatives farewell with a kiss on each cheek and by saying "ܫܠܡܐ ܥܠܝܟ"
Shlama/Shlomo lokh, which means: "Peace be upon you" in Neo-Aramaic. Others are greeted with a handshake with the right hand only; according to Middle Eastern customs, the left hand is associated with evil. Similarly, shoes may not be left facing up, one may not have their feet facing anyone directly, whistling at night is thought to waken evil spirits, etc.[266] A parent will often place an eye pendant on their baby to prevent "an evil eye being cast upon it".[267]Spitting on anyone or their belongings is seen as a grave insult.[citation needed
]
Assyrians are endogamous, meaning they generally marry within their own ethnic group, although exogamous marriages are not perceived as a taboo, unless the foreigner is of a different religious background, especially a Muslim.[268] Throughout history, relations between the Assyrians and Armenians have tended to be very friendly, as both groups have practised Christianity since ancient times and have suffered through persecution under Muslim rulers. Therefore, mixed marriage between Assyrians and Armenians is quite common, most notably in Iraq, Iran, and as well as in the diaspora with adjacent Armenian and Assyrian communities.[269]
East Semitic Assyrian dialect of Akkadian and Sumerian. After being conquered by the Assyrians, many people, including the Arameans, were deported to the Assyrian heartland and elsewhere. Due to a large number of Aramaic-speaking people, the Aramaization of Assyria began. The relationship between Arameans and Assyrians grew stronger, with Aramean scribes working with Assyrian ones.[270]
Around 700 B.C., the Aramaic alphabet replaced cuneiform and became the official writing system of the Assyrian empire.[270] Aramaic was the language of commerce, trade, and communication and became the vernacular language of Assyria in classical antiquity.[247][271][249] By the 1st century AD, Akkadian was extinct, although its influence on contemporary Eastern Neo-Aramaic languages spoken by Assyrians is significant and some loaned vocabulary still survives in these languages to this day.[272][273]
To the native speaker, "Syriac" is usually called Surayt, Soureth, Suret or a similar regional variant. A wide variety of languages and dialects exist, including
Jewish Aramaic languages of Lishan Didan and Lishanid Noshan share a partial intelligibility with these varieties. The mutual intelligibility between the aforementioned languages and Turoyo is, depending on the dialect, limited to partial, and may be asymmetrical.[274][277][278]
Being
Arabic alongside the Neo-Aramaic languages[281][2][282] and is also spoken by many Assyrians in the diaspora. The most commonly spoken languages by Assyrians in the diaspora are English, German and Swedish. Historically many Assyrians also spoke Turkish, Armenian, Azeri, Kurdish, and Persian and a smaller number of Assyrians that remain in Iran, Turkey (Istanbul and Tur Abdin) and Armenia still do today.[283]
Many loanwords from the aforementioned languages exist in the Neo-Aramaic languages, with the Iranian languages and Turkish being the greatest influences overall. Only Turkey is reported to be experiencing a population increase of Assyrians in the four countries constituting their historical homeland, largely consisting of Assyrian refugees from Syria and a smaller number of Assyrians returning from the diaspora in Europe.[284]
Assyrians predominantly use the Syriac script, which is written from right to left. It is one of the Semiticabjads directly descending from the Aramaic alphabet and shares similarities with the Phoenician, Hebrew and the Arabic alphabets.[285] It has 22 letters representing consonants, three of which can be also used to indicate vowels. The vowel sounds are supplied either by the reader's memory or by optional diacritic marks. Syriac is a cursive script where some, but not all, letters connect within a word. It was used to write the Syriac language from the 1st century AD.[286]
The oldest and classical form of the alphabet is the ʾEsṭrangēlā script.[287] Although ʾEsṭrangēlā is no longer used as the main script for writing Syriac, it has received some revival since the 10th century, and it has been added to the Unicode Standard in September, 1999. The East Syriac dialect is usually written in the Maḏnḥāyā form of the alphabet, which is often translated as "contemporary", reflecting its use in writing modern Neo-Aramaic. The West Syriac dialect is usually written in the Serṭā form of the alphabet. Most of the letters are clearly derived from ʾEsṭrangēlā, but are simplified, flowing lines.[288]
Furthermore, for practical reasons, Assyrian people sometimes use the Latin alphabet, especially in social media.
A small minority of Assyrians accepted the Protestant Reformation and became Reform Orthodox in the 20th century, possibly due to British influences, and are now organised in the Assyrian Evangelical Church, the Assyrian Pentecostal Church and other Protestant/Reform Orthodox Assyrian groups. While there are some atheist Assyrians, they tend to still associate with some denomination.[291]
Many members of the following churches consider themselves Assyrian. Ethnic identities are often deeply intertwined with religion, a legacy of the Ottoman Millet system. The group is traditionally characterized as adhering to various churches of Syriac Christianity and speaking Neo-Aramaic languages. It is subdivided into:
Baptism and First Communion are celebrated extensively, similar to a
Bar Mitzvah in Jewish communities. After a death, a gathering is held three days after burial to celebrate the ascension to heaven of the dead person, as of Jesus
; after seven days another gathering commemorates their death. A close family member wears only black clothes for forty days and nights, or sometimes a year, as a sign of mourning.
During the "Seyfo" genocide,[292] there were a number of Assyrians who were forced to convert to Islam.[293][294][295] They reside in Turkey, and practice Islam but still retain their identity.[296][297] A small number of Assyrian Jews exist as well.[298]
Assyrian music is a combination of traditional folk music and western contemporary music genres, namely pop and soft rock, but also electronic dance music. Instruments traditionally used by Assyrians include the zurna and davula, but has expanded to include guitars, pianos, violins, synthesizers (keyboards and electronic drums), and other instruments.
Assyrians have numerous traditional dances which are performed mostly for special occasions such as weddings. Assyrian dance is a blend of ancient indigenous and general Near Eastern elements. Assyrian folk dances are mainly made up of circle dances that are performed in a line, which may be straight, curved, or both. The most common form of Assyrian folk dance is khigga, which is routinely danced as the bride and groom are welcomed into the wedding reception. Most of the circle dances allow unlimited number of participants, with the exception of the Sabre Dance, which require three at most. Assyrian dances would vary from weak to strong, depending on the mood and tempo of a song.
Festivals
Assyrian festivals tend to be closely associated with their Christian faith, of which Easter is the most prominent of the celebrations. Members of the Assyrian Church of the East, Chaldean Catholic Church and Syriac Catholic Church follow the Gregorian calendar and as a result celebrate Easter on a Sunday between March 22 and April 25 inclusively.[301]
Members of the Syriac Orthodox Church and Ancient Church of the East celebrate Easter on a Sunday between April 4 and May 8 inclusively on the Gregorian calendar, March 22 and April 25 on the Julian calendar. During Lent, Assyrians are encouraged to fast for 50 days from meat and any other foods which are animal based.
Assyrians celebrate a number of festivals unique to their culture and traditions as well as religious ones:
Kha b-Nisanܚܕ ܒܢܝܣܢ, the Assyrian New Year, traditionally on April 1, though usually celebrated on January 1. Assyrians usually wear traditional costumes and hold social events including parades and parties, dancing, and listening to poets telling the story of creation.[302]
Sauma d-Ba'utha ܒܥܘܬܐ ܕܢܝܢܘܝܐ, the Nineveh fast, is a three-day period of fasting and prayer.[303]
Somikka, All Saints Day, is celebrated to motivate children to fast during Lent through use of frightening costumes
Kalu d'Sulaqa, feast of the Bride of the Ascension, celebrates Assyrian resistance to the invasion of Assyria by Tamerlane
Nusardyl, commemorating the baptism of the Assyrians of Urmia by St. Thomas.[304]
Sharra d'Mart Maryam, usually on August 15, a festival and feast celebrating St. Mary with games, food, and celebration.[304]
Assyrians celebrating Mesopotamian New Year (Akitu) year 6769 (Nisan, April 1st 2019) in Nohadra (Duhok), IraqOther Sharras (special festivals) include: Sharra d'Mart Shmuni, Sharra d'Mar Shimon Bar-Sabbaye, Sharra d'Mar Mari, and Shara d'Mar Zaia, Mar Bishu, Mar Sawa, Mar Sliwa, Mar Odisho, and many more. Each town or city also have their own Sharras based on the patron saints of the churches, monasteries, or other holy sites in the settlement or nearby.
Yoma d'Sah'deh (Day of Martyrs), commemorating the thousands massacred in the
Assyrian genocide
. It is commemorated annually on August 7.
Assyrians practice unique marriage ceremonies. The rituals performed during weddings are derived from many different elements from the past 3,000 years. An Assyrian wedding traditionally lasted a week. Today, weddings in the Assyrian homeland usually last 2–3 days. In the
Assyrian diaspora
they last 1–2 days.
Traditional clothing
Main article:
Assyrian clothing
Assyrian clothing varies from village to village. Clothing is usually blue, red, green, yellow, and purple; these colors are also used as embroidery on a white piece of clothing. Decoration is lavish in Assyrian costumes, and sometimes involves jewellery. The conical hats of traditional Assyrian dress have changed little over millennia from those worn in ancient Mesopotamia, and until the 19th and early 20th centuries the ancient Mesopotamian tradition of braiding or platting of hair, beards and moustaches was still commonplace.[citation needed]
Assyrian cuisine is similar to other Middle Eastern cuisines, and is rich in grains, meat, potato, cheese, bread and tomatoes. Typically, rice is served with every meal, with a stew poured over it. Tea is a popular drink, and there are several dishes of desserts, snacks, and beverages. Alcoholic drinks such as wine and wheat beer are organically produced and drunk. Assyrian cuisine is primarily identical to Iraqi/Mesopotamian cuisine, as well as being very similar to other Middle Eastern and Caucasian cuisines, as well as Greek cuisine, Levantine cuisine, Turkish cuisine, Iranian cuisine, Israeli cuisine, and Armenian cuisine, with most dishes being similar to the cuisines of the area in which those Assyrians live/originate from.[305] It is rich in grains such as barley, meat, tomato, herbs, spices, cheese, and potato as well as herbs, fermented dairy products, and pickles.[306]
Arab peoples in Iran, Iraq, and Kuwait") found that Assyrians were homogeneous with respect to all other ethnic groups sampled in the study, regardless of religious affiliation.[311]
In a 2011 study focusing on the genetics of Marsh Arabs of Iraq, researchers identified Y chromosome haplotypes shared by Marsh Arabs, Iraqis, and Assyrians, "supporting a common local background."[312] In a 2017 study focusing on the genetics of Northern Iraqi populations, it was found that Iraqi Assyrians and Iraqi Yazidis clustered together, but away from the other Northern Iraqi populations analyzed in the study, and largely in between the West Asian and Southeastern European populations. According to the study, "contemporary Assyrians and Yazidis from northern Iraq may in fact have a stronger continuity with the original genetic stock of the Mesopotamian people, which possibly provided the basis for the ethnogenesis of various subsequent Near Eastern populations".[313]
Haplogroups
Y-DNA haplogroup J-M304 which originated from a geographical zone that includes northeastern Syria, northern Iraq and eastern Turkey from where it expanded to the rest of the Near East and North Africa[314] has been measured at 55% among Assyrians of Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and diaspora; while it has been found at 11% among Assyrians of Iran.[315] the same haplogroup also have high prevalence among Iraqi Arabs which is "indicative of their indigenous nature".[314]
Arabian peninsula, and the northern R-M269, were also frequent at 29.2% each.[317] Lashgary et al. explain the presence of haplogroup R in Iranian Assyrians as well as in other Assyrian communities (~23%) as a consequence of mixing with Armenians and assimilation/integration of different peoples carrying haplogroup R, while explain its frequency as a result of genetic drift due to small population size and endogamy due to religious barriers.[315]
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^"Canada Census Profile 2021". Census Profile, 2021 Census. Statistics Canada Statistique Canada. 7 May 2021. Archived from the original on 3 January 2023. Retrieved 3 January 2023.
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. The Assyrians, although closely associated with their Christian religion, are divided among a number of Christian sects. The largest denominations are the Chaldean Catholic Church with about 45% of the Assyrian population, the Syriac Orthodox with 26%, the Assyrian Church of the East with 19%, the free Orthodox Church of Antioch or Syriac Catholic Church with 4%, and various Protestant sects with a combined 6%.
^Ammianus Marcellinus The Later Roman Empire (354–378) A shameful peace concluded by Jovian 6.7 p. 303, Penguin Classics, Translated by Walter Hamilton 1986
^Hyman and Walsh Philosophy in the Middle Ages Indianapolis, 1973, p. 204' Meri, Josef W. and Jere L. Bacharach, Editors, Medieval Islamic Civilization Vol.1, A-K, Index, 2006, p. 304.
^[3]Archived 22 October 2020 at the Wayback Machine "Maphrian Catholicos [Syr. Orth." in Gorgias Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Syriac Heritage
^Fortescue, Adrian Henry Timothy Knottesford. "4. The Nestorian Church in the Past". The Lesser Eastern Churches. Archived from the original on 21 April 2023. Retrieved 11 May 2023 – via Wikisource.
^Baumstark, Anton, ed. (2004). "Patriarcha de Mozal in Syria orientali". Oriens Christianus. Vol. IV:1. Rome and Leipzig: O. Harrassowitz. p. 277.
^Wigram, W.A., "The Ashiret Highlands of Hakkari (Mesopotamia)," Royal Central Asian Society Journal, 1916, Vol. III, pg. 40. – The Assyrians and their Neighbors (London, 1929)
^United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (13 October 2010). "Iran: Last of the Assyrians". Refworld. Archived from the original on 21 December 2019. Retrieved 18 September 2013.
"Sweden has also one of the largest exile communities of Assyrian and Syriac Christians (also known as Chaldeans) with a population of around 100,000."
. In the 19th cent. A. H. Layard, the excavator of Nineveh, first suggested that the local *Syriac Christian communities in the region were descended from the ancient Assyrians, and the idea was later popularized by W. A. Wigram, a member of the Abp. Of Canterbury's Mission to the Church of the East (1895–1915).
^"Eastern Churches"Archived 17 July 2018 at the Wayback Machine, Catholic Encyclopedia, see "Eastern Syrians" and "Western Syrians" respectively. Modern terminology within the group is Western Assyrians and Eastern Assyrians respectively, while those who reject the Assyrian identity opt for Syriac or Aramean rather than Assyrian.
^Chamberlain, AF. "Notes on Some Aspects of the Folk-Psychology of Night". American Journal of Psychology, 1908 – JSTOR.
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^Kaufman, Stephen A. (1974), The Akkadian influences on Aramaic. University of Chicago Press
^ abAvenery, Iddo, The Aramaic Dialect of the Jews of Zakho. The Israel academy of Science and Humanities 1988.
^Khan, Geoffrey (1999). A Grammar of Neo-Aramaic: the dialect of the Jews of Arbel. Leiden: EJ Brill.
Maclean, Arthur John
(1895). Grammar of the dialects of vernacular Syriac: as spoken by the Eastern Syrians of Kurdistan, north-west Persia, and the Plain of Mosul: with notices of the vernacular of the Jews of Azerbaijan and of Zakhu near Mosul. Cambridge University Press, London.
^Nestle, Eberhard (1888). Syrische Grammatik mit Litteratur, Chrestomathie und Glossar. Berlin: H. Reuther's Verlagsbuchhandlung. [translated to English as Syriac grammar with bibliography, chrestomathy and glossary, by R. S. Kennedy. London: Williams & Norgate 1889. p. 5].
^J. Martin Bailey, Betty Jane Bailey, Who Are the Christians in the Middle East? p. 163: "more than two thirds" out of "nearly a million" Christians in Iraq.
. Although there are some atheists among Assyrians, they are usually associated with specific communities based on the adherence to a concrete religious sect.
S2CID 10417591. The relationship probability was lowest between Assyrians and other communities. Endogamy
was found to be high for this population through determination of the heterogeneity coefficient (+0,6867), Our study supports earlier findings indicating the relatively closed nature of the Assyrian community as a whole, which as a result of their religious and cultural traditions, have had little intermixture with other populations.
^Semino O, Magri C, Benuzzi G, Lin AA, Al-Zahery N, Battaglia V, Maccioni L, Triantaphyllidis C, Shen P, Oefner PJ, Zhivotovsky LA, King R, Torroni A, Cavalli-Sforza LL, Underhill PA, Santachiara-Benerecetti AS: Origin, diffusion, and differentiation of Y-chromosome haplogroups E and J: inferences on the Neolithization of Europe and later migratory events in the Mediterranean area. Am J Hum Genet 2004, 74:1023–1034.
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![Mar Assia al-Hakim Church: is a Syriac Catholic Church in Al-Jdayde quarter of Aleppo, Syria.[299]](//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f2/Mar_Assia_Syrian_Catholic_Church%2C_Aleppo_%28interior%29.jpg/150px-Mar_Assia_Syrian_Catholic_Church%2C_Aleppo_%28interior%29.jpg)
![Rabban Hormizd Monastery: is an important monastery of the Chaldean Catholic Church and the Church of the East in Alqosh, Iraq.[300]](//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/36/Rabban_Hormizd_Monastery_-_view_from_below_%281%29.jpg/150px-Rabban_Hormizd_Monastery_-_view_from_below_%281%29.jpg)
Rabban Hormizd Monastery: is an important monastery of the Chaldean Catholic Church and the Church of the East in Alqosh, Iraq.[300]
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![Mar Assia al-Hakim Church: is a Syriac Catholic Church in Al-Jdayde quarter of Aleppo, Syria.[299]](/File:Mar_Assia_Syrian_Catholic_Church,_Aleppo_(interior).jpg)
![Rabban Hormizd Monastery: is an important monastery of the Chaldean Catholic Church and the Church of the East in Alqosh, Iraq.[300]](/File:Rabban_Hormizd_Monastery_-_view_from_below_(1).jpg)
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