Who are the Kurds?

However it is unlikely that they are purely aboriginal, or derive from one single source. Most of them are probably the descendants of Indo-European tribes setting amongst aborigial inbatiants in the mountains as much as four thousand years ago, supposedly they were the mountain people in conflict with the Mesopotamian empires of Sumer, Babylon and Assyria, and the Kurds themselves believe they are descended from the Medes, although the linguistic evidence does not bear this out. Almost cretainly these were amongst the Karduchoi )Kardu or Gutu) who gave Xenophon's Ten Thousand such a mauling during their famous retreat to the Black Sea in 400 BC.
Be that as it may the begining of the Arab period (7th Century AD) the ethnic term 'Kurds' was applied to an amalgam of Iranian or Iranicized tribes, some autochtonous (possibly Kardu?), some semitic, and, probably, some Armenian communities. As with the Arabs, the question of identity is not only to do with real ethnic origin. It is also to do with imagined lingeage. Religious fervour, among the Sunnis in particular, is inseparable from great respect for Arabic language and lineage, with which 'the border Kurd almost invariably evinces a desire to identify himself.. So we see (the tribal groups of ) Hamavend, Baban, Shuan, and Jaf, all claiming Arabs descent for their leaders, while yet very proud of being Kurds today'. It is not surprising that shaikhly (religious) and other noble families frequently claim descent from the Prophet; those of such descent being able to claim the title sayyid.

Arab lineage is not all imagined. Some in relationship with the plainspeople inevitably did mingle Kurd with semitic ancestry, and it confers immense prestige on the putative descendant. And, as will become clear, Arab descent had a very special practical role for both the Kurdish religious shaikhs and also for the chiefs of Kurdish tribal confederations. It is also true that some 'Kurdish' tribes are probably Turkic, Armenian or Assyrian ones absorbed into the dominant culture in the region. Around Arbil, and no doubt elsewhere, the Kurdish language displaced others and people originally mixed now call themselves Kurds. More significant than ethnic purity however, this society referred to as Kurdish developed its own distinctive culture, which despite the many internal differences from region to region and from tribe to tribe, contrasted with the cultures surrounding it, and established its own sense of identity.

The language of the Kurds

Unlike the Arabs, the Kurds have not yet evoled a single systematized written or spoken language. To this day the Kurds are divided in to dialect groups which cannot communicate freely with other Kurds in their mother tongue although the majority share a north-western Iranian lingusitic origin. In some cases limited comprehension is possible, elsewhere it is not. Some Kurds, of course, are able to speak more than one dialect, and the use of radio and pinted matrial, and unifing effect of education are bound to improve the ease of communication considerably, and may even produce an eventual 'literary'style for broadcast and writing. The language is composed of two major dialects, but with considerable localized variation, and a number of subdialects:

Kurmanji, spoken northwards from Mosul in to USSR. There are two literary froms, one using cyrillic characters (in USSR), the other using Hawar (Turcized Latin) characters in Turkey;

Sorani (or Kurdi) which is spoken in a wide band across the international frontier from roughly Urmiya in north to Khanaqin in the south. In Iraq this has become official Kurdish, indicating the cultural per-eminence of Sulaymaniya over other Iraqi Kurd population centers. It is the only Kurdish language taught in schools or used by government.

Sub-dialects include Krimanshahi, Leki and Gurani spoken in the area of Iranian Kurdistan running from Kermanshah to Sanandaj, and Zaza, which is spoken in Dersim, an area of Anatolia inside an inverted triangle marked by Diyarbekir, Sivas and Erzerum. Although spoken at the opposite extremities of Kurdistan, Zaza and Gurani are closely related.

Religion of the Kurds

Unlike the mountain people of Lebanon and Syria, the Druzes, Alawites and Isma'ilis and Christian Maronities, who declared their distinct identity through religious separatism from orthodoxy, the Kurds embraced Islam following the Arab conquests of the 7th Century AD. Previously tree and solar cults, Zoroastrianism, Judasim and Christianity hadcompeted in the region. Religious belief plays no part in Kurdish distinciveness. Almost all the Kurds adhere of the Safi'i school of law one of the four established schools of Sunni Islamic jurisprudence, a mild distinction from their Suni neighbours, the Turks, who adhere to the Hanafi school. To the east the Zeri Turks, Persiane and Lurs of Iran are all Shi'is. Religious difference is expressed in practice, with the widespread phenomenon of adherence to religious brotherhoods, particualarly the Qadiriya and Neaqshbandiya, and wild and eccentric manifestations of devotion. Not all the Kurds adhere to Sunni Islam. In north-west Anatolian Kurdistan some Kurds adhere to an unorthodox from of Shi'ism, and are called Alevis (not to be confused with the Alawites of Syria), and are mainly Zaza speaking (though neither all Zaza speakers are Alevis, nor are all Alevis Kurds , more are pronably Turks). And in south-eastern and extreme south Kurdistan, in Kermanshah and Khanaqin provinces several Kurdish tribes subscribe to Itena'asheri Shi'i Islam, the 'established' faith of Iran, thus demonstrating again that in religious matters Kurds have tended to confrom with orthodoxy rather than declare their difference from it.

Two other religions, both considered 'Islamic deviations' exist amongst the Kurds:
Ahl al Haqq (people of the Truth), a small sect to be foundin south and south-eastern Kurdistan, it is probably an extreme Shi'i syncretist deviation. They are also called Ali-Ilhai, misleadingly since Ali (the Prophet Mohammad's son-in-law) is not the principal figure in their relgious system. Their central belief is in seven successive manifestation of the Divinity, and they have in common with the Druzes and Alawis a veneration for Ali, though he is far outshadowed by the founder of their religion and the fourth 'theophany'the divinity . shaikh or Sultan Sahak, who ushered in the fourth divine epoch, of Haqiqa, the 'Real Truth'.

Yazidism, another synthetic religion which has absorbed elements from the almost every religion in the region including pagan, Zoroastrian (echoes of Persian dualism), Manichean (the Persian gnosis), Jewish (prohibition of certain foods), Nestorian Christian (baptism, drinking of wine, eucharistic rites) and Muslim (fasting, sacrifice, pilgrimage) elements and Islam'ili and Sufi beliefs (esoteric doctrine, ecstasy and reverence for a large number of initiate shaikhs), and sabaean and Shamanistic features. They are to be found in USSR and also in Jabal Sinjar, due west of Mosul, álthough there are a small number and also their most sacred shrine in Shaikhan, due east of Mosul, and a few in Syria. During the 1830s and 1840s the Yezidis (and Christians) endured considerable persecution at the hands of their Muslim neighbours, Turk, Kurd an Arab, at various times, and many emigrated to the Caucasus. They are also found in the district of Diyarbekir, around Anitab (north of Aleppo), and some in Iran.

Yazidis probably do not exceed 100,000 today. They continue to be a persecuted community although the allegation that they are devil-worshippers per se and many other things besides do not bear scrutiny. The Yazidis are all Kurds, though they have frequently found common cause with Christian communities, largely on account of shared persecution. Since the 1950s, however, they have increasingly identified with Kurdish nationalism party on account of the discrimination suffered at governmental hands. In 1974 many Yazidis joined the Kurdish rebellion and Yazidi leaders took refuge with Barzanis that Years. Christians and Jews have always lived amongst the Kurds. As a result of collapse of the old pluralism, political uncertainty and some persecution there are now far fewer, though both are still to be found in the region:

Suriani ( Syrian Orthodox) Christians in Tur Abdin near Mardin, and in Jaziral;
Assyrians, both Nestorian and Chaldean (erstwhile Nestorians now uniate with Rome) in Hakkari, Bahdinan, across to Urmiya;
and Armenians to the north, from Van northwards. Most Jews did not leave until the 1950s, fearful of the bitter feeling created by the establishment of Israel in Arab Palestine.

It is interesting to note that Jews and Christians used to speak an almost identical ancient semitic dialect. Both religions have lived both in separate villages and mingled with Kurds providing a number of artisan skills which virtually disappeared once the majority of them left.

How many Kurds?

Nothing, apart from the actual 'borders'of Kurdistan generates as much heat in the Kurdish question as the estimate of the Kurdish population. Kurdish natioalists are tempted to exaggerate it, and governments of the region to minimize it. in Turkey only those Kurds who do not speak Turkish are officially counted for census purposes as Kurds, yielding a very low figure. On the other hand some enthusiasts have been tempted to assume that over 30% of Iraq is Kurdish, probably 7% in excess of the actual figure.Trying to estimate the current number of Kurds is not a very fruitul exercise, since no figures can be proven correct. The aurher is responsible for the figures below.

Population estimates (1997) (Estimates in rounded figures.)
 
Country                        Total population           Kurds                 %
Iran                                65,000,000                   6,500,000           10%
Iraq                                19,300,000                   4,400,000           23%
Syria                              13,400,000                   1,100,000            8%
Turkey                           65,000,000                   14,300,000          22%
Former Soviet Union                                           500,000
Elsewhere                                                           1,700,000
Total                                                                  28,500,000

 
Write by David Mcdowall