history1NORWEGEN1

Native inhabitants of their land, there are no "beginnings" for Kurdish history and people. Kurds and their history are end products of thousands of years of continuous internal evolution and assimila-tion of new peoples and cultures intro-duced sporadically into their land. Genetically, Kurds are the descendants of all those who came to settle in Kurdistan, and not any one of them. Thus, ancient peoples such as the Kurti, Guti, Mede, Mard, Carduchi/ Gordyene, Adianbene, Zela and Khaldi, each constitute only one ancestor and not the ancestor of the modern Kurd.
Archaeological finds continue to docu-ment that some of mankind's earliest steps in the development of agriculture, domes-ti-cation of many common farm animals (sheep, goats, hogs and dogs), manufacture of grape wine and beer, record keep-ing (the token system), development of domestic technologies (tabby weaving, fired pot-tery making and glazing), metallurgy and urban-ization took place in Kurdistan between 12,000 and 8,000 years ago.
The earliest evidence so far of a unified and distinct culture (and possibly, ethnicity) by people inhabiting the Kurdish moun-tains dates back to the Halaf culture of 8,000-7,400 years ago. This was followed by the spread of the Ubaidian culture, which was a foreign introduction from Mesopotamia. After about a millennium, its dominance was replaced by the Hurrian cul-ture, which may or may not have been the Halafian people reasserting their domi-nance over their mountainous homeland. The Hurrian period lasted for nearly 4000 years from circa 6,300 to 2,600 years ago.
Much more is known of the Hurrians. They spoke a language of the Northeast Caucasian family of languages (or Alarodian), kin to modern Chechen and Lezgian. The Hurrians spread far and wide, dominating much territory outside their Zagros-Taurus mountain base. They settled most of Anatolia and all the way to the Bosphorus. Like their Kurdish descen-dents, they however did not expand too far from the mountains. Their intrusions into the neighboring plains of Mesopotamia and the Iranian Plateau, there-fore, were primar-ily military annexations with little popula-tion settlement. Their economy was sur-prisingly integrated and focused, along with their political bonds, mainly running paral-lel with the Zagros-Taurus mountains, rather than radiating out to the lowlands, as was the case during the preceding (foreign) Ubaid cultural period. Mountain-plain eco-nomic exchanges remained secondary in importance, judging from the archaeological remains of goods and their origin.
The Hurrians-whose name survives now most prominently in the name of the Kurdish districts of Hawraman/Awraman and Hakkari, and the clan name Haraki-divided into many clans and subgroups, who set up city-states, kingdoms and em-pires known today after their respective clan names. These included the Qardu, Guti, Khaldi, Mard, Mushku, Manna, Hatti, Mittani, Urartu, and the Kassu, to name a few. All these were Hurrians, and to-gether form the Hurrian phase of Kurdish history.
By about 4,000 years ago, the first van-guard of Indo-European-speaking peo-ples were trickling into Kurdistan in limited numbers. They formed the aristocracy of the Mitanni, Kassite, and Hittite kingdoms, while the common peoples remained solidly Hurrian. Meanwhile, around 3800 years ago, the name "Kurti" (Kurd) made its first debut into ancient records for a people and a kingdom located on the south shores of Lake Van and the Hakkari heights.
By about 3,000 years ago, the trickle had turned into a flood, and Hurrian Kurdistan was fast becoming Indo-European Kurdistan. Far from having been wiped out, the Hurrian legacy, despite its linguistic eclipse, remains the single most important element of Kurdish culture to date. It forms the substructure for every aspect of Kurdish existence, from their native reli-gion to their art, their social organization, women's status, and even their militia warfare.
Medes, Scytho-Sarmatians, Sindis, Alans and Sagarthians are just the better-known clans of the Indo-European-speaking Aryans who settled in Kurdistan. About 2,600 years ago, the Medes had already set up a federation that in-cluded all Kurdistan and vast territories beyond. Medians were fol-lowed by scores of other kingdoms and city-states-all dom-inated by Aryan aristocracies and a populace that was becoming Indo-European speaking if not already so.
By the advent of the classical era in 300 BC, Kurds were already experiencing mas-sive population movements that resulted in settlement and domination of many neigh-boring regions. Important Kurdish polities of this time were all by-products of these movements. The Zelan Kurdish clan of Coppadocia (Malatya-Kaysari area), for example, spread to establish in ad-dition to the Zelanid dynasty of Commagene, the Zelanid kingdom of Cappadocia and the Zelanid empire of Pontus-all in Anatolia. These became Roman vassals by the end of the 1st cen-tury BC. In the east the Kurdish kingdoms of Adiabene, Sophene, Gordyene, Cortea, Media, and Kirm had, by the 1st century BC, become confederate members of the Parthian Federation. By the 3rd century BC, the use of the name Kurd (Greek: Kurti; Latin: Cyrti) for the people inhabit-ing modern Kurdistan and other Kurdish colonies become prevalent in the classical Graeco-Roman texts.
While all larger Kurdish kingdoms of the west gradually lost their existence to the Romans, in the east they survived into the 3rd century AD and the advent of the Sasanian Persian empire. The last major Kurdish dynasty, the Kayosids, fell in AD 380. Smaller Kurdish principalities (called the Kofy�r, "mountain administrators") however, preserved their autonomy into the 7th century and the advent of Islam.
Several socioeconomic revolutions in the garb of religion emerged in Kurdistan at this time, many due to exploitation by central governments, some due to natural disasters. They continued as underground movements into the Islamic era, bursting forth periodically to demand social reforms. The Mazdakite and Khurramite movements are best-known among them.
The eclipse of Sasanian and Byzantine power by the Muslim caliphate, and its own subsequent weakening, permitted the Kurdish principalities and "mountain administrators" to set up new, independent kingdoms. The Shaddadids/Shadanids of the Caucasus and Armenia, the Rawwadids/ Rewandids of Azerbaijan, the Marwanids of western Kurdistan, the Hasanwayhids, Fadilwayhids, Kakawayhids and Ayyarids of the central Zagros and the Shabankaras of Fars were some of these Kurdish kingdoms.
The Ayyubids stand out by the vastness of their domain. From their capital at Cairo they ruled territories of Libya, Egypt, Nubia, Yemen, west-ern Arabia, Syria, the Holy Land, Armenia and much of Kurdistan. As the custodians of Islam's holy cities of Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem, the Ayyubids were instrumental in the defeat and expulsion of the Crusaders from the Holy Land. The founder of the dynasty, King Saladin (Sal�haddin) achieved lasting admiration as much from friends as foes for his magnanimity, humanity and valor. He is known by the epithet "Prince of Chivalry" in the annals of the Crusades.
With the 12th and 13th centuries, Turkic nomads arrived in the area and in time polit-ically dominated vast segments of the Middle East. Most Kurdish states became vassals to various Turkic king-doms and empires. Kurdish principali-ties, how-ever, survived and continued their au-tonomous existence until the 19th century. Intermittently, they ruled in indepen-dence when local empires weakened or collapsed.
By AD 1500, there were over a score of independent and autonomous Kurdish king-doms and principalities, some forming well-established states with currency of their own, and boasting dynastic histo-ries several centuries old. None showed any inclination for unification of Kurdistan. In this Kurdistan resembled the Germany of the 1850s, where tens of small principali-ties coexisted alongside larger kingdoms, all German in their ethnicity, but displaying little interest in merger into a united Germany. This was achieved only by force by the strongest among them; Prussia.
The advent of the Safavid and Ottoman empires in the area in the 16th century and their division of Kurdistan into two uneven imperial depen-dencies was on a par with the practice of the preceding few centuries. Their introduction of heavy artillery and a scorched-earth policy into Kurdistan was a new, and devastating devel-opment.
In the course of the 16th to 18th cen-turies, vast portions of Kurdistan were sys-tematically devastated and large numbers of Kurds deported to the far corners of the Safavid and Ottoman empires. The magni-tude of death and destruction wrought in Kurdistan unified its people in their call to rid the land of these imperial vandals. The chronic mutual suffering awakened in Kurds a community feeling-a nationalism.
For the first time, Kurdish authors called for a unified Kurdish kingdom to guard the land and foster- Kurdish culture and lan-guage. Thus the historian Bitlisi wrote in 1597 the first pan-Kurdish history, the Sharafn�ma, as Ahmad Khani, the collector and versifier of the national epic of Mem-o-Zin, called in 1695 for a Kurdish state. Kurdish nationalism was born.
It is noteworthy that, prompted by exter-nally-induced national distress, a century earlier than Europeans the Kurds were writ-ing of the need for a unitary Kurdish ethnonational state-a "nation-state."
For en siste tid en enorm Kurdish rike den Zands emerged i 1750. Som medieval Ayyubids setter aber Zands opp deres hovedstad og kongerike hovedsakelig ytre Kurdistan, og ikke forfulgt noen politikker som siktet p� forening av Kurdish nasjon. Tilgjengelighet av Ottoman myndighet som fremhevet av det virtuelle som v�rer indepen tett av Egypt og Arabia, imens, pr. suaded den eldgammele, autonomme Kurdish fyrste dynasties anlegge sak mot for full indepen tett. Det f�rste av disse var hovedity av Soran (sentral Kurdistan). I den tidlige 1830s en scion av Rewandid dynasty, Dostakid Prince Muhammad, embarkert p� etablerer ing et uavhengig kongerike av Kurdistan. P� hans hovedstad av Rewanduz etablert han foundries forfalske artilleri og skytev�pen, som muliggj�rer hans h�r i 1834 score en hovedseier mot Ottoman krefter at i cluded Prussian offiser Helmuth von Moltke (fremtid general og erobrer av Paris i 1871). Fyrste Muhammads rikeutbredelse dekke den hele sentrale Kurdistan, samt Arbil og Kirkuk, hvor rettferdighet og lov hersket h�yest. En samtidig bes�kende, J. Baillie Fraser, skrev av "observerer den store kontrasten som mellom Turkish og Koordish territorier. I det tidligere forlot alle landsbyer, den beboerhav ing tatt flykt unng� myndigheten imposts� On den andre h�nden, ingen tidligere gjorde �en� rekkevidde Altoun Kupree �p� grensen�, enn all folk flocked ut, slitsome blomster p� deres hoder som p� fridager, og skreket og cheered� They avhenger ikke p� noen land men deres eier for forsyningen av alle deres behov. Alt som de krever er produsert hjemme, og mens deres fjell former im pregnable forsvar mot utenlandske angripere, produserer deres kuperte sider og daler, med liten innsats, rikelig alt de �nsker dyrke, og har r�d til en aldri sviktende forsyning av tre, vann, og beite." Fyrste Muhammeds foretagender aborterte n�r en lokal storartet mullah var bribed utgi en religi�s edict i 1836, bekjemper som forbydende Muslim Kurds fra den Ottoman Sultan Caliph. Forlatt, Prince Muhammed overgitt seg og myrdet i fangenskap p� Trabzon det f�lgende �r. Med fallet av Soran den tilgrensende prin cipality av Jezira (moderne Cizre), under Bokthi Prince Badir (1802-1868) forfulgt det samme m�let ved � etablere forbinder med annen Kurdish fyrstee hus p� Muks, Bitlis, Kars, Hakkari og selv Ardalans i Persia, forlenging hans dynastys innflytelse til mest av Ottoman Kurdistan ved 1840. Til hans diverse emner, tultrukket Badir troskapen av Christian Armenian, Assyrian og Chaldian inhabi tants av Kurdistan. V�knet til trusselen som oppstilt av Prince Badir og annen Kurdish royaltyer, Ottomans, n� resuscitated ved enorm milit�rst�tte fra Prussia Germany, f�redd deres full kraft mot fledgling Kurdish kongeriker. Etter tre �r av full m�lestokkskrig hatt ved 1848, Ottomans suc ceeded ved shelling all Kurdish fyrste capi tals inn i overgivelse. Jezira Cizre, det eldgammele og sjarmerende hovedstad av den Bokhti princi pality, var fullstendig pulverized. Ved 1867 v�rt House av Ardalan the siste autonom Kurdish principality i Persia had likes� slukket. For f�rst gang i historie, Ottomans og Persians regjert n� all av Kurdistan direktett, via guvern�rer. Tapet av uavhengighet og/eller auton omy av Kurdish provinser skapt et politisk oppr�r i landet som var ytterligere exacerbated etter slutten av WWI og den effektive fragmentation av Kurdistan inn i fem isolerte sektorer. Treaty av S evres (undertegnet August 10, 1921) ventet at en uavhengig Kurdish stat dekker en liten porsjon av den tidligere Ottoman Kurdistan. En st�rre porsjon faktisk den hele nordlige Kurdistan, fra Van til Ardahan, fra Bitlis til Bayezid was berammet p� S evres for innbefatning i et planlagt uavhengig "Armenia." Heldigvis kom for Kurds, ingen av dette passere. Likeglad med de innf�dts krever uavhengighet, France og Britain delt tidligere Ottoman territorier i henhold til deres egene behov, med Kurdistan fordelt til de nye statene av Turkey, Syria og Iraq. Treaty av Lausanne undertegnet (June 24, 1923) formalized denne delingen. Kurds av Persia Iran og Russia USSR, imens, btholde hvor de var f�r ved Teheran og Moscow. Selv om Lausanne sprunget Kurds' h�p for uavhengighet for rest det 20th �rhundret, spart det dem fra det etniske rensingen at �pent planlagt og delvis im-ple-mented ved Armenians i storPor tions av Kurdish territorier som berammet av Treaty av S evres for innbefatning i en uavhengig Armenia. Tegningen av godt voktet statlig bundet aries deling Kurdistan har, da 1921, rammet Kurdish samfunn med en slik grad av frag mentation som dets st�t river fra hverandre Kurds' enhet som en nasjon. 1920s s� innstillingen opp av en Kurdish Autonomous Province (" Red Kurdistan") i Soviet Azerbaijan. Det oppl�ste i 1929. I 1945 setter Kurds opp en Kurdish republikk p� Mahabad i Soviet besatt sone i Iran. Det vart et �r, til det var reoccupied ved Iranian h�r. Da 1970s, Iraqi Kurds har en joyed en offisiell autonom status i en porsjon av at stats Kurdistan. Ved slutten av 1991 hatt de blir all men uavhengig. Ved 1996 aber Kurdish myndighet i Arbil forpliktet politisk selvmord derfor av fac tional sl�ssing mellom forskjellig Kurdish warlords. I August 1996, Barzani kalt fraksjon Iraqi h�r inn i Kurdistan hjelpe det dislodge konkurrent Talabani fraksjon. Da 1987 Kurds i Turkey by seg utgj�r en majoritet av all Kurds have f�rt en krig av nasjonal frigj�ring mot Ankaras 70 �r av tung gitt undertrykkelse av noe spor av Kurdish identitet og dets rik og eldgammel kultur. Den massive oppstanden hatt ved 1995 propelled Turkey inn i en stat av sivil krig. Det som knoppe og ungdommelig Kurdish befolkning i Turkey krever n� absolutt likestilling med den Turkish komponent, og svikting av det, full uavhengighet. I Caucasus fledgling Armenian Republic i kursen av 1992-94 visket ut det hele Kurdish fellesskap av Red Kurdistan (Lachin, Kelbajar, Zangelan). Renset etnisk dets Kurdish beboere, Armenia effektivt annekterer Red Kurdistans territorium som separerer Armenian exclave av Nagorno Karabakh fra Armenia. Skjebnen av Red Kurdistan tjener som en modell hva var i forretning for nordlig Kurdistan av, hatt det v�rt inkludert inn i Armenia i 1920 ved foranstaltningene av Treaty av S evres.