Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 14.djvu/168
156 KURDISTAN
as the frontier of Luristan, south of Kirmánsháhán, in about 34° N. lat. and 47° E. long. The whole of this space, which is roughly calculated to embrace an area of at least 60,000 square miles, is mountainous, being in fact a section of the great chain which, known in antiquity at one extremity as Taurus and at the other as Zagrus, bisects Asia Minor from west to east, and then turning to the south-east buttresses the great Persian plateau in a series of ranges rising step over step above the valley of the Tigris. Kurdistan thus defined may be divided, according to its physical features, into three separate sections. The first section, stretching from Kharpút to the Persian frontier, has been thus described by Consul Taylor, who resided for many years in the country.
"The general features," he says, "of this tract are high mountains, enclosing fertile valleys and an undulating upland, bounded on the south-west by the Tigris, and intersected at several points by numerous streams having their rise in the northern districts of the Diarbekir pashalic, and emptying themselves into that river. The scenery in the highlands yields to no other portion of Turkey for variety and romantic beauty, while the numerous rivers and streams flow through charming landscapes and thickly wooded valleys, bathing in their course the bases of castles and towns famous in profane and ecclesiastical history."
To supplement Mr Taylor s general description, it may
be enough to say that there are three principal ranges
running from west to east through this portion of
Kurdistan: – (1) The Dújik and Mezoor Dagh (Paryadres
and Abus of antiquity, and Mount Simus of Armenian
history), a lofty, rugged, and inaccessible range which fills
up the entire space between the two arms of the Euphrates,
being connected with Anti-Taurus to the westward, and
culminating far to the east in the isolated peaks of the
greater and lesser Ararat; (2) The Mudikán range, south
of the Murád-sú, which is a continuation of the true
Taurus, and which is prolonged under the names of
Nimrúd Dágh, Sipán Dágh, and Alá Dágh, till it reaches
the Persian frontier to the north-east of Lake Van (in
this range all the headwaters of the Tigris rise, flowing
south under the names of Debeneh-sú, Ambár-sú, Batmán-sú,
and the rivers of Arzen and Bohtán, and joining the main
stream between Diarbekir and Jezireh); and (3) Mount
Masius, or Jebel-Tur, an inferior range, south of the Tigris,
which divides Kurdistan from the great Mesopotamian desert.
The second or central division of Kurdistan, which may be regarded as extending north and south from Lake Van to Sulimaníeh, is of a more exclusively mountainous character. With the exception indeed of the districts of Amadíeh, Shekelabád, and Koi-Sanják on the immediate skirts of the Tigris basin, and the open country of Azerbiján beyond the great range to the south-west of Lake Urumíeh, where the Kurds of the mountains have overflowed into Persia, there is hardly a square mile of level land anywhere to be found. The ranges of this division, which preserve a general direction of north-north-west and south-south-east, are throughout much broken up by transverse ridges, and seem to be tossed about in inextricable disorder, a few peaks, such as the Jebel-Júdí above Amadíeh (which almost certainly represents the Ararat of the Bible) and the Gawár (or Jawár) Dágh near Julamerik in the Hakkári country, rising to a stupendous height, and thus dominating the surrounding mountains, while several large rivers, and especially the Khabúr and the Upper and Lower Záb, running in narrow and precipitous beds, burst at right angles through the gorges of the chain, and descend upon the Tigris valley in a series of cataracts amid scenery of the wildest and most impressive grandeur. The usual elevation of the hills in this part of Kurdistan is not less than 10,000 feet above the level of the sea, while some of the highest peaks reach probably to an altitude of 14,000 or even 15,000 feet.
In the third or southern division of Kurdistan, which includes the Turkish pashalic of Sulimaníeh and the Persian provinces of Ardelán and Kirmánsháhán, the mountain chain diminishes both in height and breadth. The average height of the hills is here only about 5000 or 6000 feet, and the loftiest range, that of the Bend-i-Núh, or Noah's Hill, which forms the southern barrier of the gates of Zagrus,[1] and upon which, according to the tradition of Babylonia, as opposed to the tradition of Assyria, the ark is supposed to have rested, does not exceed an elevation of 8000 feet. The pass also which traverses the range at this point, and conducts from the lowlands of Holwán to the upper plain of Kirrend, is only 10 miles in length. At the foot of the great range on the western side are the fertile plains of Shahrizor, Zoháb, and Ghilán, where rice is extensively cultivated, while on the Persian side, though rocky ridges run out to the eastward both in Ardelán and Kirmánsháhán, the general character of the country is open, and cereals are everywhere produced in extraordinary abundance.
Population. – There are no means of calculating the total Kurd population with even approximate accuracy, for neither in Turkey nor in Persia has a Government census ever been attempted, and the revenue tables which regulate taxation and conscription, and ought therefore to guide inquiry, are wilfully distorted for political purposes to such an extent as to be quite unreliable. From the materials, however, which have been recently collected by the British consular officers employed in Asia Minor, with a view of testing the relative strength of the Mohammedan and Christian populations, it seems pretty clear that the Turkish Kurds exceed one million and a half in number, while the estimates of travellers who have resided in Persian Kurdistan give about 750,000 souls for the aggregate of the tribesmen and sedentary Kurds dwelling along the mountains from Ararat to Kirmánsháhán, together with the scattered colonies of the interior. The following rough table, then, has been compiled from the above sources.
Turkey.
Pashalic of Erzeroum, including sanjaks of Erzingán, Baiburt, and Bayazíd, with Deyrsim mountains 350,000
Pashalic of Diarbekir, with sanjaks of Malatíeh and Mardin and dependent tribes 320,000
Pashalic of Betlis, with sanjaks of Músh and Sa'ert, and districts of Mudikán, Sasún, Shirwán, and Northern Bohtán 130,000
Pashalic of Van, with sanjak of Hakkári and nomad tribes of the Arab and Persian frontier 170,000
Pashalic of Kharpút, with part of Deyrsim 130,000
Pashalic of Mosul, including sanjaks of Southern Bohtán, Amadíeh, Rowandiz, and Koi-Sanják, with tribes of Bilbass, Balik, &c 250,000
Pashalic of Sulimaníeh, with dependencies to Baghdad frontier 150,000
Total of Turkish Kurds 1,500,000
Persia.
Kurds of Azerbiján, including Mikris of Saúj-Bolák, Bilbass of Lahiján, Zerzas of Ushnei, Shekáks, Hyderánli, Jeláli, and frontier tribes from Ararat to Sardasht 250,000
Kurdistan Proper or Sinna-Ardelán 120,000
Province of Kirmánsháhán, including tribes of Gurán, Kalhúr, Zengeneh, &c. 230,000
Kurds of Khorásán, at Bujnurd and Kúchán, and scattered communities in Irak 150,000
Total of Persian Kurds 750,000
- ↑ It is this range, and not the Jebel-Júdí, as is generally supposed, that represents the Nisir of the cuneiform inscriptions, where the ark is said to have rested in the Chaldæan account of the flood; and the same tradition is to be traced in the belief which universally prevailed in Babylonia almost to modern times, that the waters of the great deluge penetrated no farther to the eastward than the "peak of Holwán." See Sachau's Biruní, p. 28.