Kurdistan Mid-decade history

Soran Emirate (Kurdish: میرنشینی سۆران) was a medieval Kurdish emirate established before the conquest of Kurdistan by Ottoman Empire in 1514 and later revived by Emir Kor centered in Rawandiz from 1816 to 1836.  Kor was ousted in an offensive by the Ottomans. Early years/ While no date has been established for the …

Melayê Cizîrî (born Shaikh Ahmad), penname Nîşanî (Kurdish: مەلای جزیری, romanized: Melayê Cizîrî, born; Cizre, c. 1570 – died c. 1640) was an Kurdish poet who laid the foundations for Kurdish poetry. Born in Cizre of Bohtan around year 1570, Cizîrî was a Sufi who spoke Kurdish, Arabic and Persian. He only expressed …

The great mosque of Khurmal is one of the ancient mosques of Kurdistan which is located in Khurmal district which is a small historic town in Halabja province.   This mosque and its minaret were created by Abdullah, the grandson of the second caliph Alkattab, during the Hasanwayhids era (959-1015), …

After the Mongol period, Kurds established several independent states or principalities such as Ardalan, Badinan, Baban, Soran, Hakkari and Badlis. A comprehensive history of these states and their relationship with their neighbors is given in the famous textbook of Sharafnama written by Prince Sharaf al-Din Biltisi in 1597. The most prominent among these was Ardalan which was established in the early 14th century. The state …

Abu’l-Aswar or Abu’l-Asvar Shavur ibn Fadl ibn Muhammad ibn Shaddad was a member of the Shaddadid dynasty. Between 1049 and 1067 he was the eighth Shaddadid ruler of Arran (today in western Azerbaijan) from Ganja. Prior to that, he ruled the city of Dvin (in what is now Armenia and …

Map of the Caucasus in 1207 AD A number of wars between the Kingdom of Georgia and Ayyubid Sultanate over the Armenian lands in eastern Anatolia, fought from c. 1208 until 1210. This brought the struggle for the Armenian lands to a stall,[1] leaving the Lake Van region in a …

Mir Xanzad (or Khanzad) was a military commander and ruler of the Soran Emirate in the late 16th or early 17th century Xanzad was the sister of Mir Sulaiman, who ruled the Soran Emirate in the Ottoman Empire around 1620. After her brother was murdered by one of his military …

  Bedir Khan Beg (Kurmanji: Bedirxan Beg, Turkish: Bedirhan Bey; 1803–1869) was the last Kurdish Mîr and mütesellim of the Emirate of Botan.[1] Hereditary head of the house of Rozhaki whose seat was the ancient Bitlis castle and descended from Sharafkhan Bidlisi, Bedir Khan was born in Cizre (now in …

Ahmad Khani, also spelled Ahmad-i Khani (Kurdish: Ehmedê Xanî‎; 1650, Hakkari – 1707, Doğubayazıt), was a Kurdish writer, poet, astronomer and philosopher.[1] He was born amongst the Khani’s tribe in Hakkari province in present-day Turkey. He moved to Bayezid in Ritkan province and settled there. Later he started with teaching Kurdish (Kurmanji) at basic level. Khani was fluent in Kurdish, Arabic and Persian. He wrote his Arabic-Kurdish dictionary “Nûbihara Biçûkan” (The …

NALÎ (Pers. Nāli), the pen-name of Mela Khidrî Ehmedî Šaweysî Mikâʾîlî (b. Ḵāk o ḵol, 1797 or 1800; d. Istanbul, 1855 or 1856), Kurdish poet who contributed immensely to making Sorani the literary language of southern Kurdistan, that is, most of present-day Iraq and the neighboring districts in Iran (FIGURE …