History of the Assyrians

See Assyria for the history of ancient Assyria.

The Syriac Christians (Assyrian people, Syriacs) were Christianized in the 1st to 3rd centuries, in Roman Syria and Persian Assyria. They were divided by the Nestorian Schism in the 5th century, and from the 8th century, they became a religious minority following the Islamic conquest of Mesopotamia. They suffered a genocide at the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, and today to a significant extent live in diaspora.

Culturally, linguistically, and ethnically distinct from their neighbours in the Middle East - the Arabs, Persians, Kurds, Turks, and Armenians. Assyrian nationalism emphasizes their indigeneity to the Assyrian homeland, and cultural continuity since the Iron Age Neo-Assyrian Empire.

Pre-Christian period

Main articles: Assyria, Neo-Assyrian Empire, Roman Syria, and Assyria (Persian province)

The history of ancient Assyria harks back to the Akkadian Empire of the Early Bronze Age. The Neo-Assyrian Empire flourished in the Early Iron Age (9th to 7th centuries BC), before it was conquered by the Achaemenids. Linguistically, the Syriac Christians descend from the Aramaeans, whose Aramaic language became the lingua franca of the Assyrian Empire during Classical Antiquity.

After the defeat of Ashur-uballit II in 608 BC at Haran, the Assyrian empire was divided up by the key invading forces, the Chaldeans and the Medes. The Median empire was then conquered by Cyrus in 547 BC., under the Achaemenid dynasty, and the Persian empire was thus founded, which later consumed the Neo-Babylonian or "Chaldean" Empire. King Cyrus changed Assyria's capital from Nineveh to Arbela. Assyrians became front line soldiers for the Persian empire under King Xerxes, playing a big role in the Battle of Marathon under King Darius I in 490 BC.

Syria became a Roman province in 64 BC, following the Third Mithridatic War. The Syrian army accounted for three legions of the Roman army, defending the Parthian border. In the 1st century, it was the Syrian army that enabled Vespasian's coup. Syria was of crucial strategic importance during the crisis of the third century. From the later 2nd century, the Roman senate included several notable Syrians, including Claudius Pompeianus and Avidius Cassius. In the 3rd century, Syrians even reached for imperial power, with the Severan dynasty. From the 1st century BC, Assyria was the theatre of the protracted Perso-Roman Wars. It would eventually become a Roman province between 161 and 363 AD, although Roman control of this province was unstable and was often returned to the Persians.

Early Christian period

Funerary mosaic of an Edessa family, 3rd century.

Further information: Syriac Christianity and History of Eastern Christianity

Along with the Armenians and Ethiopians, the Assyrians were among the first people to convert to Christianity and spread Eastern Christianity to the Far East.

The Council of Seleucia of ca. 325 dealt with jurisdictional conflicts among the leading bishops. At the subsequent Council of Seleucia-Ctesiphon of 410, the Christian communities of Mesopotamia renounced all subjection to Antioch and the "Western" bishops and the Bishop of Seleucia-Ctesiphon assumed the rank of Catholicos. The Nestorian and Monophysite schisms of the 5th century divided the church into separate denominations.

Islamic empires

The ancient Assyrian capital of Nineveh had its own bishop of the Church of the East at the time of the Arab conquest of Mesopotamia. During the era of the Islamic Empire, Assyrians maintained their autonomy; in a fatwa, Mohammed, the prophet of Islam, demanded the "protection of the Assyrian people of Mesopotamia". The Assyrians eventually lost their autonomy when the region was conquered by the Ottoman Empire and the written fatwa destroyed in 1847, after which thirty thousand Assyrians were subsequently massacred.

20th century

Main articles: Assyrian genocide, Assyrianism, Assyrian naming dispute, and Assyrian diaspora

By the beginning of the twentieth century, the Ottoman Empire was disintegrating. World War I and its aftermath saw its end, during which time Assyrians – like Armenians – claim a genocide occurred (1914 to 1922), where an estimated two-thirds of Assyrians died in organized massacres, starvation, disease, and systematic kidnapping and rape. In 1932, Assyrians refused to become part of the newly-formed state of Iraq and instead demanded their recognition as a nation within a nation. The Assyrian leader Mar Eshai Shimun XXIII asked the League of Nations to recognize the right of Assyrians to govern the area known as the "Assyrian triangle" in northern Iraq. Eventually this led to the Iraqi government to commit its first of many massacres against its minority populations (see Simele massacre).

Post-Ba'thist Iraq

Further information: Assyrian independence

File:Autonomy2003.JPG

Firas Jatou's results of his teams study of remaining Assyrian villages

With the fall of Saddam Hussein and the 2003 invasion of Iraq, no reliable census figures exist on the Assyrians in Iraq (as they do not for Iraqi Kurds or Turkmen), though the number of Assyrians is estimated to be approximately 800,000.

The Assyrian Democratic Movement (or ADM) was one of the smaller political parties that emerged in the social chaos of the occupation. Its officials say that while members of the ADM also took part in the liberation of the key oil cities of Kirkuk and Mosul in the north, the Assyrians were not invited to join the steering committee that was charged with defining Iraq's future. The ethnic make-up of the Iraq Interim Governing Council briefly (September 2003 - June 2004) guided Iraq after the invasion included a single Assyrian Christian, Younadem Kana, a leader of the Assyrian Democratic Movement and an opponent of Saddam Hussein since 1979.

In October 2008 many Iraqi Christians(about 12,000 almost Assyrians) have fled the city of Mosul following a wave of murders and threats targeting their community.The murder of at least a dozen Christians, death threats to others, the destruction of houses forced the Christians to leave their city in hurry. Some families crossed the borders to Syria and Turkey while others have been given shelters in Churches and Monasteries. Accusations and blames have been exchanged between Sunni fundamentalists and some Kurdish groups for being behind this new exodus. For the time the motivation of these culprits remains mysterious , but some claims related it to the provincial elections due to be held at the end of January 2009, and especially connected to Christian's demand for wider presentation in the provincial councils.[1]

See also

• Assyrian - The Struggle for Identity (an upcoming documentary)

External links

• Assyrians after Assyria
• Assyrians from the fall of Nineveh to Present