Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 14.djvu/170

 158 KUEDISTAN entirely free from any Semitic intermixture. It is thus somewhat nearer to the Persian than the Kermanji dialect, but is essentially the same language, It is a mistake to suppose that there is no Kurdish literature. Many of the popular Persian poets have been translated into Kurdish, and there are also books relating to the religious mysteries of the Ali-Ollahis in the hands of the Deyrsimlis to the north and of the Guraus of Kirmanshahan to the south. Euro pean scholars too have been assiduous of late years in inves tigating the various Kurdish dialects. The New Testament in Kurdish was printed at Constantinople in 1857. The Rev. Samuel Rhea published a grammar and vocabulary of the Hakkari dialect in 1872. Lerch, Brugsch, Chodzko, Beresine, Blau, and many others have discussed different branches of the subject in the scientific magazines of the Continent; and quite recently (1879) there has appeared under the auspices of the Imperial Academy of St Peters burg a French-Kurdish dictionary compiled originally by Mons. Jaba, many years Russian consul at Erzeroum, but completed by Ferdinand Justi by the help of a rich assort ment of Kurdish tales and ballads, collected by Messrs Socin and Pryne in Assyria. Justi s preface to the dic tionary gives a good account of the present state of Kurdish studies in Europe and Asia. The religion of the Kurds also furnishes a very curious subject of inquiry. The great body of the nation, in Persia as well as in Turkey, are Sunnis of the Shafe i sect, but in the recesses of the Deyrsim to the north and of Zagrus to the south, there are large half-pagan communities, who are called indifferently Ali-Ollahi and Kizzil-bash, and who hold tenets of some obscurity, but of considerable interest. Outwardly professing to be Shi ahs or &quot; followers of AH,&quot; they observe secret ceremonies and hold esoteric doctrines which have probably descended to them from very early ages, and of which the essential condition is that there must always be upon the earth a visible manifestation of the Deity. While paying reverence to the supposed incarnations of ancient days, to Moses, David, Christ, Ali and his tutor Salrnan-el-Farsi, and several of the Shi ah imams and saints, they have thus usually some recent local celebrity at whose shrine they worship and make vows ; and there is, moreover, in every community of Ali-Ollahis some living personage, not necessarily ascetic, to whom, as representing the Godhead, the superstitious tribesmen pay almost idolatrous honours. Among the Gurans of the south the shrine of Baba Yadgar, in a gorge of the hills above the old city of Holwan, is thus regarded with a supreme veneration, while in the family of a certain Syed who resides in the neighbourhood the attributes of divinity are supposed to be hereditary. Similar institutions are also found in other parts of the mountains, which may be com pared with the tenets of the Druses and Ansaris in Syria and the Isrnaslis in Persia. Climate, Productions, Fauna, &c. In a country like Kurdistan, which extends over five or six degrees of latitude, and ranges in altitude from 1500 to 15,000 feet above the sea, there is of course every variety of climate and produce. In the northern part of this region the hills are covered with pine forest, while the valleys abound with walnuts, sycamores, and planes, and all sorts of fruit trees, and in summer the hillsides and uplands are covered with a luxuriant herbage. The winters are here very rigorous, and the tribes, as far as they can, migrate at that season to the plains. In central Kurdistan the pine forests cease and give way to dwarf oak and elms, the mastic, holly, &c., coats. The Gurans have for a long period abandoned nomadic habits, and are now almost imiversally congregated in villages and occupied with the cultivation of the soil, so that in a great part of Kurdistan the name Giiran has become synonymous with an agricultural peasantry, as opposed to the migratory shepherds. while further to the south large trees almost disappear, and a rough scrub takes their place. A succinct and graphic description of Turkish Kurdistan is given by Consul Taylor in his notes of travel published in the Geographical Journal for 1865. &quot; The modern Turkish province of Kurdistan,&quot; he says, &quot;watered by an infinity of noble streams, with a salubrious climate and rich soil, yields to no other province in the empire for the variety and richness of its vegetable and animal produce, while its numerous mountain chains abound in mineral wealth. Among its natural vegetable productions, galls, gum-tragacanth, madder-roots, and the pistachio-nut, from which the natives extract a fine oil used in making soap, arc the most important, the annual value of the export of the former alone being upwards of 35,000. Oleaginous seeds and olive oil are produced in large quantities, and the quality of the former is so superior that it finds its way to many of the northern governments. Sheep s wool was exported in 1863 to the value of 70,000 ; and mohair, the produce of the Angorah goats, that thrive so wonderfully in the neighbourhood of Jezireh, was eagerly sought after and bought up by native traders from Kaiserich and Constantinople in the same period to the amount of 20,000. &quot;The manufacture of native cotton cloths, shallees made from mohair, and short woollen cloaks is actively pursued ; and the shallee, for texture and variety of colour and pattern, shows the extraordinary natural intelligence of the Kurdish workman. Diarbekir is famous itself for its silk piece-goods, similar to those of Aleppo and other parts of Syria, but, from its greater cheapness and durability, more in request among the poorer classes of the mountains between Diarbekir and the Black Sea. Sheep are exported in large quantities from the mountains and desert to Aleppo, Damascus, and Beyrout, and camels, purchased from the Arabs, to Kaiserieh and other parts of Asia Minor. The uplands and hills abound in several species of polecat, martin, foxes, and wolves, whose furs add considerably in value to the sum total of the export list. A beautiful species of spotted lynx may be included among the former, although it is far more scarce than those enumerated. A rough estimate of the whole annual value of the animal and vegetable produce of the pashalic, whether consumed at home or exported (exclusive of food), will amount to more than 700,000 sterling.&quot; This account is generally applicable? to central and southern Kurdistan as well as to the pashalics of Diarbekir and Erzeroum, but it requires to be supple mented in some particulars. The rice and corn which arc grown by the Kurds of the Tigris basin and the Persian plains form a very important staple of export, while the hill forests supply charcoal, wild silk, manna, and gum- mastic, in addition to the produce noticed in Consul Taylor s list, to a very large extent ; and it may be further noted that along the whole range of mountains from Jezireh to Susa there is an outer ridge of low gypsum hills, which abounds throughout its whole extent with petroleum and naphtha springs. Mineral oils are not at present much appreciated by either Turks or Persians, but in the future of Kurdistan this important source of wealth cannot be left out of account. With regard to the fauna of Kurdistan a few words must suffice. Neither lions nor tigers are ever found in the mountains, though the former frequent the banks of the Tigris and the latter are common in the Caspian forests. The wild animals of Kurdistan are the leopard and lynx, the wild cat, bear, hyasna, wild boar, wolf, jackal, and fox, the mardl (or red deer), the roe and hog deer (and fallow deer and antelope on the skirts of the hills), the wild goat (or ibex), the wild sheep (or moufflon), together with badgers, hares, many varieties of the polecat or martin, and the ordinary smaller animals. Of game birds the most remarkable are the Kebk-i-Derv (or large partridge, first brought to the notice of naturalists by Consul Brandt), the grey and red-legged partridge, the Tihoo, quail, woodcock, and snipe, three varieties of bustard, the grey crane, and wild geese and ducks in abundance. It has not been found possible to compute the amount of revenue which is raised from the Kurds. Consul Trotter remarks on this subject : &quot;The Turkish Kurds are found in almost every possible stage, from that of thorough subjection to the Government (as in many of