Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 11.djvu/695

* KUPETZKY. 631 KURDS. Catliiilic clergy in Vienna, and to escape the In- quisition reniDVi'd secretly t« Nuremberg. Xear- iy all the reigning nionarchs of Europe ofl'ered liim lucrative positions, but liis love of inde- Iiendence jjrevailcd. He ranks among the first masters of portraiture, and adniiral)k' specimens of his art mav be seen in almost every galleiT,' in Europe, esp<>cially in Vienna. Of several portraits of himself, that in the Stuttgart Museum is the liest. Consult Xvari. Dir I'ortmtmalcr Johann Kui>et:ky {Vienna, ISS!!). KITE., kUor, or KtJBA, koo'ra (Lat. Cyrus). The largest river in Transcaucasia, Russia, rising in tlic Territoiv uf Kars. at an altitude of about CUUO feet, and llowing in a generally soutiieastern direction towiird the C'as])ian Sea. into which it falls after a. course of S.'io miles (Map: Russia, 6). It flows chietly through a mountainous region, and drains an area estimated at 00.000 square miles. The Aras, which prior to 1890 dis- charged into the Kur a short distance from its mouth, has in great part recovered its old estu- ary in the Kizil Agat<'h Bay. Despite its tur- bulent course, the Kur is navigable for steamers for aliout l-'iO miles from its mouth. KUBANDA, koo-ran'da, Ignaz (1812-84). An Austrian jiublicist and politician, born in Prague, the son of a .lewisli bookseller. After journalistic work in Vienna. Leipzig, Stuttgart, and Paris, he went to Brussels, where in 1841 he founded Dip Gn'ii:bolrii. a Liberal political and literary weekly. In 1S42 he transferred its edito- rial office to Leipzig, where it subsequently passed into the hands of Gustav Freytag and .Julian Schmidt, after Kuranda bad returned to Austria and been elected to the Frankfort Parliament in 1848. He settled in Vienna, and founded the Ostdeiitache Post, a political journal, which ceased to exist in 1800. In 1807 he was elected to the Reichsrat. and became one of its most prominent Liberal leaders. KURBSKI, kijorp'ske, Andrei Mikhailo- viTCii. Prince ( 1 .32.S-8S ). A Russian soldier and writer. He was a military commander inider Ivan the Terrible, when he aided in spreading learning, until, being unfortunate in war, he was forced to take refuge in Lithuania, where he continued his classical studies and strove to prop- agate the Orthodox faith among the Poles. Of mucli liistorical interest is his controversial cor- respondence (1.50.3-70) — half a dozen letters all told — with Ivan, whom he tried to defeat by eru- dition: but the Czar was gifted with superior talent for spontaneous vituperation. Kurbski. however, had liis revenge in the Life he wrote of Ivan the Terrible, the lirst history of its kind in Russia. KURDISH, knoKdlsh. The language spoken by the Kurds inliabiting Kirdistan, Persia, Af- ghanistan, and Baluchistan. The number of per- sons speaking Kurdish is probably not far from 2, (too. 000. In character the language is Iranian, lint it contains many loan words from Arabic. Persian. Turki'^li. and other nei,i;lilioring tongues. The old intlcctions of the Iranian have been given up. and. like the Persian, .fghan, and Baluchi, nr even like Knglish, the language is now synthetic. It is divided into several dialects, of which the most important are Luri. Kirman- shahi. Ourani. Mukri. and Zaza. wdiich ditl'er from each other so nnich as to be sometimes mutually uuintelligible. The Kurdish literature i.s chiefly oral, and is especially rich in ballads and lyrics, as well as in faiiy stories and beast faldes. Kpies are less develo])ed, and, as is usual in unwritten literatures, prose is almost entirely lacking. Consult: Garzoni, flrammatica e vocabulurio della lingua kurda (Rome, 1787) ; Rich, yimra- lii:e of a Uesidence in Komdixlan (London, 18.37) ; I^rch, Forschungcn iiber die Kurdtn utid die iriinischeii Nordchuldaer (Saint Petersburg, 18i37-.58) ; .Jaba, liccucil des notices et recite Gourdes (ib., 1800) ; id., Dictionnaire kurde- fruni-ai.idh.' 1879) ; Justi, Kurdisclie (Iraminatik (ib., 1880) ; Prym and Socin, Kurdische Sainiii- lungen ( ib., 1870-90); Socin, "Die Sprache der Kurden," in Geigcr and Kuhn. Grundris.^ der iranischen Philologie, vol. i. (Strassburg, 1895 et seq.) ; Makas, Kurdische Studien- (Heidelberg, 1901). KURDISTAN, kOor'de-stan' (Pers., land of the Kurds). The name of a region south of Ar- menia, in Western Asia, extending in a northwest and southeast direction through the northeastern part of the Turkish dominions and the north- western part of Persia, from about latitude 34° to 39° N. and from about longitude 38° to 48° E. (Map: Persia, B 3). It reaches to the vicin- ity of Malatia in the west, borders on the Tigris in the south, and embraces Lake t'rniiah in the east. On the northern borders is Lake Van. Area, about .')8,000 square miles. The region is very mountainous. West of Lake ^ an there are distinguished three principal and a number of secondary ranges, inclosing high, fertile valleys and forming one of the most picturesque parts of Western Asia. As we approach the Persian frontier, the country is still more mountain- ous, the mountain masses intersecting each other in every direction and possessing an average ele- vation of not less than 10,000 feet, with single ])eaks rising to greater heights. In the Per- sian part of Kurdistan the ranges decrease in size, and the pro))ortion of open country is much larger. Along the Tigris extends a level I)lain. Kurdistan belongs to the basins of the Tigris and the Euphrates, being traver.sed by numerous streams coursing south from the Ar- menian highlands. Among the rivers which de- scend from the mountains of Kurdistan to join the Tigris are the Greater and Lesser Zab. The climate is hot and dry in the summer and rather severe in the winter. ('reals and southern fruits are produi-cd in alnindance. The region is in- habited mainly by Kurds (q.v. ). Turkish Kur- distan is included nuiinly in the vilayets of Diarbekir, Manuiret-ul-Aziz. Bitlis, and Van. The i>art belonging to Persia has a relatively small area. In the extreme south of this ptulion is the town of Kimanshah. Xo reliable figures as to ))opilation are available. Kurdistan is a part of ancient Assyria. KURDS, koordz, or KOORDS. A people, after whom certain parts of Turkey in .sia and Persia have received the nauu' of Kurdistan, belonging lioth by language ami physical char- acters to the Iranian Itranch of the while race. Physically they are medium staturod, dark, long- headed, and. where not influenced by civilization, harsh-featured and of savage aspect. Their hos- pitality and other good qualities, including a characteristic sense of lion<ir. liave been over- clouded in the public mind by their reputation as predatory thieves and agents of IXirkish op-