1901.] on Turkish Kurdistan. 641 



which is almost unknown to Europe, where the safety of the traveller 

 is extremely precarious, and which, as I have not visited it, I cannot 

 describe ; and (2) the small tract of country known as " Hakkiari," 

 which is bounded on the north by Lake Van, on the west by the 

 Tigris, on the south by the Mosul plain, and on the east by the great 

 snow ranges which form the dividing line between Turkey and 

 Persia. 



I have selected the latter district to-night for three reasons : I 

 have traversed it twice myself in different directions and by little- 

 known roads ; it contains some of the most beautiful and striking 

 mountain scenery I know anywhere ; and it is the home, not only of 

 the fiercest and most formidable Kurdish clans, but also of the only 

 remaining race of Christians under tbe sway of the Sultan who 

 have preserved almost intact their civil as well as their religious 

 autonomy. 



A few words are sufficient to give in brief outline the historical 

 events which led to the establishment in this region of the various 

 races which now inhabit it. 



Of these the Kurds are, in one sense at all events, by far the 

 oldest. An Aryan people, supposed by some to have been of the 

 same family as the Medes, and to have come originally from the 

 north-west provinces of Persia, bordering on the Caspian Sea, their 

 name, as we all know, appears in Xenophon's History under the form 

 of the Kardouchoi, who harassed the Ten Thousand in their attempt 

 to force a passage through the upper gorges of the Tigris. But 

 whatever the original stock may have been, no common type of 

 physique, any more than of religion or language, unites the widely 

 diffused tribes of the present day. Some are Shiahs, some Sunnis ; 

 some have adopted much the same language as the Turks, others a 

 dialect scarcely distinguishable from Persian. The Rayat Kurds 

 near Pergri, east of Lake Van, dye their short stubbly beards with 

 red henna like the subjects of the Shah ; the Zaza Kurds of the 

 Dersim and Upper Euphrates, strong, broad-chested men of dark 

 complexion and almost Grecian profile, grow theirs thick, black and 

 shaggy : the Bekeranli, in the neighbourhood of Diarbekr, have the 

 slim figures, small bullet heads, neat trimmed black mustachios, 

 and straight lanky hair, curled at the tips, which distinguish the 

 Bakhtiaris of Persia ; while among the Oramar, on the very conhnes 

 of that Empire, you find fair complexions, high narrow heads, blue 

 or grey eyes, and the nearest approach I have ever seen in real life 

 to the languid features of the Burne-Jones Knight. The Turks, as 

 I have said, employ the word Kurd to convey a certain vague 

 geographical conception, but it carries with it no idea of nationality, 

 and, indeed, it is frequently used as a kind of term of contempt, 

 much as our ancestors might have used the term Highlander to 

 describe a cateran or cattle-lifter. 



If the " Mountains of Ararat " mentioned in the cuneiform texts 

 as the country to which Sharezer fled after the murder of his father 

 Vol. XVI. (No. 95.) 2 u 



