1901.] on Turkish Kurdistan. 645 



from Jovian, the lieutenant of Julian the Apostate. Many of their 

 inhabitants, however, fell victims to the fierce persecution of Sapor in 

 330, and when, 33 years later, the Persian king advanced to the occupa- 

 tion of Nisibis, it was only through the display of miraculous powers 

 by Mar Awgin that he was induced to renounce his hostility, and 

 even to grant sites for the erection of churches and monasteries. 

 This permission was immediately followed by the despatch of a band 

 of 72 missionaries, and during the next 14 years the monasteries 

 provided harbours of refuge from the renewed persecutions of Valens. 

 It is no doubt owing to the fact that the valleys were only peopled 

 by degrees from these hill stations, that the modern Nestorians are 

 still known by such significant names as the Sons of the Cave or the 

 Sons of the High Place (Rumta). 



By the close of the fifth century the infant church had extended 

 its sway over the greater part of Armenia and Persia, and by the 

 close of the eighth, Central Asia, India, and China were reckoned 

 among the number of its chief Metropolitan Sees. Many of the 

 "wealthy Persian nobles had forsaken the tenets of Magianism and 

 become liberal patrons of the monasteries. Chosru II. (590—628) 

 himself built a convent in honour of his Christian wife Shirin, and 

 his active intervention in the affairs of the rapidly growing com- 

 munity is shown by the dispute which arose in connection with his 

 nomination of Gregory of Nisibis in opposition to Gregory of 

 Seleucia for the office of Catholicos. Two years after his assassina- 

 tion, his daughter Boran, the reigning queen, sent an embassy of 

 Nestorian bishops to Heraclius for the purpose of promoting friendly 

 relations between the two empires, and it was not until the middle 

 of the eighth century that the fortunes of the Church began to 

 decline with the decay of the Persian and the rise of the Arab 

 power. 



At first the Mahommetans appear to have treated the Christians 

 in a friendly manner, and when their attitude changed, the change, as 

 at the present day, was due not to religious antagonism but to jealousy 

 of their superior wealth. The Nestorians themselves always date the 

 erection of their churches in reference to Mahomet, and the earliest 

 writers bear out the common tradition which assigns many of them 

 to a period anterior to his time. Dr. Badger mentions the legend 

 that the monastery church of Mar Audishu near Amadiyah was built 

 366 years before the date of the Prophet, and like another church of 

 the same name in the valley of Tal, it is still regarded with great 

 veneration and visited as a place of pilgrimage even by the Kurds 

 and Persians. In Jelu, one of the most treasured relics of the great 

 church of Mar Zaia is a handkerchief covered with Arabic writing 

 which the natives believe to be a firman of the Prophet himself 

 according sanction and protection to their worship ; and when the 

 Turkish troops occupied the village at the time of my visit in 1899, 

 this was the only article which they apparently thought it worth 

 their while to carry away. A similar tradition asserts that the 

 substance of the firman given by the Porte to each successive occupant 



