{"id":162,"date":"2008-05-15T22:56:39","date_gmt":"2008-05-15T21:56:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/wp\/wordpress\/kurdish-literature\/"},"modified":"2018-10-12T13:37:51","modified_gmt":"2018-10-12T13:37:51","slug":"kurdish-literature","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kurdishacademy.org\/?p=162","title":{"rendered":"Kurdish Literature"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kurdish is heir to a rich and extensive, but now mainly oral, literature extending back into pre-Islamic times. A large portion of the written literature has been lost to over eight centuries of nomadic dislocation into and through Kurdistan, leaving behind only fragments. Although now spoken by a minority of Kurds, Gur\u00e2ni is claimant to the oldest extant literary pieces in Kurdish. Pahlaw\u00e2ni in general, and particularly Gur\u00e2ni and its dialects, once enjoyed an unusual status as the language of high culture and literature. In all dialects of Kurm\u00e2nji<\/a>, Gur\u00e2ni now simply means “lyric poetry” or “balladry.” This vernacular, along with its dialect Awr\u00e2mani\/Hewr\u00e2mi, was in fact until early modern times the language of polite society and belles lettres in most of Kurdistan, irrespective of the dominant spoken local dialect. The Kurdish princely house of Ardal\u00e2n (1198-1867) spoke Gur\u00e2ni until its final removal. Not surprisingly, all of the oldest surviving literary pieces in Kurdish are in Pahlaw\u00e2ni.<\/p>\n

B\u00e2b\u00e2 T\u00e2hir<\/a> (ca. 1000-1060) of Hamad\u00e2n is one of the very first poets in the East to write rubaiyats, the medium of Omar Khayyam’s fame. B\u00e2b\u00e2 T\u00e2hir’s rusticity and mastery of both Laki\/Gur\u00e2ni, Persian (and Arabic) have rendered his works unusually dear to the common people of both nations. His particular poetic meter is perhaps a legacy of the pre-Islamic poetic tradition of southeastern and central Kurdistan, or the celebrated “Pahlawiy\u00e2t\/Fahlawiy\u00e2t,” or more specific the “Awr\u00e2nat” style of balladry. Many Y\u00e2ris\u00e2n religious works and Jilwa, the holy hymns of the Yezidi prophet Shaykh Adi, are also in this Pahlawiy\u00e2t style of verse. B\u00e2b\u00e2 T\u00e2hir himself has now ascended to a high station in the indigenous Kurdish religion of Y\u00e2ris\u00e2nism as one of the avatars of the Universal Spirit.<\/p>\n

The lyricist Parish\u00e2n Dinawari (d. ca. 1395), Mustaf\u00e2 Bis\u00e2r\u00e2ni (1642-1701), Muhammad Kandulayi (late 17th<\/sup> century), Kh\u00e2n\u00e2 Qub\u00e2di (ca. 1700-1759), Sarhang Alm\u00e2s Kh\u00e2n and Mirz\u00e2 Shafi’ Dinawari (mid- 18th<\/sup> century), Shayd\u00e2 Awr\u00e2mi (1784-1852), Ahmad Beg Kum\u00e2si (1796-1889), Muhammad Zangana Ghamn\u00e2k-i Kirkuki (early 18th<\/sup> century), Muhammad Wali Kirm\u00e2nsh\u00e2hi (d. ca. 1901) and the grand poetess, Mastura M\u00e2h-Sharaf Kh\u00e2tun Q\u00e2diri Zand (1805-1848) are just a few of the better-known poets in Gur\u00e2ni and its dialects of Awr\u00e2m\u00e2ni and Laki. Of the Gur\u00e2ni poet Muhammad Faqih-Tayr\u00e2n (1590-1660) of the town of Makas survive many witty folk tales in his book “In the Words of the Black Horse,” as also a book of Sufi verse, “The Story of Shaykh of San’\u00e2n.” Faqih-Tayr\u00e2n also composed in Kurm\u00e2nji, and engaged Ahmad Jaziri (see below) in a lively exchange of versified correspondence in that dialect.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, some of the greatest works of Kurdish secular literature presently extant in toto are in the North Kurm\u00e2nji dialect. Except for Ali Hariri, all other Kurm\u00e2nji poets of whom we know and whose works are extant today began their careers after the beginning of the wars and deportations of the 16th<\/sup> century in Kurdistan.<\/p>\n

Although works in Kurm\u00e2nji are generally of recent writing, a Yezidi religious work, the Mes’haf i Resh, is in a classic form of Kurm\u00e2nji (closer to B\u00e2hdin\u00e2ni than Sor\u00e2ni), and could well have been written sometime in the 13th<\/sup> century. It is held to have been written by Shaykh Hasan (born ca. AD 1195), a nephew of Shaykh Adi ibn Mus\u00e2fir, the sacred prophet of the Yezidis. If this date can be further authenticated, Mes’haf will be the oldest piece of literature in Kurm\u00e2nji, predating anything else in that vernacular by hundreds of years.<\/p>\n

Some of the earliest Kurm\u00e2nji poets and lyricists whose works are extant are Ali Hariri, from the town of Harir near Rew\u00e2nduz in the Hakk\u00e2ri (1425-1490?); Mull\u00e2h Ahmad (1417-1494) of Hakk\u00e2ri, the author of Mawlud, a collection of verse and an anthology;<\/p>\n

Salim Salm\u00e2n, who composed his romance of Yusif u Zulaykha in 1586; Shaykh Ahmad Jaziri, better known as Mull\u00e2-i Jaziri (or Mal\u00e2y Jaziri, 1570-1640) of Buht\u00e2n, who is considered one of the greatest of all Kurdish poets; and Ism\u00e2’il of B\u00e2yazid (1654-1710), who compiled a small Kurm\u00e2nji-Arabic-Persian glossary for the use of the young, entitled Gulzhen, and several poems.<\/p>\n

The epic drama of Mem o Zin (more properly, Mami Al\u00e2n o Zini Buht\u00e2n), versified in 1694 by Ahmad Kh\u00e2ni (1651-1707) of the Kh\u00e2niy\u00e2n tribe of Hakk\u00e2ri whose forefathers had settled early at B\u00e2yazid in northeastern Kurdistan, embodies a wealth of mythological and historical events in the national life of the Kurds and idealizes their national aspirations.<\/p>\n

Mem of the \u00e5l\u00e2n clan and Zin of the rival Buht\u00e2n clan are two lovers whose union is prevented by a certain Bakr of the Bakr\u00e2n clan. Mem eventually dies; then, while mourning the death of her lover on his grave, Zin falls dead of grief and is duly buried next to him. Fearing for his life when his role in the tragedy is revealed, Bakr takes sanctuary between the two graves. Unimpressed, the people slay Bakr. A thorn bush soon grows out of Bakr’s blood, sending its roots of malice deep into the earth between the lovers’ graves, separating the two even after their death.<\/p>\n

The heroic epic Ballad of Dem Dem is a mythologized story of the actual siege of the fortress of Dem Dem in eastern Kurdistan, defended by the Kurdish prince of Bar\u00e2dost, Kh\u00e2ni Lap-zerrin “the Kh\u00e2n with the Golden Arm,” against the Safavid King Abb\u00e2s I in the 17th<\/sup> century. The epic is alive with vivid and graphic, but mostly symbolic, descriptions of the actual battles and the heroic resistance of the defenders. The association of the Kh\u00e2n with the siege is chronologically problematic, but the literary value of the epic stands out on its own. The spirit of the Dem Dem readily reminds one of the personal face-offs of the honor-bound heroes of the Trojan war, and of the stubborn and desperate resistance of the defenders of Massada to the last man and woman.<\/p>\n

Charigars or bards, travel widely to bring to their audience the wealth of hundreds of chariga, versified epics like the Dem Dem and Mem o Zin, and other popular pieces of literature.<\/p>\n

In comparison to North Kurm\u00e2nji, South Kurm\u00e2nji has only lately produced its own works of literature. In fact, none is known before the ‘early 19th<\/sup> century and the works of Mustaf\u00e2 Kurdi (1809-1866), coming at least 1000 years after the earliest extant Gur\u00e2ni works. The first substantial works in South Kurm\u00e2nji, beginning with those of H\u00e2ji Qadir Koy’i of Koy Sanjaq in central Kurdistan (1817-1897), capitalize more on their patriotic themes than their literary value, which is at any rate hardly comparable with the works of the giants of North Kurm\u00e2nji, such as Hariri, Kh\u00e2ni, or Jaziri. A major exception is of course Shaykh Riz\u00e2 T\u00e2lab\u00e2ni (1835-1909) whose wit, playfulness, and lampooning of those who crossed him (of which, judging by his works, there happened to be many) renders him a delight to read (Edmonds 1935).<\/p>\n

Mention must be made of the discovery a few decades ago of a parchment containing many lines of Kurdish poetry in the South Kurm\u00e2nji (Sor\u00e2ni) dialect. The poem speaks of Zoroastrian Kurds being oppressed by invading Arab Muslims, who put out the fire temples and destroyed the old virtues. Much importance has been attached to this parchment, as it is held to date back to the original 7th<\/sup>-century Muslim invasion. This parchment is doubtless a forgery, as 1) it is in a Sor\u00e2ni dialect that would not be developed for another 1000 years (Gur\u00e2ni would have been the logical language, if the parchment were authentic), 2) the Kurds of central Kurdistan, where the parchment is alleged to have been found, were largely Christians at the time of the Muslim invasion, with the remainder being mostly Y\u00e2ris\u00e2ns (Zoroastrians and Jews constituted marginal populations); 3) no scientific examination of the parchment for dating and authentication has ever been presented, and no photographs of the piece are available to examine the alphabet used in its writing. Likely the work of a hapless nationalist hoaxter, the parchment was presumably meant to provide “history” for Kurdish written literature, particularly in the Sor\u00e2ni dialect .<\/p>\n

One reason that South Kurm\u00e2nji did not produce written literature earlier is of course its closeness to North Kurm\u00e2nji. Any work produced in latter dialect would have been readily accessible to the speakers of South Kurm\u00e2nji. But also, it is only in the past two centuries that South Kurm\u00e2nji has spread to occupy the crucial areas of central and eastern Kurdistan at the expense of Gur\u00e2ni, thus gaining a large number of speakers and hence the potential and the status required for a literary language. In fact the greatest of the South Kurm\u00e2nji-speaking princely houses, the B\u00e2b\u00e2ns, used Gur\u00e2ni exclusively for their court language and literature until the beginning of the 19th<\/sup> century.<\/p>\n

The present unusual importance of South Kurm\u00e2nji is the outcome of several, equal unusual, historical events. The fragmentation of Kurdistan was a primary cause, as it rendered South Kurm\u00e2nji the language of the majority of Kurds in Iraq and Iran. With the added relative freedom it received in Iraq for its development, South Kurm\u00e2nji has flourished with a disproportionately large volume of printed material produced in those two countries in the last 75 years, while North Kurm\u00e2nji has been stifled in its main domain in Turkey for this same period.<\/p>\n

A brief survey of the works of the Kurdish poets whose works have been preserved shows that in the 1000 years up to the beginning of the present century, 19 have been written in Gur\u00e2ni, 10 in North Kurm\u00e2nji, and 8 in South Kurm\u00e2nji-not a surprising statistic when one notes the former extent and importance of Pahlaw\u00e2ni. Despite its very late start, South Kurm\u00e2nji has produced over four-fifths of the literary works in Kurdish in the 20th<\/sup> century.<\/p>\n

This situation is rapidly changing again, as the ascendancy of the Kurds of Turkey again reasserts North Kurm\u00e2nji traditional supremacy. Since 1992, the trickle of North Kurm\u00e2nji language printed matter has been turned into a flood. Even a small volume of North Kurm\u00e2nji printed material is steadily appearing in Turkey-home to 52% of all Kurds, and that of 80% of North Kurm\u00e2nji-speaker. In the past decade and from their printing houses in Europe, immigrant Kurds, a vast majority of whom are North Kurm\u00e2nji-speakers hailing from Turkey, have booted an avalanche of print matter to rival and in fact surpass anything produced in South Kurm\u00e2nji (Sor\u00e2ni) in the past many decades. It must be exhilarating to any Kurd now to see both primary dialects of Kurdish are finally marching ahead shoulder to shoulder in this regard. Introduction of the Kurdish language satellite television in Brussels, the MED-TV, which also uses North Kurm\u00e2nji as its main dialect of broadcast, has meanwhile catapulted that all-important dialect of Kurdish into a whole new plain of activities the result of which in the past three years has been simply spectacular.<\/p>\n

Over the course of the present century, the Kurdish language has come under a great deal of pressure. The publication of Kurdish has been forbidden in Syria and, until relatively recently, in Iran. Since the founding of the Turkish Republic, even speaking Kurdish was illegal in Turkey, and punishable by imprisonment-an unenforceable state policy in force intermittently until December 1990, when president Ozal of Turkey announced the legalization of spoken Kurdish for domestic, and only domestic, use. When this was made law in the Turkish parliament in February of 1991, there were hysterical mass demonstrations in Ankara by academics who opposed the measure. Unimpressed, the Turkish government further liberalized the use of Kurdish language, allowing Kurdish language publications. This instantly meant the appearance of Kurdish language newspapers and magazines, even though under official supervision. Education, however, is still not included in these positive developments in Turkey, but there are signs indicating that a renaissance of Kurdish literature is on its way in Turkey, a country where over half of all Kurds live today.<\/p>\n

In Iraq, on the other hand, a great body of published work in South Kurm\u00e2nji has been produced with central government assistance and approval. A Kurdish University founded in Sulaym\u00e2nia and later, largely relocated in Arbil, has been functioning for a few decades, providing has been functioning for a few decades, providing a bilingual curriculum in Arabic and Kurdish, and fostering literature written in South Kurm\u00e2nji (i.e., Sor\u00e2ni).<\/p>\n

The Soviet Kurds, despite (or perhaps because of) their small numbers, were given an elementary and advanced education in Kurdish and other relevant languages of the Soviet Union for many decades. A number of better-known pieces of Kurdish literature also appeared in that country, but these were often targeted as propaganda pieces to attract Kurds from beyond the Soviet borders, rather than having been written just to benefit the small, widely dispersed population of Soviet Kurds. Upon the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, and the emergence of new independent states in the Caucasus and central Asia, it is doubtful that the Kurds will enjoy the same generous treatment from their local, now sovereign, ethnic neighbors.<\/p>\n

After gaining its independence following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Armenia deported en mass, first its Muslim Kurds, followed by the Yezidi Kurds. As it has turned out, the “admirable” treatment of the Kurds in Armenia was conducted from Moscow. From Erevan, Kurds have only received grief since Armenia’s independence. In Azerbaijan, on the territories of the former “Red Kurdistan,” the largest concentration of the Kurds in the CIS has seen itself evicted en mass from their ancestral homes by the Armenian forces invading Azerbaijan in 1991-1993. Leaving in refugee camps or squalid tenements in other parts of the CIS, there is need for trying to assess their “cultural and educational” state at this point.<\/p>\n

In Iraq and Iran a modified version of the Perso-Arabic alphabet has been adapted to the phonetic peculiarities of Sor\u00e2ni and is used for publications. The Kurds of Turkey have recently embarked on an extensive campaign of publication in the North Kurm\u00e2nji dialect of Kurdish from their publishing houses in Europe, in the hope that it may trickle back to their deprived kinfolk in Turkey. They have adapted a modified form of the Latin alphabet for this purpose, first championed by Prince Kamur\u00e2n Badir Kh\u00e2n in the course of 1930 when he embarked on its creation. The Kurds of the Soviet Union first began writing Kurdish in the Armenian alphabet in the 1920s, followed by Latin in 1927, then i Cyrillic in 1945, and now in both Cyrillic and Latin. Gur\u00e2ni and Laki continue to use the Persian alphabet without any change. There is likely only one modern publication in Dimili-a newspaper, Tayr\u00e2, published in Austria-and that employs the Latin-based alphabet of North Kurm\u00e2nji developed by the European Kurdish diaspora. However, recent liberalization in Turkey may change this. Since late 199 1, a Kurdish news journal, Rozhn\u00e2me, published in Turkey, has carried two pages of news in Dimili, the other 38 pages are in North Kurm\u00e2nji. Both use the same Latin-based alphabet as used for their European publications.<\/p>\n

It seems that in the absence of a standardized pan-Kurdish language, an alphabet that least reflects the vocalic system of various Kurdish dialects would serve to reach a wider audience since it would mask dialectal differences. Any piece of Kurdish literature recorded in a Latin- or Cyrillic-based alphabet would achieve the reverse. These writing systems possess a relatively exact recording of short and long vowels ‘and diphthongs. The vowel-starved Perso-Arabic alphabet, on the other hand, does the job rather nicely by its vague or non-recording of many vowels, and inexact consonant representation. When and if a standard pan-Kurdish language is adopted, then a Latin-based alphabet may be appropriate.<\/p>\n

Further Readings and Bibliography: <\/b><\/i>Amin, Abdul-Kader (collected by), Kurdish Proverbs (New York, 1989); Edmonds, C.J., “A Kurdish Lampoonist: Shaikh Riza Talabani,” Journal of the Royal CentralAsian SocietyXXII (1935) Jaba, Alexander,Recueil de Notices et R\u00e9cits kourdcs (St.Petersburg, 1860); Lescot, R., Textes Kurdes. Deuxe’me Partie: Mam\u00ed Alan (1 942); Nikitine, B. and E. Soane, “Tale of Suto and Tato: Kurdish Text with Translation and Notes,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental Studies 111 (London, 1923-25); Nikitine, B. and E. Soane, “Kurdish Stories from My Collection, “Bulletin of the School of Oriental Studies IV (London, 1948);<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Source:<\/strong> Prof. M. Izady, “The Kurds: A Concise Handbook”, Dep. of Near Easter Languages and Civilization Harvard University, USA, 1992<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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