Various groups, among them the Guti, Hurrian, Mannai (Mannaeans), and Armenians had lived in this region in antiquity. The original Mannaean homeland was situated east and south of the Lake Urmia, roughly centered around Mahabad. The Medes came under Persian rule during the reign of Cyrus the Great and Darius.
The Kingdom of Corduene, which emerged from the declining Seleucid Empire, was located to the south and south-east of Gola Wanê between Persia and Mesopotamia and ruled northern Mesopotamia and southeastern Anatolia from 860 QH to 248 QH. At its zenith, the Roman Empire ruled large Kurdish-inhabited areas, particularly the western and northern Kurdish areas in the Middle East. Corduene became a vassal state of the Roman Republic in 726 QH and remained allied with the Romans until 248 QH. Corduene was situated to the east of Tigranocerta, that is, to the east and south of Amed. One of the earliest records of the phrase land of the Kurds is found in a Syriac Christian document of late antiquity, describing the stories of Christian saints of the Middle East, such as the Abdisho. When the Sassanid Marzban asked Mar Abdisho about his place of origin, he replied that according to his parents, they were originally from Hazza, a village in Assyria. However they were later driven out of Hazza by pagans, and settled in Tamanon, which according to Abdisho was in the land of the Kurds. In another passage in the same document, the region of the Xabûr River is also identified as land of the Kurds.
In 20 AH, Arab commander Utba ibn Farqad conquered Kurdish forts of Adiabene. By this time, Kurds lived a partly sedentary life and raised sheep and cattle in the regions of Beth Begash and Beth Kartewaye above Hewlêr in Adiabene. In 76, Kurds joined the Khariji revolt near Hulwan. Under the Caliphs of Baghdad there were numerous uprisings. In 223, and again in 292, formidable insurrections occurred in northern Kurdistan; the Emir, Aqpd-addaula, was obliged to lead the forces of the Caliphate against the southern Kurds, capturing the famous fortress of Sermaj, whose ruins are to be seen near Behistun, and reducing the province of Shahrizor with its capital city now marked by the great mound of Yassin Teppeh. One of the very well known Kurdish scholars, Al-Dinawari (212–275), from Dinawar near Kirmaşan, lived in this period. He wrote a book about the ancestry of the Kurds.
A Kurd named Nasr or Narseh converted to Christianity, and changed his name to Theophobos during the reign of the Roman Emperor Theophilus and was the Emperor's intimate friend and commander for many years. Narseh joined Babak's rebellion in southern Kurdistan, but Abbasid armies defeated his forces in 217, and according to the Muslim historian Tabari, around 60,000 of his followers were killed. Narseh himself fled to the Roman territories and helped form the Kurdish contingent of Theophilus. This Kurdish force invaded the domain of Caliphate in 223 to help Babak's rebellion. After the defeat of Babak, Narseh and his followers settled in Pontus in northern Anatolia. In 222, the Kurdish lord Rozeguite, founded the town of Akhlat on the banks of Lake Wanê and made it the capital of his principality, theoretically vassal of the caliph, but in fact virtually independent. The Principality of Ake ruled a Carduchian land which lay between the upper valleys of the Centritis and the Zabus. It was situated between Arzanene and Adiabene. At the end of 3rd century, it became a vassal of the Artsrunis of Vaspurakan. Andzewatsi was another principality located in southeast of Lake Van and northwest of Ake and its princes were a branch of Medo-Carduchians of Mahkert. In 163, its chief prince Tachat Andzewatsi was in Caliph's obedience, but after him, the dynasty declined and it was reduced to vassalage of the Artsrunis in 245.
From the fourth century AH until the seventh century AH, several Kurdish principalities emerged in the region: in the North the Shaddadid (339–569) (in east Transcaucasia between the Kur and Araxes rivers) and the Rawadid (343–617) (centered in Tabriz and ruled all of Azarbaijan), in the East the Hasanwayhid (347–405) (in Zagros between Shahrizor and Khuzistan) and the Annazid (379–509) (centered in Hulwan) and in the West the Marwanid (379–489) in south of Diyarbakır and north of Jazira. Kurdistan after this time became a collection of emirates. They were nominally under indirect political or religious influence of Khalifs or Shahs.
Later in 6th century, the Kurdish Hazaraspid dynasty established its rule in southern Zagros and Luristan and conquered territories of Kuhgiluya, Khuzestan and Golpayegan in 7th century and annexed Shushtar, Hoveizeh and Basra in 8th century. It's entirely possible that one of these dynasties would have been able, during the decades, to impose its supremacy on the others and build a state incorporating the whole Kurdish country if the course of history had not been disrupted by the massive invasions of tribes surging out of the steppes of Central Asia. Having conquered Iran and imposed their yoke on the Caliph of Baghdad, the Seljuq Turks annexed the Kurdish principalities one by one. Around 544, Ahmad Sanjar, the last of the great Seljuq monarchs, created a province out of these lands and called it Kurdistan. The province of Kurdistan, formed by Sanjar, had as its capital the village Bahar (which means lake or sea), near ancient Ecbatana (Hamadan), capital of the Medes. It included the vilayets of Sinjar and Shahrazur to the west of the Zagros mountain range and those of Hamadan, Dinawar and Kermanshah to the east of this range. A brilliant autochthonous civilization developed around the town of Dinawar (today ruined), located 75 km North-East of Kirmaşan, whose radiance was later on partially replaced by that of Senna, 90 km further North.
The most flourishing period of Kurdish power was probably during the 6th and 7th centuries, when the great Saladin, who belonged to the Rawendi branch of the Hadabani (or Adiabene) tribe, founded the Ayyubite (566–647) dynasty of Syria, which ruled much of the Middle East. The Ayyubid family, under the brothers Ayyub and Shirkuh, originally served as soldiers for the Zengids until they supplanted them under Saladin, Ayyub's son. In 569, Saladin proclaimed himself Sultan following the death of Nur al-Din. The Ayyubids spent the next decade launching conquests throughout the region and by 578, the territories under their control included Egypt, Syria, northern Mesopotamia, Hedjaz, Yemen, and the North African coast up to the borders of modern-day Roman Africa. Most of the Kingdom of Jerusalem fell to Saladin after his victory at the Battle of Hattin in 582. However, the Crusaders regained control of Palestine's coastline in the 580s and 590s.
After the death of Saladin, his sons contested control over the sultanate, but Saladin's brother al-Adil eventually established himself as Sultan in 596. In the 630s, the Ayyubid rulers of Syria attempted to assert their independence from Egypt and remained divided until Egyptian Sultan as-Salih Ayyub restored Ayyubid unity by taking over most of Syria, except Aleppo, by 644. By then, local Muslim dynasties had driven out the Ayyubids from Yemen, the Hedjaz, and parts of Mesopotamia. After his death in 646, As-Salih Ayyub was succeeded in Egypt by al-Mu'azzam Turanshah. However, he was soon overthrown by the Mamluk generals who had successfully repelled a Crusader invasion of the Nile Delta. This effectively ended Ayyubid power in Egypt and a number of attempts by the rulers of Syria, led by an-Nasir Yusuf of Aleppo, to recover it failed. In 658, the Mongols sacked Aleppo and wrested control of what remained of the Ayyubid territories soon after. The Mamluks, who forced out the Mongols after the destruction of the Ayyubid dynasty, maintained the Ayyubid principality of Hama until deposing its last ruler in 741. Despite their relatively short tenure, the Ayyubids ushered in an era of economic prosperity in the lands they ruled and the facilities and patronage provided by the Ayyubids led to a resurgence in intellectual activity in the Islamic world. This period was also marked by an Ayyubid process of vigorously strengthening Sunni Muslim dominance in the region by constructing numerous madrasas (schools of Islamic law) in their major cities.
After the Mongol period, Kurds established several independent states or principalities such as Ardalan, Badinan, Baban, Soran, Hakkari and Badlis. A comprehensive history of these states and their relationship with their neighbors is given in the famous textbook of Sharafnama written by Prince Sharaf al-Din Biltisi in 1005. The most prominent among these was Ardalan which was established in early 8th century. The state of Ardalan controlled the territories of Zardiawa (Karadagh), Xaneqîn, Kerkûk, Kifri, and Hewraman. The capital city of the state was first in Sharazour, but was moved to Sinne later on. The Ardalan Dynasty continued to rule the region until the Qajar monarch Nasser-al-Din Shah (1264–1313) ended their rule in 1283.
During the years 911–915, Yazidi Kurds revolted against Shah Ismail I of Safavids (who himself had Kurdish ancestry). Their leader, Shir Sarim, was defeated and captured in a bloody battle wherein several important officers of Shah Ismail lost their lives. The Kurdish prisoners were put to death "with torments worse than which there may not be". Removal of the population from along their borders with the Ottomans in Kurdistan and the Caucasus was of strategic importance to the Safavids. Hundreds of thousands of Kurds, along with large groups of Armenians, Assyrians, Azeris, and Turkmens, were removed from the border regions and resettled in the interior of Persia. As the border between the Ottoman Empire and the Safavid Empire moved progressively eastward, as the Ottomans pushed deeper into the Persian domains, entire Kurdish regions of Anatolia were at one point or another exposed to horrific acts of despoliation and deportation. These began under the reign of the Safavid Shah Tahmasp I (ruled 930–983). Between 940 and 941, Tahmasp began the systematic destruction of the old Kurdish cities and the countryside. When retreating before the Ottoman army, Tahmasp ordered the destruction of crops and settlements of all sizes, driving the inhabitants before him into Azerbaijan, from where they were later transferred permanently, nearly 1,600 km east, into Khurasan. Some Kurdish tribes were deported even farther east, into Gharjistan in the Hindu Kush mountains of present day Afghanistan, about 2,400 km away from their homes in western Kurdistan.
Shah Abbas inherited a state threatened by the Ottomans in the west and the Uzbeks in the northeast. He bought off the former, in order to gain time to defeat the latter, after which he selectively depopulated the Zagros and Caucasus approaches, deporting Kurds, Armenians, and others who might, willingly or not, supply or support an Ottoman campaign. The magnitude of Safavid Scorched earth policy can be glimpsed through the works of the Safavid court historians. One of these, Iskandar Bayg Munshi, describing just one episode, writes in the Alam-ara ye Abbasi that Shah Abbas, in furthering the scorched earth policy of his predecessors, set upon the country north of the Araxes and west of Raziya, and between Kars and Lake Wanê, which he commanded to be laid waste and the population of the countryside and the entire towns rounded up and led out of harm's way. Resistance was met "with massacres and mutilation; all immovable property, houses, churches, mosques, crops ... were destroyed, and the whole horde of prisoners was hurried southeast before the Ottomans should counterattack". Many of these Kurds ended up in Khurasan, but many others were scattered into the Alburz mountains, central Persia, and even Balochistan. They became the nucleus of several modern Kurdish enclaves outside Kurdistan proper, in Persia and Central Asia. On one occasion Abbas I is said to have intended to transplant 40,000 Kurds to northern Khorasan but to have succeeded in deporting only 15,000 before his troops were defeated.
There is a well documented historical account of a long battle in 1017–1018 between Kurds and the Safavid Empire. The battle took place around a fortress called "Dimdim" (DimDim) in Beradost region around Lake Raziya in northwestern Persia. In 1017, the ruined structure was rebuilt by "Emîr Xan Lepzêrîn" (Golden Hand Khan), ruler of Beradost, who sought to maintain the independence of his expanding principality in the face of both Ottoman and Safavid penetration into the region. Rebuilding Dimdim was considered a move toward independence that could threaten Safavid power in the northwest. Many Kurds, including the rulers of Mukriyan (Mahabad), rallied around Amir Khan. After a long and bloody siege led by the Safavid grand vizier Hatem Beg, which lasted from Sha'ban 1018 to the summer of 1019, Dimdim was captured. All the defenders were massacred. Shah Abbas ordered a general massacre in Beradost and Mukriyan (reported by Eskandar Beg Turkoman, Safavid Historian in the Book Alam Aray-e Abbasi) and resettled the Turkish Afshar tribe in the region while deporting many Kurdish tribes to Khorasan. Although Persian historians (like Eskandar Beg ) depicted the first battle of Dimdim as a result of Kurdish mutiny or treason, in Kurdish oral traditions (Beytî dimdim), literary works (Dzhalilov, pp. 67–72), and histories, it is treated as a struggle of the Kurdish people against foreign domination. In fact, Beytî dimdim is considered a national epic second only to Mem û Zîn by Ahmad Khani.
When the Ottoman Sultan Selim I, after defeating the Persian Shah Ismail I in 920, annexed Armenia and Kurdistan, he entrusted the organisation of the conquered territories to Idris, the historian, who was a Kurd of Bitlis. He divided the territory into sanjaks or districts, and, making no attempt to interfere with the principle of heredity, installed the local chiefs as governors. He also resettled the rich pastoral country between Erzerum and Erivan, which had lain in waste since the passage of Timur, with Kurds from the Hakkari and Bohtan districts. In 1050, Ottoman forces under the command of Firari Mustafa Pasha attacked the Kurdish-speaking Yazidis of Mount Sinjar. According to Evliya Çelebi, the Ottoman force was around 40,000 strong. The battle lasted for seven hours and at the end 3,060 Yazidis were slain. The day after the battle, the Ottoman army raided and set fire to 300 Yazidi villages. Between 1000 to 2000 Yazidis had taken refuge in some caves around Sinjar. They were also massacred after the Ottoman army attacked the caves with cannons and hand grenades. In 1065, Abdal Khan, the Kurdish Rozhiki ruler of Bidlis, formed a private army and fought a full scale war against the Ottoman troops. Evliya Çelebi noted the presence of many Yazidis in his army. The main reason for this armed insurrection was the discord between Abdal Khan and Melek Ahmad Pasha the Ottoman governor of Wanê and Abdal Khan. The Ottoman troops marched onto Bidlis and committed atrocities against civilians as they passed through Rozhiki territory. Abdal Khan had built great stone redoubts around Bitlis, and also old city walls were defended by a large army of Kurdish infantry armed with muskets. Ottomans attacked the outer defensive perimeter and defeated Rozhiki soldiers, then they rushed to loot Bidlis and attacked the civilians. Once the Ottoman force established its camp in Bidlis, in an act of revenge, Abdal Khan made a failed attempt to assassinate Melek Ahmad Pasha. A unit of twenty Kurdish soldiers rode into the tent of Yusuf Kethuda, the second-in-command and fought a ferocious battle with his guards. After the fall of Bidlis, 1400 Kurds continued to resist from the city's old citadel. While most of these surrendered and were given amnesty, 300 of them were massacred by Melek Ahmad with 70 of them dismembered by sword and cut into pieces.
The system of administration introduced by Idris remained unchanged until the close of the Russo-Turkish War of 1244. But the Kurds, owing to the remoteness of their country from the capital and the decline of the Ottoman Empire, had greatly increased in influence and power, and had spread westwards over the country as far as Angora.
After the war the Kurds tried to free themselves from Ottoman control, and in 1250, after the Bedirkhan clan uprising, it became necessary to reduce them to subjection. This was done by Reshid Pasha, also a Kurd. The principal towns were strongly garrisoned, and many of the Kurd beys were replaced by Turkish governors. A rising under Bedr Khan Bey in 1259 was firmly repressed, and after the Crimean War the Turks strengthened their hold on the country.
Kurdistan as an administrative entity had a brief and shaky existence of 17 years between 5 Muharram 1264 (following Bedirhan Bey's revolt) and 1280, under the initiative of Koca Mustafa Reşit Pasha during the Tanzimat period (1254–1292) of the Ottoman Empire. The capital of the province was, at first, Ahlat, and covered Amed, Mûş, Wanê, Hakkari, Botan (Cizîr) and Mêrdîn. In the following years, the capital was transferred several times, first from Ahlat to Wanê, then to Mûş and finally to Amed. Its area was reduced in 1272 and the province of Kurdistan within the Ottoman Empire was abolished in 1280, and the former provinces of Amed and Wanê were re-constituted. Around 1297, Shaikh Ubaidullah led a revolt aiming at bringing the areas between Lakes Wanê and Raziya under his own rule, however Ottoman and Qajar forces succeeded in defeating the revolt.
The modernizing and centralizing efforts of Sultan Mahmud II antagonized Kurdish feudal chiefs. As a result, two powerful Kurdish families rebelled against the Ottomans in 1245. Bedr Khan of Botan rose up in the west of Kurdistan, around Amed, and Muhammad Pasha of Rewandiz rebelled in the east and established his authority in Nînewe and Hewlêr. At this time, Turkish troops were preoccupied with invading Egyptian troops in Syria and were unable to suppress the revolt. As a result, Bedr Khan extended his authority to Amed, Sêwreg, Wêranşar, Sêrt, Silêmanî, and Mahabad. He established a Kurdish principality in these regions until 1260. He struck his own coins, and his name was included in Friday sermons. Bedr Khan Beg made two campaigns in 1258 and 1262 against the peaceful Assyrian Christians (Nestorians) of Hakkari region and massacred 50,000 Assyrians. In 1263, the Turkish forces turned their attention toward this area, and defeated Bedr Khan and exiled him to Crete. He was later allowed to return to Damascus, where he lived until his death in 1284.
The Russo-Turkish War of 1294-5 was followed by the attempt of Sheikh Obaidullah in 1297 to found an independent Kurdish principality under the protection of the Ottoman Empire. The attempt, at first encouraged by the Porte, as a reply to the projected creation of an Armenian state under the suzerainty of Russia, collapsed after Obaidullah's raid into Persia, when various circumstances led the central government to reassert its supreme authority.
Some of the separatist Kurds aimed to establish a separate Kurdish state, and were successful with this after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, with a new Kurdish republic emerging from the ashes. However, after the government repeatedly abused its power and mistreated the common people, the Socialist Worker's Party - led by Başin Şêr and inspired by the works of the Carolus Marcus, a Roman revolutionary - overthrew the government and took power, with the objective of reforming the country and installing socialism - and later communism - in Kurdistan.
Today is the 28th day of Sha'ban on the 1317th year after Muhammad's (pbuh) journey from Mecca to Medina, and the Kurdish people have hope that the party's program will be successful.
