Assyrian Neo-Aramaic
Encyclopedia
Assyrian Neo-Aramaic is a Neo-Aramaic
dialect, spoken by an estimated 220,000 people (1994 SIL
estimate), formerly in the area between Lake Urmia
, north-western Iran
, and Siirt
, south-eastern Turkey
, but now more widely throughout the Assyrian–Chaldean–Syriac diaspora. Ethnologue
estimates that as of the mid 1990s, about 80,000 speakers lived in the Assyrian homeland
in the Middle East, while the majority of speakers lived abroad, most of them in the United States or in Europe. Most speakers are members of the Assyrian Church of the East
and the Ancient Church of the East
. Assyrian Neo-Aramaic is to a considerable extent mutually intelligible with Chaldean Neo-Aramaic
and to a lesser extent with Turoyo.
evolved from Middle Aramaic by the 13th century. The division of the Assyrian from Chaldean Neo-Aramaic
was a consequence of the religious schism of 1552
which led to the formation of the Assyrian Church of the East
.
Assyrian Neo-Aramaic is one of a number of modern Eastern Aramaic dialects spoken in the region between Lake Urmia
in Iranian Azerbaijan
and Mosul
in northern Iraq.
All Syriac Christian dialects of Aramaic have been heavily influenced by the Syriac language
, a dialect of Eastern Middle Aramaic, that became the literary and liturgical language of many churches in the Fertile Crescent
. Therefore Christian Neo-Aramaic has a dual heritage: literary Syriac and colloquial Eastern Aramaic. The Christian dialects are often called Sûret, Syriac, or Sûryāya Swādāya, Colloquial Syriac.
Russian linguists studied Assyrian Neo-Aramaic as spoken by immigrant speakers in Georgia
and Armenia
at the end of the 19th century. They called the language Айсорский, Aysorskiy, from Asori. However, by the 1930s, the official name of the language in Russian had become Ассирийский, Assiriyskiy, or Assyrian.
Northeastern Neo-Aramaic
is a dialect continuum
, and because of the high intelligibility between dialects, and due to the high level of exposure of the non-standard dialects to General Urmian or the Iraqi Koine.
dialect has become the prestige dialect of Assyrian Neo-Aramaic after 1836, when that dialect was chosen by Justin Perkins
, an American Presbyterian missionary, for the creation of a standard literary dialect of Assyrian.
In 1852, Perkins' translation of the Bible into General Urmian was published by the American Bible Society with a parallel text of the classical Syriac Peshitta
.
During the First World War, many Assyrians living in Ottoman Turkey were forced from their homes, and many of their descendants now live in Iraq
. The relocation has led to a separate dialect usually called Iraqi Koine. It is a mixture of Ashiret dialects with General Urmian. Iraqi Koine does not really constitute a new dialect, but an incomplete merger of dialects. Elements of original Ashiret dialects can still be observed in Iraqi Koine, especially in that of older speakers.
The Central and Western groups are often grouped together as Ashiret dialects. They, and especially the Western group, have more in common with Chaldean Neo-Aramaic
than with General Urmian.
Ashiret dialects are often characterised by the presence of the fricatives θ (th) and ð (dh), where other dialects pronounce them either as stops (t and d) or, in the case of the Northern group, often eliding them.
, which is also used for classical Syriac. In the 1930s, following the state policy for minority languages of the Soviet Union
, a Latin alphabet
for Assyrian was developed and some material published. However, this innovation did not displace the Syriac script.
Neo-Aramaic languages
Neo-Aramaic, or Modern Aramaic, languages are varieties of Aramaic that are spoken vernaculars in the medieval to modern era, evolving out of Middle Aramaic dialects around AD 1200 ....
dialect, spoken by an estimated 220,000 people (1994 SIL
SIL International
SIL International is a U.S.-based, worldwide, Christian non-profit organization, whose main purpose is to study, develop and document languages, especially those that are lesser-known, in order to expand linguistic knowledge, promote literacy, translate the Christian Bible into local languages,...
estimate), formerly in the area between Lake Urmia
Lake Urmia
Lake Urmia , ancient name: Lake Matiene) is a salt lake in northwestern Iran, near Iran's border with Turkey. The lake is between the Iranian provinces of East Azerbaijan and West Azerbaijan, west of the southern portion of the similarly shaped Caspian Sea...
, north-western Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
, and Siirt
Siirt
- External links :* * * *...
, south-eastern Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
, but now more widely throughout the Assyrian–Chaldean–Syriac diaspora. Ethnologue
Ethnologue
Ethnologue: Languages of the World is a web and print publication of SIL International , a Christian linguistic service organization, which studies lesser-known languages, to provide the speakers with Bibles in their native language and support their efforts in language development.The Ethnologue...
estimates that as of the mid 1990s, about 80,000 speakers lived in the Assyrian homeland
Assyrian homeland
Assyrian homeland refers to a geographic and cultural region inhabited traditionally by the Assyrian people; who call it Assyria . It is largely coterminous with the Kurdish homeland, including parts of what is now northeast Syria, northern Iraq, northwestern Iran and southeastern Turkey.The area...
in the Middle East, while the majority of speakers lived abroad, most of them in the United States or in Europe. Most speakers are members of the Assyrian Church of the East
Assyrian Church of the East
The Assyrian Church of the East, officially the Holy Apostolic Catholic Assyrian Church of the East ʻIttā Qaddishtā w-Shlikhāitā Qattoliqi d-Madnĕkhā d-Āturāyē), is a Syriac Church historically centered in Mesopotamia. It is one of the churches that claim continuity with the historical...
and the Ancient Church of the East
Ancient Church of the East
The Ancient Church of the East was established in 1968. It follows the traditions of one of the oldest Christian churches, the Church of the East, whose origins trace back to the See of Seleucia-Ctesiphon in central Mesopotamia...
. Assyrian Neo-Aramaic is to a considerable extent mutually intelligible with Chaldean Neo-Aramaic
Chaldean Neo-Aramaic
Chaldean Neo-Aramaic is a Northeastern Neo-Aramaic dialect. Chaldean Neo-Aramaic is spoken on the plain of Mosul in northern Iraq, as well as by the Chaldean communities worldwide. Most speakers are Chaldean Catholics....
and to a lesser extent with Turoyo.
History
The Neo-Aramaic languagesNeo-Aramaic languages
Neo-Aramaic, or Modern Aramaic, languages are varieties of Aramaic that are spoken vernaculars in the medieval to modern era, evolving out of Middle Aramaic dialects around AD 1200 ....
evolved from Middle Aramaic by the 13th century. The division of the Assyrian from Chaldean Neo-Aramaic
Chaldean Neo-Aramaic
Chaldean Neo-Aramaic is a Northeastern Neo-Aramaic dialect. Chaldean Neo-Aramaic is spoken on the plain of Mosul in northern Iraq, as well as by the Chaldean communities worldwide. Most speakers are Chaldean Catholics....
was a consequence of the religious schism of 1552
Schism of 1552
The Schism of 1552 was an important event in the history of the Church of the East. It divided the church into two factions, of which one entered into communion with Rome and the other remained independent. The modern Chaldean Catholic Church and the Assyrian Church of the East, both of which...
which led to the formation of the Assyrian Church of the East
Assyrian Church of the East
The Assyrian Church of the East, officially the Holy Apostolic Catholic Assyrian Church of the East ʻIttā Qaddishtā w-Shlikhāitā Qattoliqi d-Madnĕkhā d-Āturāyē), is a Syriac Church historically centered in Mesopotamia. It is one of the churches that claim continuity with the historical...
.
Assyrian Neo-Aramaic is one of a number of modern Eastern Aramaic dialects spoken in the region between Lake Urmia
Lake Urmia
Lake Urmia , ancient name: Lake Matiene) is a salt lake in northwestern Iran, near Iran's border with Turkey. The lake is between the Iranian provinces of East Azerbaijan and West Azerbaijan, west of the southern portion of the similarly shaped Caspian Sea...
in Iranian Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan (Iran)
Azerbaijan or Azarbaijan , also Iranian Azerbaijan, Persian Azarbaijan is a region in northwestern Iran. It is also historically known as Atropatene and Aturpatakan....
and Mosul
Mosul
Mosul , is a city in northern Iraq and the capital of the Ninawa Governorate, some northwest of Baghdad. The original city stands on the west bank of the Tigris River, opposite the ancient Assyrian city of Nineveh on the east bank, but the metropolitan area has now grown to encompass substantial...
in northern Iraq.
All Syriac Christian dialects of Aramaic have been heavily influenced by the Syriac language
Syriac language
Syriac is a dialect of Middle Aramaic that was once spoken across much of the Fertile Crescent. Having first appeared as a script in the 1st century AD after being spoken as an unwritten language for five centuries, Classical Syriac became a major literary language throughout the Middle East from...
, a dialect of Eastern Middle Aramaic, that became the literary and liturgical language of many churches in the Fertile Crescent
Fertile Crescent
The Fertile Crescent, nicknamed "The Cradle of Civilization" for the fact the first civilizations started there, is a crescent-shaped region containing the comparatively moist and fertile land of otherwise arid and semi-arid Western Asia. The term was first used by University of Chicago...
. Therefore Christian Neo-Aramaic has a dual heritage: literary Syriac and colloquial Eastern Aramaic. The Christian dialects are often called Sûret, Syriac, or Sûryāya Swādāya, Colloquial Syriac.
Russian linguists studied Assyrian Neo-Aramaic as spoken by immigrant speakers in Georgia
Georgia (country)
Georgia is a sovereign state in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the southwest by Turkey, to the south by Armenia, and to the southeast by Azerbaijan. The capital of...
and Armenia
Armenia
Armenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...
at the end of the 19th century. They called the language Айсорский, Aysorskiy, from Asori. However, by the 1930s, the official name of the language in Russian had become Ассирийский, Assiriyskiy, or Assyrian.
Divisions
SIL Ethnologue distinguishes five dialect groups: Urmian, Northern, Central, Western, and Sapna, each with sub-dialects. Standard literary Assyrian is based on the Urmian dialect and is known as "General Urmian" (since the 1830s), with a second standard dialect derived from General Urmian eveloping in the 20th century, known as "Iraqi Koine".Northeastern Neo-Aramaic
Northeastern Neo-Aramaic
Northeastern Neo-Aramaic is a term used by semiticists to refer to a large variety of Modern Aramaic languages that were once spoken of a large region stretching from the plain of Urmia, in northwestern Iran, to the plain of Mosul, in northern Iraq.As of the 1990s, the NENA group had an estimated...
is a dialect continuum
Dialect continuum
A dialect continuum, or dialect area, was defined by Leonard Bloomfield as a range of dialects spoken across some geographical area that differ only slightly between neighboring areas, but as one travels in any direction, these differences accumulate such that speakers from opposite ends of the...
, and because of the high intelligibility between dialects, and due to the high level of exposure of the non-standard dialects to General Urmian or the Iraqi Koine.
Urmian
The UrmiaUrmia
- Demographics :According to official census of 2006, the population of Urmia is about 871,204.- Language :The population of Urmia is mainly Azerbaijani people, with Kurdish, Assyrian Christian, and Armenian minorities...
dialect has become the prestige dialect of Assyrian Neo-Aramaic after 1836, when that dialect was chosen by Justin Perkins
Justin Perkins
Justin Perkins was an American Presbyterian missionary and linguist...
, an American Presbyterian missionary, for the creation of a standard literary dialect of Assyrian.
In 1852, Perkins' translation of the Bible into General Urmian was published by the American Bible Society with a parallel text of the classical Syriac Peshitta
Peshitta
The Peshitta is the standard version of the Bible for churches in the Syriac tradition.The Old Testament of the Peshitta was translated into Syriac from the Hebrew, probably in the 2nd century AD...
.
During the First World War, many Assyrians living in Ottoman Turkey were forced from their homes, and many of their descendants now live in Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
. The relocation has led to a separate dialect usually called Iraqi Koine. It is a mixture of Ashiret dialects with General Urmian. Iraqi Koine does not really constitute a new dialect, but an incomplete merger of dialects. Elements of original Ashiret dialects can still be observed in Iraqi Koine, especially in that of older speakers.
- Urmian group:
- UrmiaUrmia- Demographics :According to official census of 2006, the population of Urmia is about 871,204.- Language :The population of Urmia is mainly Azerbaijani people, with Kurdish, Assyrian Christian, and Armenian minorities...
(west of Lake UrmiaLake UrmiaLake Urmia , ancient name: Lake Matiene) is a salt lake in northwestern Iran, near Iran's border with Turkey. The lake is between the Iranian provinces of East Azerbaijan and West Azerbaijan, west of the southern portion of the similarly shaped Caspian Sea...
) - Sopurghan (north of UrmiaUrmia- Demographics :According to official census of 2006, the population of Urmia is about 871,204.- Language :The population of Urmia is mainly Azerbaijani people, with Kurdish, Assyrian Christian, and Armenian minorities...
) - SolduzNaghadehNaqadeh , also Romanized as Solduz and Suldoz) is a city in and the capital of Naqadeh County, West Azerbaijan Province, Iran. At the 2006 census, its population was 72,975, in 18,320 families....
(south of Lake UrmiaLake UrmiaLake Urmia , ancient name: Lake Matiene) is a salt lake in northwestern Iran, near Iran's border with Turkey. The lake is between the Iranian provinces of East Azerbaijan and West Azerbaijan, west of the southern portion of the similarly shaped Caspian Sea...
)
- Urmia
Northern group
- Northern group:
- Salmas (north west of Lake UrmiaLake UrmiaLake Urmia , ancient name: Lake Matiene) is a salt lake in northwestern Iran, near Iran's border with Turkey. The lake is between the Iranian provinces of East Azerbaijan and West Azerbaijan, west of the southern portion of the similarly shaped Caspian Sea...
) - Van (east of Lake VanLake VanLake Van is the largest lake in Turkey, located in the far east of the country in Van district. It is a saline and soda lake, receiving water from numerous small streams that descend from the surrounding mountains. Lake Van is one of the world's largest endorheic lakes . The original outlet from...
) - JiluJiluJīlū was a district located in Hakkari region of upper Mesopotamia.Before 1915 Jīlū was home to Christian Assyrians, as well as a minority of Kurds. There were 20 Assyrian villages in this district. The area was traditionally divided into Greater and Lesser Jīlū, and Ishtāzin - each with its own...
(west of Gavar and south of Qudshanis) - Gawar (between Salmas and Van)
- QochanisQochanisQodchanis was the capital of Hakkari and the seat of the Assyrian bishops before 1915.Its ruins are currently north of Hakkâri Province, near the borders of Iran and Iraq, and about 20 km north-east of the provincial capital Hakkâri, in the southeastern of modern Turkey.The town was inhabited by...
(just south of Lake VanLake VanLake Van is the largest lake in Turkey, located in the far east of the country in Van district. It is a saline and soda lake, receiving water from numerous small streams that descend from the surrounding mountains. Lake Van is one of the world's largest endorheic lakes . The original outlet from...
) - Upper BarwariBarwariBarwar also known as Barwari and Barwari Bala, is a region situated in northern Dohuk Governorate in Iraq. The region is populated by Kurds although it was once mainly inhabited by Assyrians with a large Jewish minority.-History:...
- Dez
- Baz
- Salmas (north west of Lake Urmia
Ashiret
- Central group:
- Anhar
- Nochiya
- Western group (western Hakkari ProvinceHakkari ProvinceHakkâri Province is a province in the south east corner of Turkey. The administrative centre is located in the city of Hakkâri . The province covers an area of 7,121 km² and has a population of 251,302 . The province had a population of 236,581 in 2000.The province was created in 1936 out of...
):- Upper Tiari
- Lower Tiari
- Tkhuma
- Lower BarwariBarwariBarwar also known as Barwari and Barwari Bala, is a region situated in northern Dohuk Governorate in Iraq. The region is populated by Kurds although it was once mainly inhabited by Assyrians with a large Jewish minority.-History:...
- Tal
- Lewin
The Central and Western groups are often grouped together as Ashiret dialects. They, and especially the Western group, have more in common with Chaldean Neo-Aramaic
Chaldean Neo-Aramaic
Chaldean Neo-Aramaic is a Northeastern Neo-Aramaic dialect. Chaldean Neo-Aramaic is spoken on the plain of Mosul in northern Iraq, as well as by the Chaldean communities worldwide. Most speakers are Chaldean Catholics....
than with General Urmian.
Ashiret dialects are often characterised by the presence of the fricatives θ (th) and ð (dh), where other dialects pronounce them either as stops (t and d) or, in the case of the Northern group, often eliding them.
Script
Assyrian is written in the Madnhāyā version of the Syriac alphabetSyriac alphabet
The Syriac alphabet is a writing system primarily used to write the Syriac language from around the 2nd century BC . It is one of the Semitic abjads directly descending from the Aramaic alphabet and shares similarities with the Phoenician, Hebrew, Arabic, and the traditional Mongolian alphabets.-...
, which is also used for classical Syriac. In the 1930s, following the state policy for minority languages of the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
, a Latin alphabet
Latin alphabet
The Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most recognized alphabet used in the world today. It evolved from a western variety of the Greek alphabet called the Cumaean alphabet, which was adopted and modified by the Etruscans who ruled early Rome...
for Assyrian was developed and some material published. However, this innovation did not displace the Syriac script.
See also
- Assyrian peopleAssyrian peopleThe Assyrian people are a distinct ethnic group whose origins lie in ancient Mesopotamia...
- Aramaic languageAramaic languageAramaic is a group of languages belonging to the Afroasiatic language phylum. The name of the language is based on the name of Aram, an ancient region in central Syria. Within this family, Aramaic belongs to the Semitic family, and more specifically, is a part of the Northwest Semitic subfamily,...
- Syriac alphabetSyriac alphabetThe Syriac alphabet is a writing system primarily used to write the Syriac language from around the 2nd century BC . It is one of the Semitic abjads directly descending from the Aramaic alphabet and shares similarities with the Phoenician, Hebrew, Arabic, and the traditional Mongolian alphabets.-...
- Syriac languageSyriac languageSyriac is a dialect of Middle Aramaic that was once spoken across much of the Fertile Crescent. Having first appeared as a script in the 1st century AD after being spoken as an unwritten language for five centuries, Classical Syriac became a major literary language throughout the Middle East from...
External links
- Ethnologue report for Assyrian Neo-Aramaic.
- Semitisches Tonarchiv: Dokumentgruppe "Aramäisch/Neuostaramäisch (christl.)" (text in German).
- Online Assyrian (Sureth) / English-French Dictionary by Association Assyrophile de France