Bradost

Bradost or Baradust[1] name of a Kurdish tribe, region, mountain range, river, and amirate. the tribe inhabit a vast geographical area located in the middle of historic Kurdistan, in the region between Iraq and Iran's borders. Sidakan District in Iraq is one of the largest areas inhabited by the Bradost clan. In Iran, the clan inhabited Sumai Bradost, Doll (Dizadj), Berdasor, Dimdim Castle, Mergever and Tergever. Those in the Bradost clan speak a Kurmanci dialect. The clan formed a powerful principality around Urmia. The Battle of DimDim[2] in 1609 was fought between the Bradost Prince Amir Khan Lepzerin and Shah Abbas.

Geo-History of Bradost

The tribe, lives in sidakan subdistrict (ناحيه-nahia‌) of Soran District (قضاء-qaza) in Arbil Governorate (muhafaza-محافظه‌), Iraq. They are Sunni Muslim and some Christians, speak the Kurmanji dialect of Kurdish mixed with the neighboring Sorani dialects. According to Bedlisi,[3][4] the tribe must have been much larger, occupying the entire region to the west of Lake Urmia. The region comprised, in the early 11th/late 16th century, several sub-districts (nahias) including Targavar, Margavar, Dol, Sumay, and Urmia.[5] The Ottoman-Persian frontier of 1639, which survived until World War I and forms the present boundary of Iran with Turkey and Iraq, divided Bradost territory into two parts. In the late 13th/19th-century administrative division of the Ottoman empire, Bradost was a nahia of Rawanduz qaza, shahrazur sanjaq, Mosul weleyat (.[6] Following the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire, this nahia was officially incorporated into Iraq in 1925, where it had 108 villages with a population of 5,185 in 1957.[7] Under the Qajar dynasty, the western limits of Margavar, Dasht, Targavar, Baradost, and Sumay formed part of the often disputed Ottoman-Persian frontier.[8] In the administrative redivision of Iran under the Pahlavis, the boundaries of the traditional nahias or mahal of Bradost, Targavar, Margavar, Dol, and Somay were left more or less intact forming dehestans دهستان of Urmia (.[9] The decennial census of 2006 counted 63 villages with a population of 40189 in Bradost dehestan.[10] The snow-fed Bradost river rises in the peaks of the mountain range along the Iran-Turkey border, flows through Baradost territory, and, joined by other headwaters, forms Nazluchay, which discharges into Lake Urmia to the northeast of the city of Urmia ([11]).

Bradost amirate

The formation of Bradost amirate was part of the process of the rise of Kurdish political power in the form of small dynasties and numerous (semi-)independent amirates that appeared all over Kurdistan in the 10th-11th/15th-16th centuries, Bedlisi related the founders of the principalities to the Hasanwayhid dynasty (348-406/959-1015, q.v.) and divided them into two lines—the amirs of Somay and those of Targavar and Qala Dawud (Dimdim) ([12]). At the climax of its power, the amirate’s domain extended from the western shores of Lake Urmia to parts of the welayats of Arbil, Baghdad, and Diyarbakır ([13]).

The hereditary rule of Bradost, like that of other amirates, was, however, soon threatened by the centralizing and expansionist policies of the Ottoman and Safavid empires, which turned Kurdistan into a battlefield for more than three centuries. To protect their sovereignty, Bradost princes put up continued resistance to both empires though they often relied on one against the other. Thus, after initial opposition to Shah Esmail’s efforts to establish his authority over the area, the powerful Bradost amir Ghazi Qeren (امير غازى قران) rallied to the Safavids ([14]). However, after the famous Ottoman-Safavid battle of Chalderan (q.v.) (920/1514), the principality switched allegiance to the victorious Ottoman side.

The Gold-Hand Khan

Shah Abbas I (996-1038/1588-1629, q.v.) initially recognized the hereditary rule of Bradost princes though relations deteriorated and Amir Khan Bradost ( Khani Lepzerin, “The Gold-Hand Khan”خانى له‌پزێرين) revolted against the shah in the fortress of Dimdim (Kurd. دمدم) in 1017/1609. The neighboring Mokri principality joined forces with the Bradost throughout the revolt, which has become a major theme of Kurdish folklore and literature([15]) and is also described in an eyewitness report by the shah’s chronicler Eskandar Beg ([16]).

To undermine the growing power of the Kurdish element, the Safavid and Qajar monarchs sent numerous punitive expeditions to the area, massacred the population of Mokrī principality ([17]), transferred thousands of Kurds ([18]) from the western lake area, and resettled there the Turkish tribes of Afshar and Qarapapagh ([19]). By the late 13th/mid-19th century, when Qajar and Ottoman state power was extended to all parts of Kurdistan, the principality had already disintegrated. Conflicts with the central government continued, however, and once more the entire territory of West Azerbaijan came under the rule of the Shikak tribe led by Esmail Agha Simko, “Semītqu”. tha last prince of Bradost dynasty was Abdullah Beg Benari who ruled a small area near Margavar and formed an alliance with Chief Simko Shikak during 1915-1930. Princely families and tribal organization have largely disappeared since World War II, giving way to modern party organization of Kurdish nationalism .

See also

External links

References

  1. ↑ http://www.tutiempo.net/Tierra/Irak/Baradust-IZ005402.html
  2. ↑ DIMDIM
  3. ↑ Amir Šaraf Khan Bedlīsī, Šaraf-nāma, ed. M. ʿAbbāsī, Tehran, 1343 Š./1964
  4. ↑ [(Sharafnameh تاريخ شرفنامه-‌بدليسي, pp. 382-88)]
  5. ↑ [Bedlīsīتاريخ شرفنامه-‌بدليسي ‌, pp. 382-88]
  6. ↑ Cuinet, La Turquie d’Asie II, Paris, 1892, p. 846
  7. ↑ Iraq Republic, Wezārat al-Dāḵelīya, Modīrīyat al-Nofūs al-ʿĀmma, al-Majmūʿa al-eḥṣāʾīya le-tasjīl ʿamm 1957; Sokkān al-qorā le-alwīat al-Mūṣel wa’l- Solaymānīya wa Arbīl wa Karkūk wa Dīālā, Baghdad, 1961, pp. 234-42
  8. ↑ (Jaʿfar Khan Mohandesbāšī Mošīr-al-Dawla, Resāla-ye taḥqīqāt-e sarḥaddīya, Tehran, 1348 Š./1969, p. 150)
  9. ↑ Ketāb-e asāmī-e dehāt-e kešvar, Wezārat-e Kešvar, Edāra-ye Koll-e Āmār wa Ṯabt-e Aḥwāl, vol. 1, 1329 Š./1950, pp. 460-73)
  10. ↑ http://www.amar.org.ir/portal/faces/public/census85/census85.natayej/census85.abadipage پایگاه اینترنتی مرکز آمار ایران
  11. ↑ Times Atlas, pl. 37; Gazetteer of Iran I, map I-11-B
  12. ↑ Amir Šaraf Khan Bedlīsī, Šaraf-nāma, ed. M. ʿAbbāsī, Tehran, 1343 Š./1964pp. 384-88
  13. ↑ http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/baradust-kurdish-bradost-name-of-kurdish-tribe-region-mountain-range-river-and-amirate
  14. ↑ Amir Šaraf Khan Bedlīsī, Šaraf-nāma, ed. M. ʿAbbāsī, Tehran, 1343 Š./1964, pp. 382-83
  15. ↑ D. Dzh. Dzhalilov, Kurdskiĭ geroicheskiĭ èpos “Zlatorukiĭ Khan,” Moscow, 1967
  16. ↑ Eskandar Monšī Torkmān, Tārīḵ-eʿālamārā-ye ʿabbāsī, Tehran, 1350 Š./1971-72.pp. 791-801, 807-11
  17. ↑ Eskandar Monšī Torkmān, Tārīḵ-eʿālamārā-ye ʿabbāsī, Tehran, 1350 Š./1971-72., pp. 811-14
  18. ↑ J. Perry, “Forced Migration in Iran during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,” Iranian Studies 8/4, 1975,, pp. 205, 208, 209
  19. ↑ Mīrzā Rašīd Adīb-al-Šoʿarāʾ, Tārīḵ-eAfšār, ed. P. Šahrīār Afšār and M. Rāmīān, Tabrīz, 1346 Š./1967 pp. 49-55
  20. ↑ http://www.christoph-lode.de/content/sonntag-12-juli