When the Turks occupied Armenia and Kurdistan in 1514-36, during their wars with Persia, Sultan Selim I. entrusted the organ ization of these practically independent countries to Mullah Idris, a Kurd of Bitlis. Idris transferred many Kurdish clans into the Arax valley, and Arab Sheikh families into the Kurdish tribes, to convert them to the Sunni faith. Although the Turks conferred honours on Kurdish chiefs the sympathy of the Kurds remained always with Persia, and by close co-operation with their Chris tian neighbours the Kurds waged unceasing warfare against the Turks for the maintenance of their independence. Led by Bedz khan Bey of Bohtan, the Yezidi chief of Revanduz and of Hak kiari, the tribes rose against the Turkish reforms, and from 1832 to 1847 the Turks sent army after army to overcome those courageous tribes and destroy their castles. Many of the Kurdish Derebeys (Lords of Valleys) were replaced by Turkish governors.
In order to disrupt the unwritten pact of friendship between the Kurds and their Christian neighbours, Abdul Hamid organized in 189o, in his own name, cavalry divisions from the Kurds, which became a scourge to all indiscriminately. This privileged Kurd ish force considerably retarded the growth of national self-con sciousness among the Kurds and produced hostile feeling between them and the Armenians. (See ARMENIA.) With the downfall of Abdul Hamid, the Kurdish cavalry was suppressed in 1909, and more enlightened Kurds came forward to lead their people. Several Kurdish deputies in the Ottoman cham ber and senate took up the national cause. Kurdish newspapers and party clubs were established in Constantinople, Baghdad and Mosul to cultivate a common language for the use of all Kurds. The Young Turks waged war against Ibrahim Pasha of the Millis, the Sheikh Barzani near Mosul, the Hamavends and the tribes of Dersim.
At the Peace Conference in Paris in 1919 Sherif Pasha, a Kurd, represented the claims of the Kurdish race, demanding inde pendence from Turkey. In the Treaty of Sevres, Kurdistan was defined as a narrow strip of territory lying between the southern frontier of Armenia and Northern 'Iraq. The Treaty of Lausanne
did not mention Kurdistan; it left the delimitation of the north ern boundary of 'Iraq to a friendly agreement between Great Brit ain and Turkey; failing this, the dispute was to be solved by the Council of the League of Nations. (See Mosul.) While the Council of the League was discussing this essentially Kurdish problem a Kurdish rebellion broke out in Turkey in Feb. 1925, having Ginj and other middle Taurus heights as its centre. Sheikh Said, followed by some well-known tribal chiefs, had initial successes. The Turks collected regular troops and, after short and decisive assaults, broke the Kurdish rebellion and cap tured the ringleaders. A Turkish court martial was set up at Diarbekr, which condemned to death Sheikh Said, Dr. Fuad and 46 other Kurdish nationalist leaders. They were all executed in Aug. 1925. The President of the Turkish court martial stated later that the rebellion had a purely nationalist motive. Since then the Turkish Republican Government has passed a law transferring the Kurdish leaders from their historic homes in Bohtan Sasun and Bayazid to the unhealthy coasts of Anatolia. Intermittent warfare still goes on.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.-Sharafeddin, Sharaf-Namah or Pastes de la nation Kourde, 4 vols. ; trans. into French by F. Charmoy (St. Petersburg, 1869) ; Rich, Narrative of a Residence in Koordistan (1836) ; Wagner, Reise nach Persien and dem Lande der Kurden (1852) ; Millingen, Wild Life among Koords (187o) ; Binder, Au Kurdistan (1887) ; Hiising, "Der Zagros and seine Volker," in Der Alte orient, Hefte 3-4 (1908) ; Tusti, Kurdische Grammatik, (188o) ; Hartmann, "Bohtan," in Mitt. d. Vorderas. Ges. (1896-97) Prym and Socin, Kurdische Sammlungen (189o) ; Jaha, Dict. Kurde Francais (1879) ; Houtum-Schindler, "Beitrage zum Kurd. Worbs Schatze," in Zeits d. morg. Ges., vols. xxxviii. and xlii. (1884 and 1888) ; Sykes, Kurdish Tribes in the Ottoman Empire ; Shahbaz, Armenian-Kurdish relations (in Armenian) , 191o; Soane, Elementary Kurmanji Grammar (1919) ; Jardine, Bandinan Kurmanji Grammar (1922) ; Soane, To Mesop. and Kurdistan in Disguise (1922); Safrastian, Kurds: their Origins and History (full biblio.) (1928). (A. S.)