Qirsh :
There is no such language in existence called Assyrian. The last time Assyrian was spoken was 600 BC.
The reason some people call the Syriac language "Assyrian" stems from a deliberate effort by the British Mandate in the late 19th and early 20th centuries to fabricate an ethnicity out of a religious sect called Nestorianism.
For over a thousand years, these communities were universally known as Nestorians, a designation consistently recorded in every Ottoman census (see Ottoman records from 1830 to 1914). Historical accounts from all periods also identify them as Nestorians, never as Assyrians.
However, the British convinced the Nestorians to rebrand themselves as "Assyrian," despite having no linguistic, cultural, or genetic ties to the ancient Assyrian civilization. Linguistically, they speak Aramaic not Akkadian, the language of the Assyrians. Culturally, their traditions clothing, dances, and music are unmistakenly Kurdish. Genetically, they are a mix of Kurdish, Armenian, Georgian, Greek, Indian, and other groups who joined the Nestorian Church at various points in history.
Yet today, a new generation has been misled into believing they are ethnically Assyrian, falsely linking themselves to an extinct civilization to which they have no real connection.
2025-08-26 02:40:00