Survival Among The Kurds

This is an expanded and updated edition of "The Yezidis" by John S. Guest, published by Kegan Paul International in 1987. It has been revised and reissued in response to interest in the Kurdish people, of whom the Yezidis are a sect. The 150,000 members of the Yezidi religious group are spread out over Iraq, Turkey, Syria and the former USSR - and have, despite persecutions and discrimination, retained their identity for over 500 years. The author of this history of the Yezidis traces the origin of their religion, describes the discovery of the people by Western travellers in the early nineteenth century and details the Yezidi community's traumatic recent history and its present status. The Yezidis believe that Lucifer, the fallen angel, has been forgiven by God and reinstated as chief angel: their history, like their faith, is characterized by dignity and survival in the face of great odds. Chapters also cover Sultan Abdul Hamid's cruel but vain efforts to force the Yezidis to embrace Islam, leading to the emergence of Mayan Khatun, a strong-willed Yezidi princess who ruled the community from 1913 to 1958. An epilogue reviews the present status of the Yezidi community, with the last chapter focusing on how the Yezidis are faring in the post-Communist Armenia in 1992.