Does anybody in the R&S know what an Assyrian/Chaldean is?

Question

Just wondering.

What do you think Assyrians (Chaldeans) are?
Their beliefs, and such? Where they come from, the language they speak, religion they follow, etc.

I'm writing a thesis on my nationality (I'm Assyrian) and would love feedback.

Oh no, I'm not doing the historical research.

Part of my paper is about how much people actually know of my nationality, another part of how we're mistaken for being Arabic or Muslim. :)

Answer 1

Ancient Assyrians were inhabitants of one the world's earliest civilizations, Mesopotamia, which began to emerge around 3500 B.C. The Assyrians invented the world's first written language and the 360-degree circle, established Hammurabi's code of law, and are credited with many other military, artistic, and architectural achievements. For 300 years Assyrians controlled the entire Fertile Crescent, from the Persian Gulf to Egypt. In 612 B.C., however, Assyria's capital, Nineveh, was besieged and destroyed by a coalition of Medes, Scythians, and Chaldeans, decimating the previously powerful Assyrian Empire.

Modern Assyrians claim descent from the inhabitants of the ancient Assyrian Empire, and linguistic evidence seems to support that contention. Different dialects have developed from ancient Aramaic, a language used within the Assyrian Empire. The modern language is sometimes called Assyrian, but some scholars reserve the terms "Assyrian" and "Babylonian" for the cuneiform writing of the ancient empire. The modern language, then, is generally referred to as "neo-Aramaic," "Chaldean," or "Syriac" and is considered to be 75 percent pure (i.e., ancient) Aramaic. The ancient and modern Assyrian languages belong to the Semitic Language Family. The survival of Syriac as a spoken language is an important indication that the Assyrians have been a cohesive, endogamous group for more than two thousand years.

Religion is an important factor in the identification and description of both ancient and modern Assyrians. Modern Assyrians refer to themselves as "Surayi," which can be translated as either "Assyrian" or "Syrian." Assyrians may be further divided into Assyrian Nestorians and Assyrian Jacobites, some of whom prefer to be called Syrian Aramaeans. In their homelands, the Nestorians are considered the easterners and the Jacobites the westerners. The distinctions between the two are based primarily on religious differences. The term "Nestorian" derives from Nestorius, who was the patriarch of Constantinople from A.D. 428 to 431. Nestorius was condemned for heresy; he and his followers fled from Syria to Persia, where they practiced their distinctive religion for fifteen centuries. The Jacobites are named for Jacobus Baradeus, who was also considered heretical at the Council of Chalcedon in A.D. 451; his followers have kept their faith for as long as the Nestorians.

The ancient split between the Church of the East (Nestorians) and the Church of Antioch (Jacobites), and between these two and the rest of Christianity, has continued to the present. The picture was further complicated when, beginning in the sixteenth century, Christian missionaries from various denominations made their way to the Middle East to convert the indigenous Christians. Their limited success led to a variety of Christian denominations and patriarchs in the Middle East. Some Nestorians have continued to support the Church of the East; others, known as "Chaldeans," converted to Roman Catholicism. Most Jacobites remained with the Church of Antioch, but those who converted to Catholicism are called Syrian Catholics. All four of these groups support a church hierarchy or patriarchy in the homeland.

Geography has also played an important role in the history and culture of the Assyrians, especially Nestorian Assyrians. The geographic heart of Assyria was traditionally located in the north Tigris highlands, north of Babylon and south of Armenia. In classical times, Persia and Byzantium boxed in the mountain Assyrians. Later, they found themselves between Turks and Persians, Kurds and Arabs. After the rise of Islam, the Assyrians were the target of converging Sunni forces from the south and the north and Shiite forces from the east. For security and collective well-being, they took refuge in the rocky Hakkâri Mountains, which served as a natural military fortress.

The Assyrians, or their Nestorian descendants, lived in small villages along the Great Zab River and in the Sapna Valley of northern Iraq, as well as near the shore of Lake Urmia in western Iran until the twentieth century. They survived as a group in this compact, relatively contiguous area for more than 1,500 years. Unfortunately, this area had the great disadvantage of lying within the boundaries of three different states—Turkey, Iraq, and Iran.

Within this environment, the Nestorian Assyrians' subsistence stemmed from irrigation agriculture. Crops included wheat, barley, millet, melons, lentils, and other vegetables. A few sheep, goats, donkeys, and water buffalo were also raised. The staple foods consisted of cereals, vegetables, and milk products. Meat was rarely eaten.

The extended patriarchal family was the primary social and ecomomic unit of the Nestorian Assyrians. Tribal formations sometimes led to internal conflicts, but the constant threat of outside attacks led to internal cohesion and group solidarity. Nestorian Assyrians did not intermarry with other Christians, and intermarriage with Muslims was, generally speaking, not even an option.

Women in ancient Assyria may have received greater status or dignity than their counterparts in other Middle Eastern cultures have since then. In the mid-twentieth century Nestorian women were treated almost as equals with men. For example, most women were considered companions to their husbands and, as such, participated in social gatherings. In Iraq, Assyrian Christian women were often more literate than Muslim men. The patriarchal tradition, however, assured that male predominance in husband-wife relations was the norm.

Because of many factors, including the massacres of 1918 (by Turks and Kurds) and 1933 (by Iraqi Arabs and Kurds), constant battles with the Kurds, forced migrations, forced participation in Iraqi wars, assimilation and "Arabization" into majority cultures, and emigration out of their traditional homeland, the population of the Assyrians in their traditional homeland has dwindled considerably. Additionally, confusion over the terms "Assyrian," "Chaldean," "Nestorian," and "Jacobite"—as well as a lack of consensus over which groups of people they designate—makes counting the Assyrians even more difficult. One estimate of the number of Chaldean Catholic Assyrians in Iraq is 750,000, or 4 percent of the population (1991). From available census counts, there are about 10,000 Assyrians in Syria (interpolated from Grimes 1988), 77,375 in Iraq (1986), 40,000 in Iran (1982), 25,000 in Turkey (1981), and 15,000 in the former Soviet Union (1979). It is estimated that there are also 150,000 Assyrians in the United States (Ishaya and Naby 1980); some Assyrian leaders believe there are about one million Assyrians scattered throughout the world.

In Iraq, the extent to which Assyrians are surviving or accommodating to Arabization attempts is not clear. Outside the Middle East, particularly in the United States, Assyrian group life continues to reflect ancient religious as well as relatively new political divisions. For example, the Syrian Aramaeans of New Jersey are Jacobites, but they prefer to call themselves Syrian rather than Assyrian in order to avoid political implications with which they disagree. Further, some Assyrians are in favor of the establishment of an Assyrian homeland, and some are not.

Answer 2

Well, there are two applications of these terms, both of which have been at least mentioned in previous answers. There are the ancient Chaldeans, from the region of the southern part of what is now Iraq, and the ancient Assyrians, who conquered the entire Mesopotamian area, extending to the Mediterranean (and appear in the Hebrew scriptures).

But nowadays Assyrian/Chaldean refers to a Christian population within Iraq. It is a denonination that has its own independent history (although it has had with some ties both to East Orthodox Christianity and Roman Catholic Christianity).
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Answer 3

Assyria (northern Mesopotamia) was never inhabited by a race of people called ethnically Chaldeans. History books never hinted of any sort of link between the ancient Chaldeans, who lived predominantly in southern Mesopotamia; whose title meant those dealing with sooth saying, Astronomy and astrology, and the modern-day Chaldeans of the Mosul region in north of Iraq. The ancient Chaldeans did not settle in Assyria after the fall of Nineveh at the hands of the Medes and the Babylonians, as the latter were under the rule of the Chaldean kings at the time. On the contrary, history books tell us that the Medes took control of Assyria while the Chaldeans continued to rule southern Mesopotamia and extended their power later into the upper Euphrates in Syria and down to Palestine. In addition, there is no evidence whatsoever that a massive migration of a specific race of people called Chaldeans from southern Mesopotamia to Assyria ever took place.

If there is any link between ancient Babylonians or Chaldeans and any modern people, then that link is represented in the Mandaeans (Subbiyeen). The Mandaeans still preserve many aspects of the ancient Babylonians and Chaldeans and continue to live mainly in mid and southern Iraq.

Modern-day Chaldeans are simply Catholic Assyrians, or yet better put Catholic Nestorian Assyrians. The Nestorian Assyrians who followed Rome and became Catholics were given this title by the Vatican to distinguish them from the Nestorian Assyrians or members of the Church of the East. There is ton of evidence that attest to this simple fact published by educators, scholars, historians, theologists and others representing British, French, Americans, Arabs, Assyrians and others. These accounts came from various religious groups representing Moslems, Jewish, and different Christian denominations including Orthodox, Catholic, Presbyterian, and Church of the East members and others.

Answer 4

I am so sorry. The Assyrians were most known for their brutality. Walls of skulls, burning flesh, pulling limbs, and that's just keeping it Y!A appropriate. In fact in the story of Jonah, the city Jonah wanted to avoid, Ninevah, was the capital of Assyria. As far as empires, they were right after the Polyponesions (sorry if I spell that wrong) and before the Persians. People would bribe them not to fight their cities, but if they didn't, the Assyrians would go into phases of attack in an organized way, after they locked everyone in the city for days, starving and dehydrating them. The only city that escaped was Judah, because iit had it's own water supply. They started middle east, southern europe area. They were polytheistic. That's all I know.

Answer 5

Well, I don't think you should group Assyrians and Chaldeans together.

This can help you with Assyrian people. Even though it says they are also called Chaldeans, I do not believe this is correct. Although it is possible that some Assyrians consider themselves to also be Chaldean and vice versa.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assyrian_people

Answer 6

The Assyrians/Ninevites were the Northern half of Mesopotamians.

The Chaldeans/Babylonians were the Southern half of Mesopotamians.

Answer 7

Western Union does not transfer money outside of India. You can only get inward remitances, outward is not done by them. You will need to have a bank account in India and you can use the services of that bank to route your outward remitances. Its mandatory that you have a bank account in India or you cannot do the needful. If you meant converting INR to US$, then there are authorised money changers like Amex, Thomas Cook, Prithvi Securities etc who can convert INR into US$ either currency or Travelers Checks.

Answer 8

Assyrians invented chariots and succesfully conquered Ancient Egypt at one point. They were a very violent and warlike people back then.

They were located in the middle east.

That's all I know.


Now are you really researching your THESIS on Y!S???
Things must not be going well.


EDIT:
Well then, since you're the expert, how'd I do?

Answer 9

Go to the library (national library) and search about the history of your country .If you defend your thesis from what you have heard , you are not sure whether those are false information or true information. For sure search it from your library.
jtm

Answer 10

Babylonian

Answer 11

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