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99-567: The forerunners of the Mountain Jewish community have inhabited Ancient Persia since the 5th century BCE. The language spoken by Mountain Jews, called Judeo-Tat , is an ancient Southwest Iranian language which integrates many elements of Ancient Hebrew . It is believed that Mountain Jews in Persia, as early as the 8th century BCE, continued to migrate east; settling in mountainous areas of

198-730: A casus belli to attack the Empire. After many gains, the Sassanians were defeated at Issus, Constantinople, and finally Nineveh, resulting in peace. With the conclusion of the over 700 years lasting Roman–Persian Wars through the climactic Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628 , which included the very siege of the Byzantine capital of Constantinople , the war-exhausted Persians lost the Battle of al-Qādisiyyah (632) in Hilla (present-day Iraq ) to

297-703: A Jewish teip , the Zhugtii. In Chechen society, ethnic minorities residing in areas demographically dominated by Chechens have the option of forming a teip in order to properly participate in the developments of Chechen society such as making alliances and gaining representation in the Mekhk Khell , a supreme ethnonational council that is occasionally compared to a parliament. Teips of minority-origin have also been made by ethnic Poles, Germans, Georgians, Armenians, Kumyks, Russians, Kalmyks, Circassians, Andis, Avars, Dargins, Laks, Persians, Arabs, Ukrainians and Nogais, with

396-577: A canal between the Nile and the Red Sea , a forerunner of the modern Suez Canal . He improved the extensive road system, and it is during his reign that mentions are first made of the Royal Road (shown on map), a great highway stretching all the way from Susa to Sardis with posting stations at regular intervals. Major reforms took place under Darius. Coinage , in the form of the daric (gold coin) and

495-725: A commentary on the Mishneh Torah of Maimonides . Rabbi Mattathia ben Shmuel ha-Kohen wrote his kabbalistic essay "Kol Hamevaser" in Aba-Sava. With the brutal destruction of Aba-Sava in roughly 1800 CE, however, the religious center of Mountain Jews moved to Derbent . Prominent rabbis of Mountain Jews in the nineteenth century included: Rabbi Gershom son of Rabbi Reuven of Qırmızı Qəsəbə , Shalom ben Melek of Temir-Khan-Shura (today known as Buynaksk ), Chief Rabbi of Dagestan Jacob ben Isaac, and Rabbi Hizkiyahu ben Avraam of Nalchik , whose son, Rabbi Nahamiil ben Hizkiyahu, later played

594-672: A community after Qajar Iran ceded the areas in which they lived to the Russian Empire per the Treaty of Gulistan of 1813. Mountain Jews have an oral tradition, passed down from generation to generation, that they are descended from the Ten Lost Tribes exiled by the king of Assyria (Ashur), who ruled over northern Iraq from Mosul (across the Tigris River from the ancient city of Nineveh ). The reference most likely

693-563: A crucial role in saving Nalchik's Jewish community from the Nazis . In the early decades of the Soviet Union, the government took steps to suppress religion . Thus, in the 1930s, the Soviet Union closed synagogues belonging to Mountain Jews. The same procedures were implemented among other ethnicities and religions. Soviet authorities propagated the myth that Mountain Jews were not part of the world's Jewish people at all, but rather members of

792-738: A key player in Middle Eastern and global geopolitics. The earliest archaeological artifacts in Iran were found in the Kashafrud and Ganj Par sites that are thought to date back to 10,000 years ago in the Middle Paleolithic. Mousterian stone tools made by Neanderthals have also been found. There are more cultural remains of Neanderthals dating back to the Middle Paleolithic period, which mainly have been found in

891-612: A number of historians who see the rule of the Umayyads as setting up the "dhimmah" to increase taxes from the dhimmis to benefit the Muslim Arab community financially and by discouraging conversion. Governors lodged complaints with the caliph when he enacted laws that made conversion easier, depriving the provinces of revenues. In the 7th century, when many non-Arabs such as Persians entered Islam, they were recognized as mawali ("clients") and treated as second-class citizens by

990-535: A period of more than 400 years, Iran was once again one of the leading powers in the world, alongside its neighbouring rival, the Roman and then Byzantine Empires . The empire's territory, at its height, encompassed all of today's Iran, Iraq , Azerbaijan , Armenia , Georgia , Abkhazia , Dagestan , Lebanon , Jordan , Palestine , Israel , parts of Afghanistan , Turkey , Syria , parts of Pakistan , Central Asia , Eastern Arabia , and parts of Egypt . Most of

1089-575: A propagandist and then to revolt on their behalf. He took Merv defeating the Umayyad governor there Nasr ibn Sayyar . He became the de facto Abbasid governor of Khurasan. During the same period, the Dabuyid ruler Khurshid declared independence from the Umayyads but was shortly forced to recognize Abbasid authority. In 750, Abu Muslim became the leader of the Abbasid army and defeated the Umayyads at

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1188-608: A settlement was first founded possibly as early as 4395 cal BC) and settlements such as Chogha Mish , dating back to 6800 BC; there are 7,000-year-old jars of wine excavated in the Zagros Mountains (now on display at the University of Pennsylvania ) and ruins of 7000-year-old settlements such as Tepe Sialk are further testament to that. The two main Neolithic Iranian settlements were Ganj Dareh and

1287-465: A time right after the establishment of the ancient Sumerian city of Uruk in 4500 BC. The general perception among archaeologists is that Susa was an extension of the Sumerian city-state of Uruk , hence incorporating many aspects of Mesopotamian culture. In its later history, Susa became the capital of Elam, which emerged as a state founded 4000 BC. There are also dozens of prehistoric sites across

1386-686: A unified empire of the Medes and Persians, leading to the Achaemenid Empire (c.550–330 BC). Cyrus the Great overthrew, in turn, the Median , Lydian , and Neo-Babylonian empires, creating an empire far larger than Assyria. He was better able, through more benign policies, to reconcile his subjects to Persian rule; the longevity of his empire was one result. The Persian king, like the Assyrian ,

1485-603: Is also evident in their culture and language. By the early 17th century, Mountain Jews formed many small settlements throughout the mountain valleys of Dagestan . One valley, located 10 km south of Derbent , close to the shore of the Caspian Sea , was predominantly populated by Mountain Jews. Their Muslim neighbors called this area "Jewish Valley". The Jewish Valley grew to be a semi-independent Jewish state, with its spiritual and political center located in its largest settlement of Aba-Sava (1630–1800). The valley prospered until

1584-467: Is mostly based in the standard liturgy, for prayer and the celebration of holidays. Celebratory music played during weddings and similar events is typically upbeat with various instruments to add layers to the sound. Ancient Persia The history of Iran (or Persia , as it was known in the Western world) is intertwined with Greater Iran , a sociocultural region spanning from Anatolia to

1683-611: Is support for the revival of the Judeo-Tat-language theater and the publication of newspapers in that language. "And we, the Tats We, Samson warriors, Bar Kochba's heirs... we went into battles and bitterly, heroically struggled for our freedom -"The Song of the Mountain Jews" Mountain Jews have a military tradition and have been historically viewed as fierce warriors. Some historians suggest that

1782-649: Is to Shalmaneser , the King of Assyria mentioned in II Kings 18:9–12. According to local Jewish tradition, some 19,000 Jews departed Jerusalem (used here as a generic term for the Land of Israel) and passed through Syria, Babylonia, and Persia and then, heading north, entered into Media. Mountain Jews maintained a strong military tradition. For this reason, some historians believe they may be descended from Jewish military colonists, settled by Parthian and Sassanid rulers in

1881-602: The Babylonian king Nabopolassar invaded Assyria and laid siege to and eventually destroyed Nineveh , the Assyrian capital, which led to the fall of the Neo-Assyrian Empire . Urartu was later on conquered and dissolved as well by the Medes. The Medes are credited with founding Iran as a nation and empire, and established the first Iranian empire, the largest of its day until Cyrus the Great established

1980-615: The Battle of the Zab . Abu Muslim stormed Damascus , the capital of the Umayyad caliphate, later that year. The Abbasid army consisted primarily of Khorasanians and was led by an Iranian general, Abu Muslim Khorasani . It contained both Iranian and Arab elements, and the Abbasids enjoyed both Iranian and Arab support. The Abbasids overthrew the Umayyads in 750. According to Amir Arjomand, the Abbasid Revolution essentially marked

2079-728: The First Persian invasion of Greece , the Persian general Mardonius re-subjugated Thrace and made Macedon a full part of Persia. The war eventually turned out in defeat, however. Darius' successor Xerxes I launched the Second Persian invasion of Greece . At a crucial moment in the war, about half of mainland Greece was overrun by the Persians, including all territories to the north of the Isthmus of Corinth , however, this

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2178-961: The Indus River and from the Caucasus to the Persian Gulf . Central to this area is modern-day Iran , which covers the bulk of the Iranian plateau . Iran is home to one of the world's oldest continuous major civilizations, with historical and urban settlements dating back to 4000 BC. The western part of the Iranian plateau participated in the traditional ancient Near East with Elam (in Ilam and Khuzestan ), Kassites (in Kuhdesht ), Gutians (in Luristan ) and later with other peoples such as

2277-691: The Iranian plateau before the emergence of Iranian peoples during the Early Iron Age . The Early Bronze Age saw the rise of urbanization into organized city-states and the invention of writing (the Uruk period ) in the Near East. While Bronze Age Elam made use of writing from an early time, the Proto-Elamite script remains undeciphered, and records from Sumer pertaining to Elam are scarce. Russian historian Igor M. Diakonoff stated that

2376-658: The Islamic Republic of Iran led to the restructuring of its political system, with Ayatollah Khomeini as the Supreme Leader. Iran's foreign relations have been shaped by the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988), ongoing tensions with the United States, and its nuclear program, which has been a point of contention in international diplomacy. Despite economic sanctions and internal challenges, Iran remains

2475-605: The Macedonians , Arabs , Turks , and Mongols . Despite these invasions, Iran continually reasserted its national identity and developed as a distinct political and cultural entity. The Muslim conquest of Persia (632–654) ended the Sasanian Empire and marked a turning point in Iranian history, leading to the Islamization of Iran from the eighth to tenth centuries and the decline of Zoroastrianism . However,

2574-602: The Neo-Assyrian Empire and its records of incursions from the Iranian plateau. As early as the 20th century BC, tribes came to the Iranian plateau from the Pontic–Caspian steppe . The arrival of Iranians on the Iranian plateau forced the Elamites to relinquish one area of their empire after another and to take refuge in Elam, Khuzestan and the nearby area, which only then became coterminous with Elam. Bahman Firuzmandi say that

2673-560: The Tat community that settled in the region. Soviet antisemitic rhetoric was intensified during Khrushchev 's rule. Some of the synagogues were later reopened in the 1940s. The closing of the synagogues in the 1930s was part of a communist ideology that resisted religion of any kind. At the beginning of the 1950s, there were synagogues in all major Mountain Jewish communities. By 1966, reportedly six synagogues remained; some were confiscated by

2772-767: The Urartians (in Oshnavieh and Sardasht ) in the southwest of Lake Urmia and Mannaeans (in Piranshahr , Saqqez and Bukan ) in the Kurdish area. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel called the Persians the "first Historical People". The Iranian empire began in the Iron Age with the rise of the Medes , who unified Iran as a nation and empire in 625 BC. The Achaemenid Empire (550–330 BC), founded by Cyrus

2871-624: The history of Islam . Iran functioned again as a leading world power, especially in rivalry with the Ottoman Empire . In the 19th century, Iran lost significant territories in the Caucasus to the Russian Empire following the Russo-Persian Wars . Iran remained a monarchy until the 1979 Iranian Revolution , when it officially became an Islamic republic on 1 April 1979. Since then, Iran has experienced significant political, social, and economic changes. The establishment of

2970-597: The shekel (silver coin) was standardized (coinage had already been invented over a century before in Lydia c. 660 BC but not standardized), and administrative efficiency increased. The Old Persian language appears in royal inscriptions, written in a specially adapted version of the cuneiform script . Under Cyrus the Great and Darius I , the Persian Empire eventually became the largest empire in human history up until that point, ruling and administrating over most of

3069-538: The 4th millennium BC. There is a large quantity of objects decorated with highly distinctive engravings of animals, mythological figures, and architectural motifs. The objects and their iconography are considered unique. Many are made from chlorite , a grey-green soft stone; others are in copper , bronze , terracotta , and even lapis lazuli . Recent excavations at the sites have produced the world's earliest inscription which pre-dates Mesopotamian inscriptions. There are records of numerous other ancient civilizations on

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3168-608: The 9th century. Shortly thereafter the real power of the Abbasid caliphs began to wane; eventually, they became religious figureheads while the warrior slaves ruled. Aoul An aul ( / ˈ ɔː l / ; lit.   ' village ' ) is a type of fortified village or town found throughout the Caucasus mountains and Central Asia . They are generally built out of stone, on faces of ridges or against cliffs in order to provide protection against surprise attacks. Houses are usually two stories high, and they are staggered to make it virtually impossible for enemies to get anywhere on

3267-552: The Caucasus as frontier guards against nomadic incursions from the Pontic steppe . A 2002 study by geneticist Dror Rosengarten found that the paternal haplotypes of Mountain Jews "were shared with other Jewish communities and were consistent with a Mediterranean origin." In addition, Y-DNA testing of Mountain Jews has shown they have Y-DNA haplotypes related to those of other Jewish communities. The Semitic origin of Mountain Jews

3366-586: The Caucasus, have inhabited the Caucasus since the fifth century CE. Being the descendants of the Persian Jews of Iran , their migration from Persia proper to the Caucasus took place in the Sasanian era (224–651). It is believed that they arrived in Persia from ancient Israel as early as the 8th century BCE. Other sources attest that Mountain Jews were present in the region of Azerbaijan at least since 457 BCE. However, Mountain Jews only took shape as

3465-492: The Caucasus. Mountain Jews survived numerous historical vicissitudes by settling in extremely remote and mountainous areas. They were known to be accomplished warriors and horseback riders. Mountain Jews are distinct from Georgian Jews of the Caucasus Mountains . The two groups are culturally differentiated: they speak different languages and have many differences in customs and culture. Mountain Jews, or Jews of

3564-735: The European Scythians around the Danube river. In 512/511 BC, Macedon became a vassal kingdom of Persia. In 499 BC, Athens lent support to a revolt in Miletus , which resulted in the sacking of Sardis . This led to an Achaemenid campaign against mainland Greece known as the Greco-Persian Wars , which lasted the first half of the 5th century BC, and is known as one of the most important wars in European history . In

3663-470: The German teip having been formed as recently as the 1940s when Germans in Siberian exile living among Chechens assimilated. Mountain Jews have also settled in the territory of modern Azerbaijan. The main Mountain Jewish settlement in Azerbaijan was and remains Qırmızı Qəsəbə , also called Jerusalem of the Caucasus. In Russian, Qırmızı Qəsəbə was once called Еврейская Слобода (translit. Yevreyskaya Sloboda ), "Jewish Village"; but during Soviet times it

3762-420: The Great (r. 712–728), managed to hold his domains during his long struggle against the Arab general Yazid ibn al-Muhallab , who was defeated by a combined Dailamite-Dabuyid army, and was forced to retreat from Tabaristan. With the death of the Umayyad Caliph Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik in 743, the Islamic world was launched into civil war. Abu Muslim was sent to Khorasan by the Abbasid Caliphate initially as

3861-408: The Great , was the largest empire the world had seen, spanning from the Balkans to North Africa and Central Asia . They were succeeded by the Seleucid , Parthian , and Sasanian empires, who governed Iran for almost 1,000 years, making Iran a leading power once again. Persia's arch-rival during this time was the Roman Empire and its successor, the Byzantine Empire . Iran endured invasions by

3960-439: The Hebrew sound " ayin " (ע), whereas no neighboring languages have it. Until the early Soviet period, the language was written with semi-cursive Hebrew alphabet . Later, Judeo-Tat books, newspapers, textbooks, and other materials were printed with a Latin alphabet and finally in Cyrillic, which is still most common today. The first Judeo-Tat-language newspaper, Zakhmetkesh (Working People), was published in 1928 and operated until

4059-538: The Iberian Peninsula) nor Ashkenazim (from Central Europe) but rather of Persian Jewish origin, and most of them follow Edot HaMizrach customs. Mountain Jews tenaciously held to their religion throughout the centuries, developing their own unique traditions and religious practices. Mountain Jewish traditions are infused with teachings of Kabbalah and Jewish mysticism . Mountain Jews have also developed and retained unique customs different from other Jews, such as govgil , an end-of- Passover picnic celebration involving

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4158-418: The Iranian plateau pointing to the existence of ancient cultures and urban settlements in the fourth millennium BC. One of the earliest civilizations on the Iranian plateau was the Jiroft culture in southeastern Iran in the province of Kerman . It is one of the most artefact-rich archaeological sites in the Middle East. Archaeological excavations in Jiroft led to the discovery of several objects belonging to

4257-462: The Mountain Jews to collective farms , but allowed them to continue their traditional cultivation of grapes, tobacco, and vegetables; and making wine. In practical terms, the Jews are no longer isolated from other ethnic groups. With increasing urbanization and sovietization in progress, by the 1930s, a layer of intelligentsia began to form. By the late 1960s, academic professionals, such as pharmacists, medical doctors, and engineers, were common in

4356-526: The Parthian cavalry was most notably feared by the Roman soldiers, which proved pivotal in the crushing Roman defeat at the Battle of Carrhae . On the other hand, the Parthians found it difficult to occupy conquered areas as they were unskilled in siege warfare. Because of these weaknesses, neither the Romans nor the Parthians were able completely to annex each other's territory. The Parthian empire subsisted for five centuries, longer than most Eastern Empires. The end of this empire came at last in 224 AD, when

4455-433: The Roman Empire. During this time, the Sassanian and Romano-Byzantine armies clashed for influence in Anatolia, the western Caucasus (mainly Lazica and the Kingdom of Iberia ; modern-day Georgia and Abkhazia ), Mesopotamia , Armenia and the Levant. Under Justinian I, the war came to an uneasy peace with payment of tribute to the Sassanians. However, the Sasanians used the deposition of the Byzantine emperor Maurice as

4554-454: The Romans at the Battle of Edessa in 260 and took emperor Valerian prisoner for the remainder of his life. Eastern Arabia was conquered early on. During Khosrow II 's rule in 590–628, Egypt , Jordan , Palestine and Lebanon were also annexed to the Empire. The Sassanians called their empire Erânshahr ("Dominion of the Aryans", i.e., of Iranians ). A chapter of Iran's history followed after roughly six hundred years of conflict with

4653-452: The Russian invasion and indiscriminate bombardment of civilian population by the Russian military. Despite historically close relations between Jews and Chechens, many also suffered high rate of kidnappings and violence at the hands of armed ethnic Chechen gangs who ransomed their freedom to "Israel and the international Jewish community". Many Mountain Jews emigrated to Israel or the United States. Today, Qırmızı Qəsəbə in Azerbaijan remains

4752-409: The Sasanian Empire and led to the eventual decline of the Zoroastrian religion in Persia. Over time, the majority of Iranians converted to Islam. Most of the aspects of the previous Persian civilizations were not discarded but were absorbed by the new Islamic polity. As Bernard Lewis has commented: "These events have been variously seen in Iran: by some as a blessing, the advent of the true faith,

4851-405: The Sasanian Empire's lifespan was overshadowed by the frequent Byzantine–Sasanian wars , a continuation of the Roman–Parthian Wars and the all-comprising Roman–Persian Wars ; the last was the longest-lasting conflict in human history. Started in the first century BC by their predecessors, the Parthians, and Romans, the last Roman–Persian War was fought in the seventh century. The Persians defeated

4950-644: The Sasanian throne under the two prominent generals Bahrām Chōbin and Shahrbaraz , it remained loyal to the Sasanians during their struggle against the Arabs, but the Mihrans were eventually betrayed and defeated by their own kinsmen, the House of Ispahbudhan , under their leader Farrukhzad , who had mutinied against Yazdegerd III. Yazdegerd III fled from one district to another until a local miller killed him for his purse at Merv in 651. By 674, Muslims had conquered Greater Khorasan (which included modern Iranian Khorasan province and modern Afghanistan and parts of Transoxiana ). The Muslim conquest of Persia ended

5049-424: The Sassanian Persians into the broader Muslim world. In 633, when the Sasanian king Yazdegerd III was ruling over Iran, the Muslims under Umar invaded the country right after it had been in a bloody civil war. Several Iranian nobles and families such as king Dinar of the House of Karen , and later Kanarangiyans of Khorasan , mutinied against their Sasanian overlords. Although the House of Mihran had claimed

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5148-449: The Soviet Union, Mountain Jews experienced a significant religious revival, with increasing religious observance by members of the younger generation. Mountain Jews speak Judeo-Tat , also called Juhuri, a form of Persian ; it belongs to the southwestern group of the Iranian division of the Indo-European languages . Judeo-Tat has Semitic (Hebrew/Aramaic/Arabic) elements on all linguistic levels. Among other Semitic elements, Judeo-Tat has

5247-402: The Soviet authorities. While Mountain Jews observed the rituals of circumcision , marriage and burial, as well as Jewish holidays , other precepts of Jewish faith were observed less carefully. Yet, the community's ethnic identity remained unshaken despite the Soviet efforts. Cases of intermarriage with Muslims in Azerbaijan or Dagestan were rare as both groups practice endogamy. After the fall of

5346-499: The Zagros Mountains region in western Iran. Around about the same time, the earliest-known clay vessels and modelled human and animal terracotta figurines were produced at Ganj Dareh, also in western Iran. There are also 10,000-year-old human and animal figurines from Tepe Sarab in Kermanshah Province among many other ancient artefacts. The south-western part of Iran was part of the Fertile Crescent where most of humanity's first major crops were grown, in villages such as Susa (where

5445-691: The Zagros region and fewer in central Iran at sites such as Kobeh, Kunji, Bisitun Cave , Tamtama, Warwasi , and Yafteh Cave. In 1949, a Neanderthal radius was discovered by Carleton S. Coon in Bisitun Cave. Evidence for Upper Paleolithic and Epipaleolithic periods are known mainly from the Zagros Mountains in the caves of Kermanshah and Khorramabad and a few number of sites in Piranshahr , Alborz and Central Iran . During this time, people began creating rock art . Early agricultural communities such as Chogha Golan in 10,000 BC along with settlements such as Chogha Bonut (the earliest village in Elam) in 8000 BC, began to flourish in and around

5544-408: The achievements of prior Persian civilizations were absorbed into the new Islamic polity. Iran suffered invasions by nomadic tribes during the Late Middle Ages and early modern period , negatively impacting the region. Iran was reunified as an independent state in 1501 by the Safavid dynasty , which established Shia Islam as the empire's official religion, marking a significant turning point in

5643-428: The area brought the Nalchik community under its protection. The Mountain Jewish community of Nalchik was the largest Mountain Jewish community occupied by Nazis, and the vast majority of the population has survived. With the help of their Kabardian neighbors, Mountain Jews of Nalchik convinced the local German authorities that they were Tats , the native people similar to other Caucasus Mountain peoples, not related to

5742-529: The beginning of World War II , when schools switched to Russian as the central government emphasized acquisition of Russian as the official language of the Soviet Union. Mountain Jewish community has had notable figures in public health, education, culture, and art. In the 21st century, the Russian government started encouraging the revival of cultural life of minorities. In Dagestan and Kabardino-Balkaria , Judeo-Tat and Hebrew courses have been introduced in traditionally Mountain Jewish schools. In Dagestan, there

5841-538: The biggest settlement of Mountain Jews in the world, with the current population over 3,000. While elsewhere in the Russian Empire, Jews were prohibited from owning land (excluding the Jews of Siberia and Central Asia ), at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, Mountain Jews owned land and were farmers and gardeners, growing mainly grain. Their oldest occupation was rice-growing, but they also raised silkworms and cultivated tobacco and vineyards. Mountain Jews and their Christian Armenian neighbors were

5940-486: The cities of Makhachkala , Buynaksk , Derbent , Nalchik and Grozny in North Caucasus; and Quba and Baku in Azerbaijan. In the Second World War , some Mountain Jews settlements in North Caucasus, including parts of their area in Kabardino-Balkaria were occupied by the German Wehrmacht at the end of 1942. During this period, they killed several hundreds of Mountain Jews until the Germans retreated early 1943. On 19 August 1942, Germans killed 472 Mountain Jews near

6039-420: The community. Mountain Jews worked in more professional positions than did Georgian Jews , though less than the Soviet Ashkenazi community, who were based in larger cities of Russia. A sizable number of Mountain Jews worked in the entertainment industry in Dagestan. The republic's dancing ensemble " Lezginka " was led by Tankho Israilov , a Mountain Jew, from 1958 to 1979. Mountain Jews are not Sephardim (from

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6138-479: The dress of the highlanders. They have continued to follow Jewish dietary laws and affirm their faith in family life. In 1902, The New York Times reported that clans of Jewish origin, who maintain many of the customs and the principal forms of religious worship of their ancestors, were discovered in the remote regions of the Eastern Caucasus. By 1926, more than 85% of Mountain Jews in Dagestan were already classed as urban. Mountain Jews were mainly concentrated in

6237-437: The empire's organization had loosened and the last king was defeated by one of the empire's vassal peoples, the Persians under the Sasanians. However, the Arsacid dynasty continued to exist for centuries onwards in Armenia , the Iberia , and the Caucasian Albania , which were all eponymous branches of the dynasty. The first shah of the Sasanian Empire, Ardashir I , started reforming the country economically and militarily. For

6336-510: The empire's territorial borders, reaching as far as Western Europe, Africa, China and India and also playing a prominent role in the formation of both European and Asiatic medieval art. This influence carried forward to the Muslim world . The dynasty's unique and aristocratic culture transformed the Islamic conquest and destruction of Iran into a Persian Renaissance. Much of what later became known as Islamic culture, architecture, writing, and other contributions to civilization, were taken from

6435-409: The empire. The city of Baghdad was constructed on the Tigris River , in 762, to serve as the new Abbasid capital. The Abbasids established the position of vizier like Barmakids in their administration, which was the equivalent of a "vice-caliph", or second-in-command. Eventually, this change meant that many caliphs under the Abbasids ended up in a much more ceremonial role than ever before, with

6534-431: The end of the 18th century, when its settlements were brutally destroyed in the war between Sheikh-Ali-Khan, who swore loyalty to the Russian Empire , and Surkhai-Khan, the ruler of Kumukh . Many Mountain Jews were slaughtered, with survivors escaping to Derbent where they received the protection of Fatali Khan , the ruler of Quba Khanate . In Chechnya, Mountain Jews partially assimilated into Chechen society by forming

6633-413: The end of the Arab empire and the beginning of a more inclusive, multi-ethnic state in the Middle East. One of the first changes the Abbasids made after taking power from the Umayyads was to move the empire's capital from Damascus , in the Levant , to Iraq . The latter region was influenced by Persian history and culture, and moving the capital was part of the Persian mawali demand for Arab influence in

6732-524: The end of the age of ignorance and heathenism; by others as a humiliating national defeat, the conquest and subjugation of the country by foreign invaders. Both perceptions are of course valid, depending on one's angle of vision." After the fall of the Sasanian Empire in 651, the Arabs of the Umayyad Caliphate adopted many Persian customs, especially the administrative and the court mannerisms. Arab provincial governors were undoubtedly either Persianized Arameans or ethnic Persians; certainly Persian remained

6831-510: The ethnic Jews, who merely adopted Judaism. The annihilation of the Mountain Jews was suspended, contingent on racial investigation. Although the Nazis watched the village carefully, Rabbi Nachamil ben Hizkiyahu hid Sefer Torahs by burying them in a fake burial ceremony. The city was liberated a few months later. In 1944, the NKVD deported the entire Chechen populace that surrounded the Mountain Jews in Chechnya, and moved other ethnic groups into their homes; Mountain Jews mostly refused to take

6930-510: The group traces its beginnings to Persian-Jewish soldiers who were stationed in the Caucasus by the Sasanian kings in the fifth or sixth century to protect the area from the onslaughts of the Huns and other nomadic invaders from the east. Men were typically heavily armed and some slept without removing their weapons. Over time the Mountain Jews adopted the dress of their Muslim neighbors. Men typically wore chokhas and covered their head with papakhas , many variations of which could symbolize

7029-569: The highest religious authority for the town and nearby smaller settlements. Dayans were elected democratically by community leaders. The religious survival of the community was not without difficulties. In the prosperous days of the Jewish valley (roughly 1600-1800 CE), the spiritual center of Mountain Jews centered on the settlement of Aba-Sava. Many works of religious significance were written in Aba-Sava. Here, Elisha ben Schmuel Ha-Katan wrote several of his piyyuts . Theologian Gershon Lala ben Moshke Nakdi, who lived in Aba-Sava in 18th century, wrote

7128-501: The homes of deported Chechens while there are some reports of deported Chechens entrusting their homes to Jews in order to keep them safe. Given the marked changes in the 1990s following the dissolution of the Soviet Union and rise of nationalism in the region, many Mountain Jews permanently left their hometowns in the Caucasus and relocated to Moscow or abroad. During the First Chechen War , many Mountain Jews left due to

7227-408: The house, both single and married women covered their hair with headscarves . Mountain Jewish cuisine absorbed typical dishes from various peoples of the Caucasus , Azerbaijani and Persian cuisine, adjusting some recipes to conform to the laws of kashrut , with a great emphasis on using rice (osh) to accompany many of their dishes. Typical Mountain Jewish dishes include: The music of Mountain Jews

7326-450: The hypothetical Zayandeh River Culture . Parts of what is modern-day northwestern Iran was part of the Kura–Araxes culture (circa 3400 BC—ca. 2000 BC), that stretched up into the neighbouring regions of the Caucasus and Anatolia . Susa is one of the oldest-known settlements of Iran and the world. Based on C14 dating, the time of the foundation of the city is as early as 4395 BC,

7425-566: The invading Muslim forces. The Sasanian era, encompassing the length of Late Antiquity , is considered to be one of the most important and influential historical periods in Iran, and had a major impact on the world. In many ways, the Sassanian period witnessed the highest achievement of Persian civilization and constitutes the last great Iranian Empire before the adoption of Islam. Persia influenced Roman civilization considerably during Sassanian times, their cultural influence extending far beyond

7524-585: The language of official business of the caliphate until the adoption of Arabic toward the end of the seventh century, when in 692 minting began at the capital, Damascus . The new Islamic coins evolved from imitations of Sasanian coins (as well as Byzantine ), and the Pahlavi script on the coinage was replaced with Arabic alphabet . During the Umayyad Caliphate, the Arab conquerors imposed Arabic as

7623-487: The main producers of wine, as Muslims were prohibited by their religion from producing or consuming alcohol. Judaism limited some types of meat consumption. Unlike their neighbors, the Jews raised few domestic animals , although tanning was their third most important economic activity after farming and gardening. At the end of the 19th century, 6% of Jews were engaged in this trade. Handicrafts and commerce were mostly practiced by Jews in towns. The Soviet authorities bound

7722-431: The men's social status. Wealthier men's dress was adorned with many pieces of jewelry, including silver and gold-decorated weaponry, pins, chains, belts, or kisets (small purse used to hold tobacco or coins). Women's dress was typically of simpler design in dark tones, made from silk , brocade , velvet , satin and later wool. They decorated the fabric with beads, gold pins or buttons, and silver gold-plated belts. Outside

7821-537: The modern inhabitants of Iran are descendants of mainly non-Indo-European groups, more specifically of pre-Iranic inhabitants of the Iranian Plateau: "It is the autochthones of the Iranian plateau, and not the Proto-Indo-European tribes of Europe, which are, in the main, the ancestors, in the physical sense of the word, of the present-day Iranians." Records become more tangible with the rise of

7920-536: The primary language of the subject peoples throughout their empire. Al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf , who was not happy with the prevalence of the Persian language in the divan , ordered the official language of the conquered lands to be replaced by Arabic, sometimes by force. In al-Biruni 's From The Remaining Signs of Past Centuries for example it is written: "When Qutaibah bin Muslim under the command of Al-Hajjaj bin Yousef

8019-447: The region. For over 150 years Assyrian kings of nearby Northern Mesopotamia had been wanting to conquer Median tribes of Western Iran. Under pressure from Assyria, the small kingdoms of the western Iranian plateau coalesced into increasingly larger and more centralized states. In the second half of the seventh century BC, the Medes gained their independence and were united by Deioces . In 612 BC, Cyaxares , Deioces ' grandson, and

8118-519: The roads. The houses usually have a southern aspect to take advantage of the sun in the winter and to be sheltered from the northern winds. Often, they are not located near good farmland or water sources, so it is necessary to bring water into the settlement. In the 19th century, as Russia fought to conquer the Caucasus , auls were very formidable defences and could be taken for the most part only by storming. The auls of Svaneti , Georgia , with their distinctive medieval towers, have been recognized as

8217-411: The ruling Arab elite until the end of the Umayyad Caliphate. During this era, Islam was initially associated with the ethnic identity of the Arab and required formal association with an Arab tribe and the adoption of the client status of mawali . The half-hearted policies of the late Umayyads to tolerate non-Arab Muslims and Shias had failed to quell unrest among these minorities. However, all of Iran

8316-485: The second half of the twentieth century. Originally, only boys were educated through synagogue schools. Starting from the 1860s, many well-off families switched to home-schooling, hiring private tutors, who taught their sons not only Hebrew, but also Russian . In the early 20th century, with advance of sovietization , Judeo-Tat became the language of instruction at newly founded elementary schools attended by both Mountain Jewish boys and girls. This policy continued until

8415-624: The southern Iranians might be intermixed with the Elamite peoples living in the plateau. By the mid-first millennium BC, Medes , Persians , and Parthians populated the Iranian plateau. Until the rise of the Medes, they all remained under Assyrian domination, like the rest of the Near East . In the first half of the first millennium BC, parts of what is now Iranian Azerbaijan were incorporated into Urartu . In 646 BC, Assyrian king Ashurbanipal sacked Susa , which ended Elamite supremacy in

8514-592: The successful Greek repelling of the Second Invasion with numerous Greek city-states under the Athens' newly formed Delian League , which eventually ended with the peace of Callias in 449 BC, ending the Greco-Persian Wars. In 404 BC, following the death of Darius II , Egypt rebelled under Amyrtaeus . Later pharaohs successfully resisted Persian attempts to reconquer Egypt until 343 BC, when Egypt

8613-531: The then known world, as well as spanning the continents of Europe , Asia, and Africa. The greatest achievement was the empire itself. The Persian Empire represented the world's first superpower that was based on a model of tolerance and respect for other cultures and religions. In the late sixth century BC, Darius launched his European campaign, in which he defeated the Paeonians , conquered Thrace , and subdued all coastal Greek cities, as well as defeating

8712-553: The village of Bogdanovka, and on September 20 the Germans killed 378 Jews in the village of Menzhinskoe. A total of some 1000–1500 Mountain Jews were murdered during the Holocaust by bullets . Many Mountain Jews survived, however, because German troops did not reach all their areas; in addition, attempts succeeded to convince local German authorities that this group were "religious" but not "racial" Jews. The Soviet Army's advances in

8811-570: The vizier in real power. A new Persian bureaucracy began to replace the old Arab aristocracy, and the entire administration reflected these changes, demonstrating that the new dynasty was different in many ways from the Umayyads. By the 9th century, Abbasid control began to wane as regional leaders sprang up in the far corners of the empire to challenge the central authority of the Abbasid caliphate. The Abbasid caliphs began enlisting mamluks , Turkic-speaking warriors, who had been moving out of Central Asia into Transoxiana as slave warriors as early as

8910-438: The whole community. Mountain Jews have traditionally maintained a two-tiered rabbinate , distinguishing between a rabbi and a dayan . "Rabbi" was a title given to religious leaders performing the functions of liturgical preachers ( maggids ) and cantors ( hazzans ) in synagogues ("nimaz"), teachers in Jewish schools ( cheders ), and shochets . The dayan was a chief rabbi of a town, presiding over beit dins and representing

9009-540: Was also " King of Kings ", xšāyaθiya xšāyaθiyānām ( shāhanshāh in modern Persian) – "great king", Megas Basileus , as known by the Greeks . Cyrus's son, Cambyses II , conquered the last major power of the region, ancient Egypt , causing the collapse of the Twenty-sixth Dynasty of Egypt . Since he became ill and died before, or while, leaving Egypt , stories developed, as related by Herodotus , that he

9108-626: Was also turned out in a Greek victory, following the battles of Plataea and Salamis , by which Persia lost its footholds in Europe, and eventually withdrew from it. During the Greco-Persian wars, the Persians gained major territorial advantages. They captured and razed Athens twice , once in 480 BC and again in 479 BC. However, after a string of Greek victories the Persians were forced to withdraw, thus losing control of Macedonia , Thrace and Ionia . Fighting continued for several decades after

9207-400: Was reconquered by Artaxerxes III . From 334 BC to 331 BC, Alexander the Great defeated Darius III in the battles of Granicus , Issus and Gaugamela , swiftly conquering the Persian Empire by 331 BC. Alexander's empire broke up shortly after his death, and Alexander's general, Seleucus I Nicator , tried to take control of Iran, Mesopotamia , and later Syria and Anatolia . His empire

9306-471: Was renamed Красная Слобода (translit. Krasnaya Sloboda ), "Red Village". In the 18th–19th centuries, Mountain Jews resettled from the highland to the coastal lowlands but carried the name "Mountain Jews" with them. In the villages ( aouls ), the Mountain Jews had settled in separate sections. In the lowland towns, they also lived in concentrated neighborhoods, but their dwellings did not differ from those of their neighbors. Mountain Jews retained

9405-488: Was sent to Khwarazmia with a military expedition and conquered it for the second time, he swiftly killed whoever wrote the Khwarazmian native language that knew of the Khwarazmian heritage, history, and culture. He then killed all their Zoroastrian priests and burned and wasted their books, until gradually the illiterate only remained, who knew nothing of writing, and hence their history was mostly forgotten." There are

9504-605: Was still not under Arab control, and the region of Daylam was under the control of the Daylamites , while Tabaristan was under Dabuyid and Paduspanid control, and the Mount Damavand region under Masmughans of Damavand . The Arabs had invaded these regions several times but achieved no decisive result because of the inaccessible terrain of the regions. The most prominent ruler of the Dabuyids, known as Farrukhan

9603-513: Was struck down for impiety against the ancient Egyptian deities . After the death of Cambyses II, Darius ascended the throne by overthrowing the legitimate Achaemenid monarch Bardiya , and then quelling rebellions throughout his kingdom. As the winner, Darius I , based his claim on membership in a collateral line of the Achaemenid Empire. Darius' first capital was at Susa, and he started the building program at Persepolis . He rebuilt

9702-770: Was the Seleucid Empire . He was killed in 281 BC by Ptolemy Keraunos . The Parthian Empire —ruled by the Parthians, a group of northwestern Iranian people—was the realm of the Arsacid dynasty. This latter reunited and governed the Iranian plateau after the Parni conquest of Parthia and defeating the Seleucid Empire in the late third century BC. It intermittently controlled Mesopotamia between c.  150 BC and 224 AD and absorbed Eastern Arabia . Parthia

9801-584: Was the eastern arch-enemy of the Roman Empire and it limited Rome's expansion beyond Cappadocia (central Anatolia). The Parthian armies included two types of cavalry : the heavily armed and armored cataphracts and the lightly armed but highly-mobile mounted archers . For the Romans, who relied on heavy infantry , the Parthians were too hard to defeat, as both types of cavalry were much faster and more mobile than foot soldiers. The Parthian shot used by

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