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War and Genocide
General Editors: Omer Bartov, Brown University; A. Dirk Moses, University
of Sydney
In recent years there has been a growing interest in the study of war and geno-
cide, not from a traditional military history perspective, but within the framework of
social and cultural history. This series offers a forum for scholarly works that reflect
these new approaches.
“The Berghahn series Studies on War and Genocide has immeasurably enriched the
English-language scholarship available to scholars and students of genocide and, in
particular, the Holocaust.” —Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions
For a full volume listing, please see back matter
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Sayfo – The Genocide against the Assyrian,
Syriac and Chaldean Christians in the
Ottoman Empire
Edited by David Gaunt, Naures Atto and
Soner O. Barthoma
berghahn
N E W Y O R K (cid:127) O X F O R D
www.berghahnbooks.com
Published in 2017 by
Berghahn Books
www.berghahnbooks.com
© 2017 David Gaunt, Naures Atto and Soner O. Barthoma
All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages
for the purposes of criticism and review, no part of this book
may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or
mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information
storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented,
without written permission of the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A C.I.P. cataloging record is available from the Library of Congress
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-1-78533-498-6 hardback
ISBN 978-1-78533-499-3 ebook
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Preface vii
Acknowledgements x
Introduction: Contextualizing the Sayfo in the First World War 1
David Gaunt, Naures Atto and Soner O. Barthoma
Chapter 1
How Armenian was the 1915 Genocide? 33
Ug˘ur Ümit Üngör
Chapter 2
Sayfo Genocide: The Culmination of an Anatolian Culture of Violence 54
David Gaunt
Chapter 3
The Resistance of Urmia Assyrians to Violence at the Beginning of the
Twentieth Century 70
Florence Hellot-Bellier
Chapter 4
Mor Dionysios ‘Abd an-Nur Aslan: Church Leader during a Genocide 100
Jan J. van Ginkel
Chapter 5
Syriac Orthodox Leadership in the Post-Genocide Period (1918–26) and
the Removal of the Patriarchate from Turkey 113
Naures Atto and Soner O. Barthoma
Chapter 6
Sayfo, Firman, Qafle: The First World War from the Perspective of
Syriac Christians 132
Shabo Talay
vi Contents
Chapter 7
A Historical Note of October 1915 Written in Dayro D-Zafaran
(Deyrulzafaran) 148
Sebastian Brock
Chapter 8
Interpretation of the ‘Sayfo’ in Gallo Shabo’s Poem 157
Simon Birol
Chapter 9
The Psychological Legacy of the Sayfo: An Inter-generational
Transmission of Fear and Distrust 178
Önver A. Cetrez
Chapter 10
Sayfo and Denialism: A New Field of Activity for Agents of the Turkish
Republic 205
Racho Donef
Chapter 11
Turkey’s Key Arguments in Denying the Assyrian Genocide 219
Abdulmesih BarAbraham
Chapter 12
Who Killed Whom? A Comparison of Political Discussions in France and
Sweden about the Genocide of 1915 233
Christophe Premat
Index 255
P
RefaCe
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his book appears in a political atmosphere in which great parts of
the Middle East have been set alight, where massacres and ethnic and
religious cleansing have become part of our daily lives and indigenous
minorities that were the target of massacres and ethnic cleansing in
the Ottoman Empire during the First World War are again faced with
extinction. In their demonstrations worldwide, Assyrians are appeal-
ing to the international community to put an end to the ongoing geno-
cide; they have been holding placards on which is written ‘1915, 1933,
now 2014: No more genocide!’ – referring to the genocidal events in
the last century and today. The year 2015 marked the centenary of the
genocide during the First World War in Ottoman Turkey. Assyrians
refer to this genocide as ‘the year of the sword’ (i Shato du Sayfo1).
In a broader context it is more commonly known as the Assyrian
genocide, which took place in the borderlands between Turkey, Iran
and present-day Iraq and decimated an indigenous population with
a unique ethno-religious heritage. Hundreds of thousands were mur-
dered or driven into exile with survivors scattered all over the world.
Today they are greatly dispersed in a worldwide diaspora, with large
populations in the United States, Europe and Australia, and in the
Middle East in Iraq and Lebanon, with only tiny remnants of once
vibrant communities in Turkey, Syria and Iran. Although it happened
a century ago, among the descendants of its victims and survivors
the genocide is still a living trauma. The denial of this genocide, the
continued oppression of the Assyrians and their recent expulsion from
their ancestral homeland have all served to trigger the remembrance
of this traumatic past.
viii P reface
This book is a result of the international research project, ‘An
Intergenerational Approach to the Study of Genocide: Seyfo’, organized
in the Netherlands by the Inanna Foundation in 2011. The impetus for
this book stemmed from a shared conviction among its contributors
that there are many issues regarding the Assyrian genocide that have
not been dealt with or that still require further investigation. Although
the genocide of Ottoman Armenians, Assyrians and Pontic Greeks took
place in the same time frame and in the same political context, most of
the academic publications that have hitherto appeared discuss only the
Armenian genocide. So far, existing literature about the Assyrian geno-
cide has been composed principally of a few monographs and articles
mainly by historians. Therefore, the primary aim of this volume is to fill
the gap in academic research about the Assyrian genocide and develop a
greater interest in the Sayfo among scholars. This work is the first aca-
demic anthology dealing specifically with the Sayfo. The book aims to
provide an interdisciplinary account of the study of the Sayfo by bring-
ing together scholars from history, philosophy, anthropology, linguistics,
theology, political science and law in order to open up new avenues of
research to the study of this less-researched genocide. We believe that
the volume will be an important contribution to comparative genocide
studies.
Naming
In this volume, the reader will notice the use of various names for the
group(s) discussed in this study. Some of the writers apply the cross-
denominational term Assyrian or Syriac to denote what can be seen as
an ethnic group originally from Anatolia and Mesopotamia who adhere
to several indigenous Christian churches.2 Other authors use a cross-
denominational name when referring to the victim group(s) in general
terms, as well as their use of the church name when discussing specific
experiences. Yet other authors might use only confessional names. In all
cases authors have made it clear in their specific chapters how they refer
to the group(s) concerned.
This multiple naming is the result of a historical condition arising
from the millet system of the Ottoman Empire in which the formal
status of the Assyrians was that of separate church communities and
not an ethno-national group. The national awakening of Assyrians came
about in the late Ottoman period but rapidly collapsed as, in the period
before and during the First World War, their intellectuals were among
the first to be killed. Only after the relocation of large numbers of the
Preface ix
group to Western countries in the twentieth century did they begin
to express a cross-denominational national identity en masse, first as
‘Assyrian’ and later also as ‘Aramean’.3 The name ‘Chaldean’ has also
been used to indicate a community when referring to both a religious
and an ethnic group. The use of the respective names ‘Assyrians’ and
‘Arameans’ reflects a particular (perceived) ancient ancestry. Many who
use the name ‘Arameans’ focus on a more religious identity and stress
the importance of their collective identity after their conversion to
Christianity. Hence they also use either the name ‘Syriac’ or ‘Aramean’
interchangeably; the latter highlights a more ethno-national identity. In
this context, the present-day use of ‘Arameans’ has been developed in
opposition to the use and identification as ‘Assyrians’ which has a more
political and secular orientation. Despite the heated dispute over what
name to use when translating the emic name ‘Suryoye’/‘Suryaye’ into
Western languages, all sides suffered from the Sayfo and request recog-
nition of it as a genocide from the international community.
Notes
1. Sayfo is also spelled Seyfo and Saypa.
2. These churches are the Syriac Orthodox Church, the Church of the East, the Chaldean
Catholic Church, the Syriac Catholic Church and their Protestant offshoots.
3. Atto (2011) details the disagreement over self-identity. Cetrez, Donabed and Makko
(2013) present the case for Assyrian continuity. For the case of Aramean continuity,
see Brock et al. (2001).
Bibliography
Atto, N. 2011. Hostages in the Homeland. Orphans in the Diaspora. Leiden: Leiden
University Press.
Brock, Sebastian, et al. 2001. The Hidden Pearl: The Syrian Orthodox Church and its
Ancient Aramaic Heritage. Rome: Trans World Film Srl.
Cetrez, Ö.A., S.G. Donabed and A. Makko (eds). 2013. The Assyrian Heritage. Threads of
Continuity and Influence. Uppsala: Uppsala University Library.
