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The Syriacs (In Syriac: ܣܘܪܝܝܐ ) are an ethnic group that is widely spread into countrys like Syria, Turkey, Israel, and Iraq. In later time, many of them had fled into Europe, the United States and Australia, to countrys like Germany and Sweden. Today hundreds of thousands of Syriacs lives in diaspora. Many Syriacs claims that they are descendants to the Arameans.

The Aramean king Abgar the Black (Abgar u Komo) got the Syriac people to leave their polytheism belief for Christianity. During this time (300 after Christ), the most Syriacs lived in a place called Tur Abdin in Turkey . Today, there is still 3000 Syriacs left in Tur Abdin . The most Syriacs today lives in Sweden and Germany. There are about 80,000 Syriacs in Sweden, and 13,000 - 15,000 live in Sodertalje, also known as Mesopotalje. Worldwide, there are about 4–5 million Syriacs.

The term was changed from Syrian to Syriac in referring to the (Syrian Christian) people and language so as to avoid confusion with belonging to the country of Syria. For information on Syrian nationals see the Demographics of Syria.

Identification

The Syriac people was earlier named as Arameans and their language, Aramaic . The first ones that named the Arameans as Syrians (note the old name Syrians, today known as Syriacs ) was the well-known greek geographer and historian Strabo (Died AD 24) sayd in his work

-"Those who call them selves Arameans, are called Syrians by us"

History

The Aramaeans
The Aramaeans was a semitical ethnic group that lived in Mesopotamia and in Syria from around 1100 B.C. to 500 B.C.
Their language, Aramaic, was a northsemitical language that had its time of greatness in the bigger part of the Near East during the first millennium before our time of counting; much as a result of the new Assyrian empire, that assumed the language as its national language, that led to the big spread of the Aramaic language in that area in the Middleast, today known as the Fertile Crescent . Later, even the Persians and the Jews came to talk different accents of Aramaic . In the Old Testament, the Aramaeans are described as with the Jews, a close related ethnic group .
During 720 B.C the assyrian emperor Sargon II dispersed the Aramaean kingdoms indenpendence . Some people mean that the Chaldeans that occupied Babylon, was of Aramaic extraction

Syriacs meets Christianity

Main article: Abgar

The great king Abgar V the Black (In Syriac; Abgar u Komo), son of the Araméans , suffered from a leprosy sickness, that even his own doctor not could cure him from. Abgar had been told about a wise man in Palestine (Jesus) and that this person had effective cures against sicknesses. He send a delegation with a letter to Jesus and invited him to Edessa, to cure Abgar. Jesus answered that could not come to Edessa, because he was on other dutys. But he sent one of his followers, Taddeus and this Taddeus cured king Abgar V. and not long after, Abgar V and the aramaic converted into Christianity. Abgar V´s kingdom, Edessa, got famous because of this event, and many people visited Edessa to look at the letters that was exchanged between Abgar V and Jesus .
Later, Edessa became a important centre for the christian Arameans (Syriacs) and for theirs Syriac-Christian culture. The aramaic dialect that was spoken in Edessa, became standard language in the new Syriac-Christian church.

A stateless people
Since 300 A.D. the Syriac people are living without a own state. At the Ottoman Empiress fall after the first world war, the colonial power wanted to establish new order in the Middleast. France and Britain divided the area without taking consideration to ethnic groups. They drew a new map over the area and created new countrys as Syria, Iraq, Lebanon etc. Many Syriacs fled from Tur Abdin into the new countrys. Kamishli, Hassakeh and Derik was City´s in Syria that got dominated by Syriacs. Others fled to Irak, Jordan, Lebanon, and the remaining ones stayed in Tur Abdin, In Southwest Turkey. The Syriac group got divided, and at the late 60´s, the first Syriac people fled into Europe from Lebanon. Today, there are not many Syriacs left in the middleast. In the homeland, Tur Abdin there are still about 3000 Syriacs left .

A majority becomes a minority
in the end of 1300 AD, the Syriacs were in significiant majority in different areas in the Middleast, but at the end of this century, the mongol Timur Lenk had assumed the Islamic religion and conquered big areas. Large amounts of Syriacs were killed and the survivals became a minority. Over 90,000 Syriacs were killed in Baghdad. The survival Syriacs fled into the mountains of Tur Abdin. The Syriacs gave it the name Tur Abdin, that in english means Mountain of the servants of God. This area became the centre for survival Syriacs. After this century, the Syriacs never succeeded in recovering, and this was the start on oppressions, persecutions and constant massacres on the Syriacs. They´re counting on 25 big genocides on the Syriacs, and the largest one performed by Timur Lenk.

The Syriac Genocide

Main article: Syriac Genocide

The Syriac Genocide (In Turkish: Arami-Suryani Soykirim, In Syriac: ܣܝܦܐ) is the event known as when the young turks in the Ottoman Empire killed about 2 million Christians, of this are about 500,000 Syriacs in southwest Turkey, an area called Tur Abdin. The massacres started in 1915 and lasted in several years in shadows of the First World War. Priests were killed, churches were burned down, women were transported away and got raped and killed, children was taken and adopted by Turkish and Kurdish families. Two Eye-Witnesses are describing the situation in some Syriac Villages.
Danho from Deyr Salib:

In 1915, the then chief of Deyr Salib village, Alike Sevgan had promised that the Syriac people from Deyr Salib village would not be killed if they return to their village. Deyr Salib people went back to the village since they had believed Sevgan's word. As soon as they had returned, Sevgan sent them to the homes of Kurdish families as 'visitors' in groups of four or five. Nevertheless, this bloodthirsty murderer had set up a plan with the Kurdish villagers beforehand. In the evening of the same day he gave the Kurds a signal to "attack" by firing his gun. The Kurds using guns, sticks and stones attacked the innocent Syriac peole of Deyr Salib who had already been under captivity and killed 75 of them. Moreover, they threw the priest of Deyr Salib into the fire they had lit. As the priest was trying to run away from the flames, they brutally killed him with sticks and daggers.

Eye-Witnesse Niso Mirza from Beth Ishok village:

-"'In 1914 the Kurds gathered the Syriac people from Beth Ishok in Turabdin outside of the village and after they had strangled them all, they threw their dead bodies into the water wells of the village. Those wells still remain unopened. There are many wells full of our people's bones. I pray God that nobody would suffer such things."

The Syriac Flag

The Syriac flag has it history when André Dupont-Sommer made diggings in the well known and historical aramaic village Tell-Khalaf in Syria, in the beginning of the 1900-century. He found a relief that shows three demons carrying the bewinged sunplate.
The Syriacs in Syria started to use this symbol as an honour to their aramaic origin. The sun is representing the universe, the wings as symbol for everything between the universe and earth, the flowers (that looks as stars) is a symbol for the four cardinal points and all life in earth. These three symbolize the universe. The red background was chosen because of all Syriac blood that has been spilled out due to all suffering and persecutions. The yellow color is symbolizing the hope for a own country.

Known Syriac Doctors of the Church

Main article: Doctor of the Church

Ephrem the Syrian (306 AD - 373)
Jakob from Edessa (640 AD - 5 June 708)
Bar-Hebraeus (1226 AD - 13 July 1286)
Bardaisan (154 AD – 222)
Jakob from Serug (451 AD – 29 Nov 521)

References

Abu Al-husayn 'ali Ibn Al-husayn Al-mas'udi, born 895 in Baghdad Iraq and died 957 in al-Fustat Egypt, was a historian and traveler, known as the “Herodotus of the Arabs.” He was the first Arab to combine history and scientific geography in a large-scale work. "Tur Abdin is the mountain where remnants of the Aramean Syriacs still survive." (Michael Jan de Goeje: Bibliotheca Geographorum Arabicorum III, Leiden 1906, 54, I)
^ *SOC News report , He was documenting life in the Tur Abdin, where about 3,000 members of the Aramean minority still live.
The Syrian-Orthodox Mor Jacob of Edessa (Urhoy) (present-day Urfa in Turkey, †708) says: " It is in this same way also we the Arameans, that is to say the Syrians …"
Another East-Syrian lexicographer Bar Bahlul from Bagdad (†963) explains in his Syriac (Aramaic) dictionary the name "Syria": "And the Syrians were formerly called Arameans, (but) when Cyrus ruled over them, from then on they were called Syrians."
Dionoysius Bar Salibi the Syrian-Orthodox bishop of Amid (Diyarbekir, Turkey, †1171), also called the star from the 12th century, says in his book ‘Against the Armenians": "The Armenians say: "From whom do you descend - you who are Syriacs by race?" Against them we will say: Neither do you know from whom you descend....It is we (Syrians) who have enlightened your authors and revealed to them that you are descending from Togarma....As to us Syrians, we descend racially from Shem, and our father is Kemuel (the) son of Aram, and from this name of Aram we are also called sometimes in the books by the name of "Aramaeans".
The Syrian-Orthodox Patriarch Mor Michael the Great of Militene (Malatya, Turkey, † 1199 AD) writes: "The Children of Shem are the Assyrians, the Chaldeans, the Ludians and the Arameans who are the Syrians, the Hebrew and the Persians.". The same author says about the Mesopotamian history” The kingdoms which have been established in antiquity by our race, (that of) the Aramaeans, namely the descendants of Aram, who were called Syrians”.
The Greek writer Posidonius (150 BC) says in his work.. " The people that we (The Greeks) calls as Syrians, is called by them-self Arameans..........Beacuse the people in Syra is the Arameans "
:The term was changed from Syrian to Syriac in referring to the (Syrian Christian) people and language so as to avoid confusion with belonging to the country of Syria. For information on Syrian nationals see the Demographics of Syria.
^ http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9009188/Aramaean
^ http://scriptures.lds.org/en/bd/a/108?sr=1
^ Watson E. Mills (1990). Mercer Dictionary of the Bible. Mercer University Press. pp. pp. 52. ISBN 0865543739. OCLC 20852514. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help); Cite has empty unknown parameters: |origmonth=, |accessmonth=, |chapterurl=, |accessyear=, |month=, and |origdate= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
S:t Jakob from Serug in a poem about the martyrs Guria and Shamuna, he says that Abgar V is son of the Araméans: "Two precious pearls, which were an ornament for the bride of my lord Abgar, the Aramaean's son." (Text tr. A. Roberts and J. Donaldson (eds.), Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 8 (1886);) (See Syriac Manuscripts from the Vatican Library: Volume 1, VatSyr. 117, number 224:On Shmona and Gurya. Fol. 551a, p. 1099)
This event is described in Eusebios from Caesares work Church-history (I.13;II.1) ( 300 A.D.)