CHALDEAN Flag

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Chaldean Identity


Chaldeans have several churches (see below). They speak, and many can read and write, dialects of Chaldean Neo-Aramaic.[2]

In certain areas of the Chaldean homeland, identity within a community depends on a person's village of origin (see List of Chaldean villages) or Christian denomination rather than their Chaldean ethnic commonality, for instance Chaldean Catholic.

Neo-Aramaic exhibits remarkably conservative features compared with Imperial Aramaic.[3]

Other Related Self-designation

The communities of indigenous pre-Arab Chaldean Neo-Aramaic-speaking people of Iraq, Israel, Palestine, Syria, Iran, Turkey and Lebanon and the surrounding areas advocate different terms for ethnic self-designation.

  • "Chaldeans", after the ancient Mesopotamia, advocated by followers of the Chaldean Church of the East, the Ancient Church of the East, followers of the Chaldean Catholic Church and Chaldean non Catholics. ("Chaldeans"),[4] and some communities of the Syriac Orthodox Church and Syriac Catholic Church ("Chaldeans"). Those identifying with Chaldea, and with Mesopotamia in general, tend to be from Iraq, northeastern Syria; southeastern Turkey, Iran, Armenia, Georgia; southern Russia and Azerbaijan. It is likely that those from this region are indeed of Chaldean/Mesopotamian heritage as they are clearly of pre-Arab and pre-Islamic stock. Furthermore, there is no historical evidence or proof to suggest the indigenous Mesopotamians were wiped out; Chaldea existed as a specifically named region until the second half of the 7th century AD. Most speak Chaldean and the Mesopotamian dialects of Neo-Aramaic. Chaldean nationalism emphatically connects Modern Chaldeans to the population of ancient Mesopotamia and the Neo-Chaldean Empire. A historical basis of this sentiment was disputed by a few early historians,[5] but receives strong support from modern Sumeriologists like Robert D. Biggs and Giorgi Tsereteli [6]
  • "Chaldeans", after ancient Chaldea, advocated by some followers of the Chaldean Catholic Church who are mainly based in the United States. This is mainly a denominational rather than ethnic term, though some Chaldean Catholics espouse a distinct Chaldean ethnic identity. It is likely that these are exactly the same people as the Chaldeans, both having the same culture and originating from the same lands.[7]
  • "Syriacs", advocated by followers of the Syriac Orthodox Church, Syriac Catholic Church and to a much lesser degree Maronite Church. Those self identifying as Syriacs tend to be from Syria as well as south central Turkey. The term Syriac is the subject of some controversy, as it is generally accepted by most scholars that it is a Luwian and Greek corruption of Chaldean. The discovery of the Çineköy inscription seems to settle conclusively in favour of Chaldea being the origin of the terms Syria and Syriac. For this reason, some Chaldeans accept the term Syriac as well as Chaldean. However, Poseidonios (ca. 135 BC – 51 BC), from the Syrian Apamea, was a Greek Stoic philosopher, politician, astronomer, geographer, historian, and teacher who says that the Syrians call themselves Arameans.[nb 1]. At the same time historians, geographers and philosophers like Herodotos, Strabo, and Justinus mention that Chaldeans were afterwards called Syrians.[nb 2].
  • "Arameans", after the ancient Aram-Naharaim, advocated by some followers of the Syriac Orthodox Church and Syriac Catholic Church in western, northwestern, southern and central Syria as well as south central Turkey. The term Aramean is sometimes expanded to "Syriac-Aramean".

In addition Western Media often makes no mention of any ethnic identity of the Christian people of the region and simply call them Christians, Iraqi Christians, Iranian Christians, Syrian Christians, Turkish Christians, etc. This label is rejected by Chaldeans/Chaldeans/Syriacs since it erroneously implies no difference other than theological with the Muslim Arabs, Kurds, Turks, Iranians and Azeris of the region.

Chaldean vs. Syrian naming controversy

As early as the 8th century BC Luwian and Cilician subject rulers referred to their Chaldean overlords as Syrian, a western Indo-European bastardisation of the true term Chaldan. This corruption of the name took hold in the Hellenic lands to the west of the Chaldean Empire, thus during Greek Seleucid rule from 323 BC the name Chaldea was altered to Syria, and this term was also applied to Aramea to the west which had been an Chaldean colony. When the Seleucids lost control of Chaldea to the Parthians they retained the corrupted term (Syria), applying it to ancient Aramea, while the Parthians called Chaldea, a Parthian form of the original name. It is from this period that the Syrian vs Chaldean controversy arises. Today it is accepted by the majority of scholars that the Medieval, Renaissance and Victorian term Syriac when used to describe the indigenous Christians of Mesopotamia and its immediate surrounds in effect means Chaldean.[8]

The modern terminological problem goes back to colonial times, but it became more acute in 1946, when with the independence of Syria, the adjective Syrian referred to an independent state. The controversy isn't restricted to exonyms like English "Chaldean" vs. "Aramaean", but also applies to self-designation in Neo-Aramaic, the minority "Aramaean" faction endorses both Sūryāyē ܣܘܪܝܝܐ and Ārāmayē ܐܪܡܝܐ

Alqosh of the Chaldeans, located in the midst of Chaldean contemporary civilization.

The question of ethnic identity and self-designation is sometimes connected to the scholarly debate on the etymology of "Syria". The question has a long history of academic controversy, but majority mainstream opinion currently strongly favours that Syria is indeed ultimately derived from the Chaldean term 𒀸𒋗𒁺 𐎹 Kaldaya.[9][10] Meanwhile, some scholars has disclaimed the theory of Syrian being derived from Chaldean as "simply naive", and detracted its importance to the naming conflict.[11]

Rudolf Macuch points out that the Eastern Neo-Aramaic press initially used the term "Syrian" (suryêta) and only much later, with the rise of nationalism, switched to "Chaldean" (atorêta).[12] According to Tsereteli, however, a Georgian equivalent of "Chaldeans" appears in ancient Georgian, Armenian and Russian documents.[13] This correlates with the theory of the nations to the East of Mesopotamia knew the group as Chaldeans, while to the West, beginning with Greek influence, the group was known as Syrians. Syria being a Greek corruption of Chaldea.

The debate appears to have been settled by the discovery of the Çineköy inscription in favour of Syria being derived from Chaldea.

The Çineköy inscription is a Hieroglyphic Luwian-Phoenician bilingual, uncovered from Çineköy, Adana Province, Turkey (ancient Cilicia), dating to the 8th century BC. Originally published by Tekoglu and Lemaire (2000),[14] it was more recently the subject of a 2006 paper published in the Journal of Near Eastern Studies, in which the author, Robert Rollinger, lends support to the age-old debate of the name "Syria" being derived from "Chaldea" (see Etymology of Syria).

The object on which the inscription is found is a monument belonging to Urikki, vassal king of Hiyawa (i.e., Cilicia), dating to the eighth century BC. In this monumental inscription, Urikki made reference to the relationship between his kingdom and his Chaldean overlords. The Luwian inscription reads "Sura/i" whereas the Phoenician translation reads ’ŠR or "Ashur" which, according to Rollinger (2006), "settles the problem once and for all".
  1. "Chaldea". kaldaya.net. Archived from the original on 12 October 2008. Retrieved 2008-11-16. 
  2. Florian Coulmas, The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Writing Systems 23 (1996)
  3. J.G. Browne, "The Chaldeans", Journal of the Royal Society of Arts 85 (1937)
  4. "Eastern Churches", Catholic Encyclopedia, see "Eastern Syrians" and "Western Syrians" respectively. Modern terminology within the group is Western Chaldeans and Eastern Chaldeans respectively, while those who reject the Chaldean identity opt for Syriacs or Aramean rather than Chaldean.
  5. "Early History of Chaldea to 5300 B.C." 2005. The survival of the Chaldean people will always remain a unique and striking phenomenon in ancient history. Other, similar kingdoms and empires have indeed passed away but the people have lived on. ... No other land seems to have been sacked and pillaged so completely as was Chaldea . 
  6. Biggs, Robert (2005). "My Career in Sumeriology and Near Eastern Archaeology" (HTML). Journal of Chaldean Academic Studies. 19 (1).  pp. 10, "Especially in view of the very early establishment of Christianity in Chaldea and its continuity to the present and the continuity of the population, I think there is every likelihood that ancient Chaldeans are among the ancestors of modern Chaldeans of the area."
  7. {{ }}
  8. "Who are the Chaldeans". Kaldaya.net. 2007-09-07.  Text "http://www.kaldaya.net/Articles/500/Atricle575_Sep12_07_Chaldean.html " ignored (help);
  9. Cite error: Invalid <ref> tag; no text was provided for refs named Who_are_the_Chaldeans
  10. Rollinger, Robert (2006). [Sep 12, 2007 "Chaldean History"] Check |url= value (help) (PDF). Journal of Near Eastern Studies. 65 (4): 283–287. doi:10.1086/511103. 
  11. Festschrift Philologica Constantino Tsereteli Dicta, ed. Silvio Zaorani (Turin, 1993), pp. 106–107
  12. Rudolf Macuch, Geschichte der spät- und neusyrischen Literatur, New York: de Gruyter, 1976.
  13. Tsereteli, Sovremennyj jazyk, Moscow: Nauka, 1964.
  14. Tekoglu, R. & Lemaire, A. (2000). La bilingue royale louvito-phénicienne de Çineköy. Comptes rendus de l’Académie des inscriptions, et belleslettres, année 2000, 960–1006.


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