The Cradle of Mankind; Life in Eastern Kurdistan

by W. A. Wigram; Edgar Thomas Ainger Wigram

From the south-west. The figures are those of Rabban Werda and others of our suite.

No. 5

The floor of the southern nave is three steps lower than that of the northern; and at its western end is a square tank of running water, sunk below the level of the floor. Ceremonial ablutions have a prominent place in the ritual of Yezidi worship. There is a second tiny tank in the quadrangle: and a third (evidently fed by the overflow of the tank in the nave) just under the south-western angle of the temple, on the level of the lower terrace. A dwarf wall between the arcade pillars fences off the central bays of the upper nave, thus enclosing a sort of presbytery in front of the opening to the sanctuary.

At the eastern end we turned to the left through a door in the northern wall, and entered the square chamber under the smaller and more easterly of the two conical spires. From this we passed back into the sanctuary itself; a larger square chamber, situated under the larger spire, and thus, placed practically in the centre of the northern nave wall.[48] A low doorway, closed with an iron grille, opens from the nave into this sanctuary; and immediately behind the opening stands a sort of ark, rather smaller than the shrine of St. Alban, and completely shrouded in red drapery. We were led up to it, but bidden not to touch it: so we stood round solemnly, and gazed.

“What is in it?” we asked our interpreter, the Syrian Deacon, Werda—a man of some education, who is generally superior to the superstitions of his race. But in this Domdaniel of Sorcery even his assurance was wavering—“I will tell you later,” he replied nervously. “I cannot say it in this place.” It was not till we were safe again in the quadrangle that he approached us with much circumspection,[{98}] and confided to us in an awestruck whisper, “the King of the Peacocks is in that big chest!”

Melek Taüs, “the King of the Peacocks,” is the Yezidi euphemism for Sheitan; who of course must never be referred to by the latter disparaging name.[49] His image in the form of a peacock is regarded as the Yezidi Palladium; and it was his principal image which was kept in that red-draped shrine.

There are seven images or sānjāks[50] in the charge of the Yezidi priesthood. One is always kept at Sheikh Adi; and the rest go on circuit in the villages, to be exhibited to the faithful, and to receive the temple tithes.[51] Their progress is somewhat precarious; for the Kurds (when they can) like to capture them, thus combining pleasure and profit with a parade of religious zeal. It is probably one of these sanjaks which is now in the British Museum; and, “if he had guessed that King George would like it,” Mar Shimun “would have been delighted to make him a present of another,” which was known to have been straying about Tyari a year or two before. The Kurds themselves roundly assert that they carried off the actual headquarters image when they looted the temple in 1892; but the priests contend that it had been already placed in hiding, and that the plunderers found only a dummy. The Kurds would of course say they took it, even if they did not; and the priests would equally of course deny it, even if they did. Both alternatives are equally probable; and the image has always been secreted so jealously that any identification is impossible.[52] There is therefore nothing to prevent us from believing whichever we choose.

But although Melek Taüs no doubt is the dominant[{99}] guardian of Sheikh Adi, we feel that behind his presentment there broods an older tutelary shade. For when we quitted the larger sanctuary, and passed back again into the more eastern one, “Rabbi Mr. Wigram” headed at once for a small door in a corner, from whence a steep stone staircase plunged down into the bowels of the rock. A priest had planted himself in front of that door, making himself as broad as possible, and valiantly trying to mask it; and when he found concealment impossible, he pointedly bowed us away. They had shown us the shrine of Melek Taüs; but here was something which they could not show us. Here was one secret of Sheikh Adi which must be kept inviolate still.

What would they have said, we wonder, had they been told that one of their visitors had already actually penetrated into that Holy of Holies? Would they have hailed him as a prophet? Would they have murdered him for sacrilege? Or would they have compromised matters by flatly refusing to believe? We discreetly kept our own counsel; but the thing had been done notwithstanding. And the story of how it happened needs a few explanatory remarks.

In the year 1892 there came a new Vali to Mosul—a sanguine and active “Reformer” whose name was Osman Bey. He had set out from Constantinople equipped with a Radical “Program” and his programme (as is usual with programmes) was planned on an extensive scale. He had to do just three things—to cure the Arabs of Nomadism; to make the Kurds pay their taxes; and finally to induce the Yezidis to discard their heathenish superstition. The first problem floored him promptly, for the Arabs decamped to the desert; and the Kurdish chiefs eyed him pretty blankly when he proceeded to propound Problem II. But when he got to “thirdly and lastly,” and invited their co-operation, the worthy fellows cheered up amazingly and found things looked feasible after all. Taxation was much less intolerable when viewed in relation to its context, for the “Peaceable Persuasion” of the Yezidis would leave them a profit on the deal.