Kurd Mountain or Kurd Dagh ( ku, چیای کورمنج, Çiyayê Kurmênc; tr, Kürt Dağı, officially ; ar, جبل الأكراد) is a highland region in northwestern Syria and

southeastern Turkey The Southeastern Anatolia Region ( tr, Güneydoğu Anadolu Bölgesi) is a geographical region of Turkey. The most populous city in the region is Gaziantep. Other examples of big cities are Şanlıurfa, Diyarbakır, Mardin and Adıyaman. It is b ...

. It is located in the

Aleppo Governorate Aleppo Governorate ( ar, محافظة حلب / ALA-LC: ''Muḥāfaẓat Ḥalab'' / ) is one of the fourteen governorates of Syria. It is the most populous governorate in Syria with a population of more than 4,867,000 (2011 Est.), almost 23% of t ...

of Syria and

Kilis Province Kilis Province ( tr, Kilis ili) is a province in southern Turkey, on the border with Syria. It used to be the southern part of the province of Gaziantep and was formed in 1994. The town of Kilis is home to around 67% of the inhabitants of the p ...

of Turkey. The Kurd Mountain should not be confused with the neighboring Jabal al Akrad, which is located further southwest towards the mediterranean coastline.

Location and description

Kurd Mountain is a part of the Limestone Massif of northwestern Syria. The mountain is a southern continuation into the Aleppo plateau of the highlands on the western part of the Aintab plateau. The valley of River Afrin surrounds Kurd Mountain from east and south and separates it from the plain of Aʻzāz and Mount Simeon to the east, and from Mount Harim to the south. The valley of River Aswad separates Mount Kurd from Mount Amanus to the west. In Syria, it is among the four "ethnic mountains" of western Syria, along with

al-Ansariyah mountains The Coastal Mountain Range ( ar, سلسلة الجبال الساحلية ''Silsilat al-Jibāl as-Sāḥilīyah'') also called Al-Anṣariyyah is a mountain range in northwestern Syria running north–south, parallel to the coastal plain.Federal ...

("Mountain of the Alawites"), Jabal Turkman ("Mountain of the

Turkmens Turkmens ( tk, , , , ; historically "the Turkmen"), sometimes referred to as Turkmen Turks ( tk, , ), are a Turkic ethnic group native to Central Asia, living mainly in Turkmenistan, northern and northeastern regions of Iran and north-weste ...

") and Jabal al-Duruz ("Mountain of the Druze"). The main town is Afrin (Efrîn in Kurdish), in Syria. The area is known for its olive growing and charcoal production. The majority of the Kurd-Dagh population are

Hanafi The Hanafi school ( ar, حَنَفِية, translit=Ḥanafiyah; also called Hanafite in English), Hanafism, or the Hanafi fiqh, is the oldest and one of the four traditional major Sunni schools ( maddhab) of Islamic Law (Fiqh). It is named a ...

-Muslims, while most Syrian Kurds are Shafiite-Muslims.

Yazidis Yazidis or Yezidis (; ku, ئێزیدی, translit=Êzidî) are a Kurmanji-speaking endogamous minority group who are indigenous to Kurdistan, a geographical region in Western Asia that includes parts of Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Iran. The ma ...

also have a presence in the region.

Demographics

As the Kurd Dagh was governed by the French, several Kurdish tribes were living in the area. From the 1800s onwards, there have settled several Kurds from the Kurd Dagh to Aleppo. In the 1930s, Kurdish Alevis who fled the persecution of the

Turkish Army The Turkish Land Forces ( tr, Türk Kara Kuvvetleri), or Turkish Army (Turkish: ), is the main branch of the Turkish Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. The army was formed on November 8, 1920, after the collapse of the ...

during the Dersim Massacre, settled in Mabeta.

Etymology

In 1977 the Kurd Dagh was renamed into the Arabic Jabal al-`Uruba in accordance with decree 15801, which banned non-Arabic place names. The Turkish part was renamed officially as ''Kurt Dağı'' ("Wolf Mountain"), with a

pun A pun, also known as paronomasia, is a form of word play that exploits multiple meanings of a term, or of similar-sounding words, for an intended humorous or rhetorical effect. These ambiguities can arise from the intentional use of homophoni ...

on the Turkish words ''Kürt'' (Kurd) and ''kurt'' (

wolf The wolf (''Canis lupus''; : wolves), also known as the gray wolf or grey wolf, is a large canine native to Eurasia and North America. More than thirty subspecies of ''Canis lupus'' have been recognized, and gray wolves, as popularly un ...

References

Mountain ranges of Syria Mountain ranges of Turkey Landforms of Kilis Province Aleppo Governorate Geography of Turkish Kurdistan Afrin District {{Kilis-geo-stub

Location and description

Demographics

Etymology

See also

References