Kale Hristiyanları قلعه مسیحیلری | |
|---|---|
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Kirkuk,Iraq | |
| Languages | |
| DistinctTurkish dialect Ottoman Turkish (liturgical) | |
| Religion | |
| Chaldean Catholic Church | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Assyrians,Iraqi Turkmen |
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| Assyrians |
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TheCitadel Christians (Turkish:Kale Hristiyanları;colloquially: قلعه مسیحیلری;romanised:Qəl‘ə Məsihiləri) are a community of ethnicAssyrians who speak their own dialect ofTurkish and religiously follow theChaldean Catholic Church. They are native toKirkuk and have traditionally been the caretakers of theKirkuk Citadel.
They are ethnic Assyrians fromKirkuk who lived in or near the citadel, where they adopted the Turkish language from Iraqi Turkmen, especially during theOttoman Empire. Their dialect is mutually intelligible with the Iraqi Turkmen dialect. Their official hymns, eulogies, and prayers are in Turkish.[1] Their bible is in theOttoman Turkish language written in the 1800s and is recited by community leaders.[2][3] The Citadel Christians are distinct from the community ofIraqi Turkmen who follow theRoman Catholic Church. Iraqi Turkmen Catholics wereLatin Catholic and were a significantly larger community, numbering around 30,000 in 2015. They lived in all areas ofTurkmeneli, including Kirkuk. The Citadel Christians wereChaldean Catholic, lived only in Kirkuk, and were ethnically Assyrian whereas the Iraqi Turkmen were ethnicallyTurkic.[4][5][6] The Citadel Christians, however, enjoyed good relations with Iraqi Turkmen and were both persecuted by the Ba'ath regime and theIslamic State. The Citadel Christians were described as a community of "a few thousand" in 2017.[7] The Citadel Christians, and minorities in Kirkuk in general, had muchcultural heritage destroyed by the Islamic State, and had most of their churches were shelled or destroyed, and many of them migrated.[8] The community identifies as Assyrian, though they embrace their Turkish aspects and do not view themself as assimilated. A leader of the community stated that "our language since the days of our ancestors is Turkish, which we consider our mother tongue, and on top of that, we do not know anything about Chaldean. Our traditions of cooking, activity, culture, clothing, and civil life, are all Turkish".[7] The Citadel Christians also saw thevisit by Pope Francis to Iraq in 2021 as a symbol of hope for the future.[9]
There are estimated to be some three million Turkmen in Iraq, but despite ... There are also about 30,000 Christian 'Catholic'Turks and some Jews living in Iraq...