Ottoman Kurdistan

The Ottomans saw Kurdistan as an official region comprising settlements inhabited by Kurds, and included it many maps, although it was largely not an administrative division.

[2] Much of the Kurdish population in the Safavid Empire that lived near the Ottoman borders was forcefully deported to other parts of Iran or killed.

[10][11] Among the emirates were Ardalan, Bahdinan, Baban, Bitlis, Bohtan, Bradost, Dimli, Hakkari, Hasankeyf, Kilis, Mukriyan, Pazuki, and Soran.

The Ottomans tolerated the Kurdish emirates as they did not pose a separatist threat, and also as a reward for the loyalty of Kurds during the wars with the Safavids.

[14] In the 1882 edition of "Lugât-ı Tarihiyye ve Coğrafiyye", it stated that "Ottoman Kurdistan" was the lands "between Armenia, Jazira, Iraq-i Arab, and Ajamistan.

"[16] In "Kâmûsü'l-A'lâm", which is considered the first Turkish encyclopedic dictionary, published in 1896, it was mentioned that "Kurdistan extends from the shores of Lake Urmia and Lake Van to the sources of the Karkheh River and Diyala River and the flow bed of the Tigris, and its borders towards the northwest, following the flow bed of the Tigris, reaching the Karasu bed that forms the Euphrates and from there to the north, to the water separation line separating the Aras basin separates from the Euphrates and Tigris basin.

If those six thousand Kurdish tribes were not a strong barrier in these high mountains between Iraq-i Arab and the Ottoman Empire, it would be very easy for the people of Persia to invade Anatolia.

[22] His remarks about the administrative divisions of the Ottoman Empire was criticised by many who interpreted them as signs of Erdoğan’s desire to implement a federal system, or Neo-Ottomanism.

As a challenge to the Turkish nationalists, Erdoğan recalled that during the Ottoman era there were eyalets called Kurdistan and Lazistan.