Norwich bulletin., 1916-08-31
THE WAR PRIMER By National Geographic Society

1 5itIs, the Armenian city from which | the Russians conceded their retirement recently in favor of a superior Turk ish force, is the subject of the follow 1 ing war geOgrap phy bulletin issued to- day from the Wilmington headquarters Of the National Geographic Society: With it's thick-walIed houses built Of volcanic rock, the town of Bitlis, spreading over the steep banks of the Bitlis Chai, a tributary of the Tigris, is one of the most picturesque com mUnities of Asia Minor. Its inhabi- tants, 35,000 in number, one-third of whom are ArE1enians and the others of Kurdish descent, are largely en- gagged in the manufacture of Q coarse red cloth, while their commercial ac- tiVitieS are chiefly confined 10 the ex- port of an inferior grade of tobacco and the gathering and shipment of gum tragaCanth.
 'Bitlis for hundreds of years has been a town of great strategic i'm portance because it is situated on the main highway between the Van plateau and the plains of 1Iesop0tarlia. Lake Van is only 50 miles to the east; Mush is 20 miles to the northwest, and Erzeru1n a little more than 10G miles in the same direction. Roads lead through Q mountain pass in a south erly direction toward 1TCsul, which is more than 150 miles distant in an air line.
 Owing to it's elevation, nearly a mile above sea level, BiLIis suffers greatly from snOWstorns and it not infrequently happens that many of it's narrow streets are blocked by snOw- drifts for four or five months of the year, although the temperature sel- dom falls below zero.
 Like many of the towns in this morning land of history Bitlis has had more interesting past. Fact and Table are so intTicatciy interWOVen, however, that the reader of Kurdish literature finds it equally hard to be WhOleiy Credulous or altogether skep- tical. One of the most interesting tra- dltlons of the town concerns the site of the ruins of castle occupying the triangle at the junCtuTe of two streams near the center of the city. Here AL exanGer the Great is said to have built fortress during his campaign of world conquest" Nineteen cen turies later, almost under the shadow of this castle, the great Turkish sultan SOiyman the Magnificent, met one Of his few defeats at the hands of the Persians whom he Subdued many times just as he defeated many European armies on the rlaiIs and in the noun tain fastnesSes of Hungary during his brilliant reign of nearly half a century marking the height of the Ottoman empire.
 Tt was in the 14th century that a subject of the great AIOngOI war lord Tamerlane, was appointed to rule this part of KUTdistan after the conquest cf Diarbelir. The official entrusted with this duty was Amir Cara Uthman (Black Lord Uthman), who. instead Of perpetrating such CrueltieS as did his master in building a pyramid Of 2 00O human beings piled up with alternate layers of brick and mortar, conquered the land by matrimOry. Taking a daughter Of the noble Kurdish family of Hakkari as his wife Cara Uthman soon won his way into the affections of the people, so that when Tanner lanes power began to wane this vice roy was able to retain a strong hold upon the mountain tribes. Uthmans descendants adopted the title of Princes of BitIis and they held sway in this region for more than four cen turies. The last Of this renarka bIe line was Sharif Bey who held out against the pTepOnderant power of the Turks for several years during the
 first half of the 18th century but was finally defeated and taken a captive to COnstantinople in 1849.
 "The kurds, who constituted two thirds of the population of BitIis and who have held sway in this mountain ous region of Asia Minor for many centuries, have been VariOusly ap praised by travellers. One extreme view is that they are as destitute of annals as the wolves and jackals among whom they have lived in the high mountains from immemorial times,' while the writer who estimates the other side of the shield of their character speaks gIowingIy of the rnouutaineers thus: Every nation that ever acquired fame and name in the eastern worlds history-A ssyrian, Parthian, Greek, Roman, Persian, the Arabs. Mohammedans and MongreIs- has invaded this part Of western Asia yet the holders of the hills and the possessors of the tongue have with stood every army and have retained the purity of their Aryan blood and their Aryan language
 "ConceTning the origin of the Kurds there are two picturesque Persian legends. The first relates that at the suggestion of the devil the serpents of the nythological monster Zohak were regularly fed upon human brains Two youths who had been condemned to have their heads robbed for serpent sustenance escaped death by substi- tuting goats brains for their own. These youths became the prOgenitors of the Kurds.
 "The other legend is Q bit more erotic, as if it had come from the mental loom which wove the tales of the Thousand And One Nights It re- lateS that during his campaign for the collection of 7G0 wives, King Solomon ordered a contingent of 40O virgins from the Far East While on their way to Jerusalem they passed through the ~BitIis region and here a band of