page_title: Arameans
section_title: Early Christian period
hierarchical_section_title: Arameans / History / Early Christian period
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Denkmal für die Aramäer, die im Osmanischen Reich 1915 Opfer eines Völkermordes (aramäisch Sayfo) geworden sind. Errichtet in Brüssel (Belgien).Nederlands: Herdenkingsmonument voor de 500.000 Arameeërs die in 1915, in opdracht van het Ottomaanse Rijk, tijdens de genocide zijn vermoord. Het monument is in Brussel, België, geplaast.
context_page_description: The Arameans also known as Syriacs, are an ethnic group indigenous to the Levant and Mesopotamia, a region in the Middle East previously known as Aram. Arameans claim descent from the ancient Arameans one of the oldest civilizations in the world, dating back to 2500 BC in ancient Mesopotamia.
  Arameans speak various dialects of Neo-Aramaic a modern variant of the ancient Aramaic language, with Turoyo and Western Neo-Aramaic being the two main spoken subdialects. The Arameans are a predominantely christian nation who belong to various denominations of Syriac Christianity and to a lesser degree a group of Mandaeans who are non-christian remnants of the ancient Arameans. Arameans have maintained a continuous and separate identity that predates the Arabization of the Middle East.
  The Arameans originate from present-day southeastern Turkey, northeastern Syria and northern Iraq. The majority of the Arameans live in a diaspora and fled to other regions of the world, such as Europe, North America, and Australia. They fled due to islamic oppression in their ancestral homeland.
context_section_description: The Parthian, Roman and Byzantine Empires followed, with the Aramean lands becoming the front line initially between the Parthian and Roman empires, and then between the Sassanid and Byzantine Empires. There was also a brief period of Armenian rule during the Roman Period. Between the 1st and 4th centuries AD, the Arameans began to adopt Christianity in place of the polytheist  Aramean religion. The Levant and Mesopotamia became an important centre of Syriac Christianity from where the Syriac language and Syriac script emerged.
  Syriac Christianity survives among the indigenous pre-Arab population to the present day. Arameans continued to be the majority population in their homeland (most of modern Syria and part of south-central Asia Minor) until well after the Arab Islamic Conquest of the mid-7th century AD. A number of Aramean kingdoms sprang up in the region, the most important being Palmyra, (which for a brief period became the Palmyrene Empire, rivaling Rome). There was probably some synthesis with pre-Islamic Arab migrants in the southern deserts (and possibly Greeks and Phoenicians also).
caption: Aramean Genocide monument (Brussels, Belgium)
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