The Culture and Unique Dialect of Mosul
MASSIVE WALL OF TEXT INBOUND
In light of ISIS recent and on-going attempts to exterminate the cultural heritage of Ninaweh into a giant blob of whatever they consider to be "islamic culture" I am making this post to share with you all a few things about Mosul's culture, heritage and some unique linguistic features of the Moslawi dialect.
As many of you know Mosul is Iraq's second largest city, what you may not know however is that the city was at one point a major location in the Assyrian Empire and it's estimate to be founded anywhere from 700 to 615 BC.
A great site in Mosul is the Nirgal Gate, this is where ISIS smashed up all those statues. The city was a main producer of Muslin and Marble in Iraq, it is also the site where Saddam's sons in hiding were killed by US forces.
Tariq Aziz was also a Moslawi Christian and is probably one of the most memorable figures from Saddam's Iraq.
The city's most iconic symbol is el-Habda which is a leaning minaret. ISIS apparently tried to destroy this but was stopped by locals. [I don't have any 'good' sources for this, I read it on a news site once.] This minaret is also the symbol of the local anti-ISIS resistance group, 'Kataeb Mosul'.
During the Ottoman Empire, Mosul became a Vilayet which would be comparable to a state which encompassed most of Nineveh province.
The city and surrounding villages are populated mostly by Sunnis but are also home to thousands of Christian Arabs, Assyrians and Armenians as well as the Kurdish Shabak minority that lives around Mosul itself.
The Tigris River runs through the middle of Mosul, on the shores of the river it is extremely green with two islands making up a park as well as some isolated woods on the left bank of the city. The water is safe to swim in but not to ingest, people I know have gotten kidney failure from this due to pollution in the river and high salt levels.
The river's name in Arabic is Dejlat and in Syriac they call it Deqlat and Diglath depending on the dialect. The Islamic etymology is Hudaqel.
Traditional Moslawi music is mostly folk style and rural music, Yerdele is one of the most famous songs attributed to Mosul. This is also another nice example of Moslawi folk music. We call this type of music "Mosuliyeh" and "Maslawiyat". The actual folk genre is normally called Sha3bi in Arabic. (The 3 represents the letter Ayn which has no equivalent in the Latin script.)
This is a good time to mention the dialect of Mosul, I made a larger post on this here but I'll go over some unique features quickly.
Moslawis do not traditionally roll their R's like all other Arabs, we pronounce it with the tongue pressed at the bottom of the teeth like the Israelis and the French. Because of this Moslawis might write the letter Reh and Ghayn. For example راح with the Reh in the front may be written as غاح with Ghayn in front instead.
Moslawis do not omit /q/ like Urban Levantine dialects or pronounce it as /g/ like other Iraqi dialects we say it in its proper form as /q/.
Moslawi follows a similar trend as North West Levantine Arabic in that it makes a traditional vowel shift from A > O in many but not all words. For example the Arabic word for morning is Sabah, we would say this as Soboh. As well as this shift, the O phenomenon can also occur due to assimilation in the Moslawi dialect. For example the word for Four is Arba'ah, we say it as Oba'ah. The reason for this is as said above, Moslawis pronounce R different and it made a gradual shift from Arba'ah to Awba'ah to simply Oba'ah.
Another example, Qarbal (قربل) we say and write as Qobal (قوبل).
The Moslawi dialect is classified as a 'Qeltu' dialect while South Iraqi is a 'Gelet' dialect, both mean "I said" but it goes to show the difference between the two.
To show this better, if you wanted to say something along the lines of 'I threw the coffee' you would say 'Ramet el-gahwa' in Baghdadi and 'Remto 'l-qahwe' in Moslawi.
Or this one which is well known to South Iraqis, they would say "Shefit" for 'I saw you' and we would say "Shiftonu."
The Moslawi dialect also tends to change a medial A vowel into an EI sound, for example the Arabic word 'Kan' is pronounced as 'Kein' in the Moslawi dialect and written as "كين".
The closest dialects to Moslawi I would say are that of Mardin in Turkey, Deir Ezzor and it also bares similarities to the dialect of Aleppo in Syria.
There is some Turkish influence in the Moslawi dialect, in general in all Iraqi Arabic as we have been influenced by so many languages in Iraq, English, French, Armenian, Persian, Kurdish, Aramaic and even Akkadian etc..
A common Turkish influence found in all Iraqi dialects is the suffic "siz", Edebsiz is a famous Iraqi saying which literally means 'devoid of manners'. We also use the word Yok which also means 'without' or a 'lack of' but it is not a suffix, it comes after the noun.
In Moslawi we use the Turkish suffix "ci" (pronounced Jee) to denote a profession, Beltaji is a woodman who cuts trees for example.
The modern fashion of Mosul is like most of Iraq and Syria, a mix of Arab, Turkish and Western^botox^wala^peroxide styles with most men sporting a 'stache. Well now a days it is more like a potato sack and a veil but that should change once ISIS is exterminated from the premises.
Traditionally Mosul is home to some nice outfits, like a black hat commonly worn by people who play musical instruments and the Moslawi Tarboush (an Embroidered Fez).
There's also this Assyrian outfit which is worn at dances and other events.
That's all I can think of without making this too long, feel free to AMA and I hope I've taught you something about the culture of Ninaweh.
EDIT:
I'll throw in a bit about Moslawi cuisine now.
Let's start with the obvious choice of Moslawi food, Kubbet Mosul. (Not to be confused with Kubba Halab which is more like a dumpling)
Kubbet Mosul is a meat pie basically, it's made with a traditional spice mix, pine nuts and of course mince meat.
Then we have another pie, Kada which is originally Assyrian and their absolute best gift to the world.
This is a sweet pie made with Martukha (date syrup, butter and flour), gymbros turn away now because this requires more than a little butter...
Christians traditionally eat Kada on Christmas, it's made with date syrup filling (Martukha) and then the actual Kada pastry is just a simple pie crust. You can watch a recipe here.
Sabranhiyet/Sbinakh Fatereh is a Moslawi spinach pie in a pyramid shape with fillings from cheese, nuts and mushrooms to meat, spice and onions the main gist is that it's got spinach, lots of it and it's delicious.
Kleicha basically semolina date and walnut cookies, best thing you will ever taste.
Ma'amoul similar to Kleicha this is filled with pistachio and dates, some people also add chocolate sauce to it.
Guss also known as Shawarma, it's sliced meat in a wrap with vegetables of your choosing, traditionally in Iraq it's with pickles as well.
Doner if you don't know what this is... It's basically the most famous food the Turks ever came up with, sliced meat on a spit in a sandwich.
Dolma! (aka Yofrekh/Yaprekh or Waraq Enab) Dolma is a Turkish food that's eaten all around the Mediterranean and also in Iraq, you can buy it by the tin in most countries.
Moslawi dolma is made in a lot of ways, traditionally it's made by wrapping rice and or meat in vine leaves but you can make it with capsicum, zucchini, aubergine, onions and tomato.
Qouzi is basically a giant mound of rice topped with a slow roasted leg/shoulder/entire lamb with raisins and pine nuts.
Shish Tawuk (from Turkish Şiş tavuk) is my favourite food! It's just chicken cubes grilled on skewers and served with rice, bulgur or if you are an uncultured barbarian^jk you can eat it with French fries.
Lahm bi'ajin this time we give back to the Turks! They call it Lahmacun the name in Arabic means Meat (Lahm) with dough (bi'ajin).
Loash/Marqoqa Armenian Pita bread.
Khebez (Khubbz in other dialects) just means bread in Arabic and that's all it is, traditional Arabic flat bread.
Khebez Taboun is a flat bread wrap with za'atar, mince meat and other fillings the bread is also baked in a special Taboun oven.
Kunafeh is a pastry with a sweet cheese filling normally served drenched in syrup.
Ka'ak bagels! The name is also used for other types of sweet bread.
Burek is just phyllo pastry stuffed with meat or some sweet syrup.
Okra aka Bamiya is a... vegetable thing? No idea how to describe it they are very nice though and apparently good for your bowels. Fry 'em.
Qima Iraqi hipster time, why? The name is Akkadian a language that is from 2300 BC. It's basically a stew with thinly chopped meat, potato sticks and peas.
Shorbet Rummana is pomegranate soup with yellow split peas, basically. Goes nice with roast lamb.
Manti are little meat dumplings, we serve them with sour cream and tomato sauce.
Maqluba is rice meat and vegetables basically, the name means upside down because you flip it when serving.
Masgouf the most famous Iraqi food! It's carp which is 'butterflied' and grilled over an open fire. The dish is apparently Babylonian.
Morbeh Jizar beetroot jam. I've had this once and I didn't really like it personally it messes with your mind a bit since you're expecting something super sweet.
This ain't everything; Kufte, Sujuk (Turkish processed sausage) is an Iraqi favourite as well as Dawud Pasha meatballs, Iskender Kebab and Kebab Khoshkhosh.
Pretty much everything that's eaten in the Levant, Turkey, Iran and Gulf we eat!
Here's a few pages on Iraqi cuisine for those still hungry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_cuisine
http://www.food.com/topic/iraqi
Posted Feb 27, 2015, 2:14 PM UTC · edited