1908 | The Kurdish Tribes of the Ottoman Empire

Mavi Boncuk | The Kurdish Tribes of the Ottoman Empire by Mark Sykes [1]
Source: The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol.38 (Jul. - Dec., 1908), pp. 451-486 PDF Download


[1] Colonel Sir Mark Sykes, 6th Baronet (born Tatton Benvenuto Mark Sykes) (16 March 1879 – 16 February 1919) was an English traveller, Conservative Party politician and diplomatic adviser, particularly about matters respecting the Middle East at the time of World War I. He is associated with the Sykes-Picot Agreement, drawn up while the war was in progress, regarding the apportionment of postwar spheres of interest in the Ottoman Empire to Britain, France and Russia. 


Sykes was in Paris in connection with peace negotiations in 1919. At the conference, a junior diplomat present, Harold Nicolson, described Sykes' effect: "It was due to his endless push and perservance, to his enthusiasm and faith, that Arab nationalism and Zionism became two of the most successful of our war causes." He died in his room at the Hotel Lotti near the Tuileries Garden on 16 February 1919, aged 39, a victim of the Spanish flu pandemic.