Persians, Kurds and some peoples of West and Central Asia used to celebrate Nowruz on March 21 of each year, and it is considered the Persian New Year and the Kurdish year, and about 300 million people around the world celebrate it as the beginning of a new year.

This celebration has a long history spanning more than 3 thousand years, in Central Asia, the Black Sea basin, the Middle East, the Caucasus, the Caspian, and other regions.

But Nowruz (the day of the spring equinox) is no longer confined to the Kurds and Persians only, but also to the countries inhabited by some of these nationalities.

In Iraq, the Kurdish Arabs participate in their celebration, despite the difference of some traditions. In the celebrations of the Arabs, they do not set fire and do not wear the traditional Kurdish dress, but rather it is a passing celebration as part of a Kurdish custom that has infiltrated other nationalities.

The word Nowruz comes mainly from two different phonemic syllables "Nu" and "Rose", meaning the new day.

Nowruz has many folk tales and stories that differ from one country to another, especially since the Kurds consider it a national holiday, and it is an official holiday in Iraq and other countries concerned with it, and in 2010 UNESCO included Nowruz in the list of the intangible cultural heritage of humanity.

Nowruz and literati Kurds

Al-Jazeera Net polled the opinions of some intellectuals, and asked them: How do the Kurds celebrate Nowruz?

Is there a difference or difference between the celebrations of the Iraqi and Syrian Kurds in terms of customs?

Did Kurdish poets write texts about him?

Do poets and writers participate in these rituals with their families, or do they differ from them, since poets and writers have their own customs and different ideas?

Poet and translator Ghassan Hamdan says that “although Nowruz has an ancient history, there is no definite opinion about it until now, but the four Kurds of Kurdistan agree on the existence of this national day, and it is celebrated in all parts of Kurdistan, each section celebrates according to the freedom available to it. In the country (Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran) to remember his ancestors. "

But he added, "But in general, everyone celebrates that they gather on the mountains and outside the city by lighting a fire at sunset, to commemorate the Kawa revolution and mourning against the tyranny of the mythical king, laughing, and they participate in the Kurdish dance wearing the traditional Kurdish dress, and there are those who compete by jumping over these fires as well."

Hamdan added to Al-Jazeera Net, that the first official celebration of Nowruz was in 1933, when Hussein Hazni Murkriani set fire to the Citadel of Erbil, and in Sulaymaniyah, the poet Berah Mard commemorated Nowruz for the first time.

Hamdan refers to the changes of Nowruz in Syria, as the Kurdish holiday after political turmoil in the 1980s turned into Mother’s Nature Day, then to the mother, after which it became known in other Arab countries as Mother’s Day, according to his account.

Texts of Nowruz

Regarding the celebration of Kurdish writers and poets, the translator Ghassan Hamdan explains that traditional and modern Kurdish poets have texts on Nowruz, and each one of them sees it with a different view: The first person who wrote about Nowruz was the poet Ahmadi Khani, when he said about the customs of the Kurds on that day:


People used to come out with sentences


a boy And a brat and an old man,


on the day that Eid is the feast of Nowruz,


greatness will become our gain with Nowruz

He explained that Nowruz among the Kurdish poets represents the beginning of a new chapter, the renewal of nature, a sign of salvation from injustice, and also indicates courage and sacrifice.

Contemporary Kurdish poet Abdullah Bashyo (born 1946) says:


I will not celebrate Nowruz this year


without the mountains and


without the wind of flowers,


I will not celebrate Nowruz


without the red flame of fire,


I will not celebrate Nowruz


if I do not see the dust of the feet of young people


when they dance and


I

am

on the head of the Dabkeh

Hamdan indicated that, like other holidays, the individual participates in his community, whether he is a poet, a politician, or a private person, and that includes the participation of the immortal poet Berah Mard al-Nas al-Nas, on March 19, 1940, he invited the people of Sulaymaniyah to attend the festival, saying: “Nowruz, and for that You learned that we did not give up on this holiday.We will have the Nowruz Festival on Sunday evening at the hill of Mam Yara, and we will go out to the fresh air on Friday. The gentle (female) sexes can come - after they have been broken in the snow season - to open their wings and share the rough sex (males), without To mix with each other in Kurdish dance. "

Wrote the

poet beer due poetry immortal about Nowruz hear every year with the

arrival of

spring, repeated by

poets, singers, young and old since ancient times

, and the

most famous singer of the

Iranian Kurdish Hassan Zirak, and from

him:


Behold ,

Nowruz has returned today in the

New Year


Festival Old Bahina and joy returned


how much years flower Aktopt Our hopes are in the blood of youth.


A primrose sprouted within all this dormancy

In an interview with Al-Jazeera Net, the young Iraqi poet Ibrahim Almas said that unlike the Persian and Kurdish peoples, other nationalities in many countries such as Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, Kashmir, Iraq, Iran and other countries celebrate the occasion, and the Kurds light fire and dance around it, while some women gather old clothes and burn them to celebrate this day.

"Nowruz cannot be considered a national or religious holiday limited to a specific people, as the people of Central and Minor Asia and other regions celebrate it ... there is no difference, but the holiday took on a national character among the Kurds," Almas added.

Concerning poetry and how poets of the nationalities celebrate Nowruz, the poet explained that poets of different nationalities have sung this holiday, “I remember from them from the Persians: Hafez Shirazi, Saadi Shirazi, and from the Kurds: Mawlawi, Bireh Mard, Abdullah Goran, and from the Arabs. : Al-Mutanabi, Al-Buhtari, Al-Sayyab, and many others.

About himself, Almas said: "As for me, I do not like public events, and every new day for me is an occasion worth celebrating."

No one knows the exact date of the beginning of the celebration of Nowruz, but the best estimates go back to an ancient time around 3,000 years.

The origin of Nowruz goes back to the ancient Persian religion, "Zoroastrianism," and because it is an ancient religion for thousands of years, it moved outside the borders of ancient Persia, during the time of the expansion of the Persian empires, and affected the neighboring peoples, and for this reason millions of non-Iranians celebrate Nowruz until now.