'... the best single narrative history of the Kurds ... it certainly belongs on the shelf of anyone interested in the Middle East.' - Washington Post Book World

David McDowall is a specialist on Middle Eastern affairs and is the author of 'Palestine and Israel: The Uprising and Beyond (I.B.Tauris)'.

1. Introduction: Kurdish identity and social formation. Book I The Kurds in the age of tribe and empire 2. Kurdistan before the 19th century 3. Ottoman Kurdistan, 1800-1850 4. Ottoman Kurdistan, 1850-1914 5. The Qajars and the Kurdis 6. Revolution, nationalism and war, 1908-1918 Book II Incorporating the Kurds 7. Redrawing the map: the partition of Ottoman Kurdistan 8. The Kurds, Britain and Iraq 9. Incorporating Turkey's Kurds 10. The Kurds under Reza Shah. BOOK III Ethno-nationalism in Iran 11 Tribe or Ethnicity? The Mahabad Republic 231 12 Iran: Creating a National Movement 249 13 Subjects of the Shi'i Republic 261 BOOK IV Ethno-nationalism in Iraq 14 The Birth of a Nationalist Movement under Hashimite Rule 287 15 The Kurds in Revolutionary Iraq 302 16 The Kurds under the Baath, 1968A-1975 323 17 The Road to Genocide, 1975A-1988 343 18 Uprising and Self-rule 368 BOOK V Ethno-nationalism in Turkey 19 The Kurdish National Revival in Turkey, 1946A-1979 397 20 The PKK and the Mass Movement 420 21 The Kurds in Exile: building the nation 455 Afterword 462 Appendix 1 The Treaty of SA vres 464 Appendix 2 The Kurds of Syria 466 Appendix 3 The Kurds of Lebanon 485 Appendix 4 The Kurds of the Caucasus 490 Index 495