A line of barefoot girls in headscarves and long patterned skirts carry large clay water jars on their backs past a brick wall. Newton & Co lantern slide no. 50 from the series "The Persians, Kurds, and Nestorians, their manners and customs", attributed by the Nelson Collection to Ernest Hoeltzer, late 19th century; published in The Living Races of Mankind (1901) as "Armenians water-carrying (Nestorians)" and by D'Allemagne (1911) as "Jeunes filles Nestoriennes faisant le métier de porteuses d'eau" (young Nestorian women working as water carriers).

Nestorian (Assyrian) girls carrying water jars

View across flat mud-brick roofs and gardens of Urmia toward the mountains, with a two-storey building in the middle distance. Mounted print captioned "Ourmiah", from Henry Binder's album given to the Société de Géographie in 1887.

View over the rooftops of Urmia

Three men stand at a large hand-cranked printing press, one holding up a printed sheet, at the Presbyterian mission press in Urmia about 1900.

Assyrian printers at the mission press, Urmia, c. 1900

Armed men in caps and overcoats stand in a snowy bazaar street in Urmia in 1918, described as Assyrian militia on patrol.

Assyrian militia patrolling in Urmia, 1918

Four refugees, two men and two women, stand in rags and wrapped footwear after reaching the American Relief Station in Urmia, 1918–1919. The War Department caption does not name their community; they were possibly Assyrian or Armenian.

Four refugees reach the American relief station in Urmia

Group portrait of Russian Orthodox and Assyrian clergy, published in Niva in 1898 under the title "The joining of the Syro-Chaldean Nestorians to the Orthodox Church". The Russian caption names, among others, Bishop Iona, Archpriest Viktor Sinadsky and priest David Veniaminov.

Leaders of the 1898 union of Urmia Assyrians with Russian Orthodoxy

Title page of the Russian-language edition of the Urmia Orthodox mission's periodical ("Pravoslavnaya Urmiya"), no. 16, October 1913, with subscription details. The mission published it alongside a Syriac edition for Assyrian converts to Orthodoxy.

Cover of Pravoslavnaya Urmiya (Urmia Orthodokseta), October 1913

A dense crowd of refugees from the Kurdistan mountains, men, women and children, fills the steps and yard of a brick building at the Russian consulate in Urmia. Published in Abraham Yohannan's The Death of a Nation (1916); they were likely Assyrians from Hakkari.

Refugees from the Kurdistan mountains at the Russian consulate, Urmia

About sixty girls in headscarves sit and stand in rows with two male teachers and several women at the girls' school in Supurghan, a village of the Urmia plain, in 1904. Published in G. D. Malech's History of the Syrian Nation (1910).

Girls' school in Supurghan, Urmia, 1904

A long column of refugees on foot, with carts and horses, winds down a slope beside Lake Urmia in spring 1915. Photographed by Basil Nikitin, then Russian consul at Urmia; the refugees are likely Assyrian and Armenian Christians.

Refugee column near Lake Urmia, 1915

Assyrian Christian refugees from Tiyari and Tkhuma sit in a grove hung with drying meat and clothing, autumn 1915. The original caption says they brought their sheep, wheat, kettles and clothes and had no shelter for the winter.

Assyrian refugees from Tiyari and Tkhuma encamped near Urmia, 1915

Armenian and Syrian (Assyrian) refugees with carts and bundles in the tree-lined avenue leading out of the Kurdish gate of Urmia in 1918.

Armenian and Syrian (Assyrian) refugees at the Kurdish gate, Urmia, 1918

Armed men with rifles and bandoliers, described as "our army of defence", crowded in a street at Urmia in 1918, during the Assyrian defence of the city.

The army of defence at Urmia, 1918

Dr. William Ambrose Shedd, the American missionary (likely the man in the white suit), among refugees seated with their bundles in the city compound at Urmia in 1918.

Dr. Shedd with refugees in the city compound, Urmia, 1918

A crowded street in Urmia; an "x" on the right marks the house in which the author and his family were confined, and the high roof on the left belongs to one of the mission buildings. Likely 1915.

Street in Urmia where the Shahbaz family was confined

Studio portrait of the Rev. K. Odisho with his children, described as members of the persecuted Christian church in Urmia. Taken before 1916.

Rev. K. Odisho and his children, Urmia

A large crowd in festive dress moving through a village street in a wedding procession at Urmia, with musicians and onlookers on the roofs. Taken before 1916.

A wedding procession in Urmia

A dense crowd of refugees from the Kurdistan mountains gathered at the Russian consulate in Urmia. Likely 1915, during the Ottoman and Kurdish attacks on the Assyrians.

Mountain refugees in the Russian consulate, Urmia

St. Mary's Church in Urmia, said by tradition to hold the grave of one of the Magi, with a large crowd of men standing in front of it. Taken before 1916.

St. Mary's Church, Urmia

Page of a small, worn Syriac manuscript of the Gospel of Mark with six roundels outlined in red, green and yellow, each holding lines of Syriac script, inside a red ruled frame. The Library of Congress catalogues the manuscript as from Urmia and dates it "17??".

Syriac manuscript of the Gospel of Mark from Urmia, decorated page

A crowd of refugee children in headscarves and coats, captioned as wearing clothing just given to them on Christmas Day 1915 by Madame Nikitine, wife of the Russian consul at Urumia. Plate from the 1916 pamphlet "The Pitiful Plight of the Assyrian Christians in Persia and Kurdistan."

Refugee children on Christmas Day 1915, Urmia

Eleven young women in white dresses and headscarves pose in two rows before a large patterned rug, which the caption says was their own handiwork; they are captioned as graduates of the Girls' Industrial School at Urumia ("since closed"). Plate from the 1916 pamphlet "The Pitiful Plight of the Assyrian Christians in Persia and Kurdistan."

Graduates of the Girls' Industrial School at Urmia

An older woman in a headscarf and patched coat stands with three children in patterned dresses and caps against a brick wall. The Red Cross caption describes them as "a group of Tiarians who are being helped by the Armenian Committee in Urumia, Persia"; the photograph was received in November 1917.

Tiyari (Assyrian) refugees helped by the Armenian Committee in Urmia, 1917

Tinted lithograph by Charles Fenderich of Mar Yohannan, bishop of Urmia, in a large striped turban and robe with his hand on his chest, above a line of Syriac script and a caption "translated by his brother and fellow laborer in the gospel, J. Perkins." The print is dedicated to the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions and was likely made during his 1842 visit to America with Justin Perkins.

Mar Yohannan, Bishop of Urmia, lithograph portrait, 1842

A large wedding crowd, the women in white headscarves and the men in caps, gathers on open ground beside a mud-brick wall, with a drummer and large drum at front left. Newton & Co lantern slide no. 48, attributed by the Nelson Collection to Ernest Hoeltzer, "1897 or earlier"; it was published as "Nestorian Wedding" in Rabbi Mooshie G. Daniel's Modern Persia (1898), and by D'Allemagne (1911) as a wedding celebration among the Nestorians of the Urmia plain.

Faces, places & memories of the Assyrian people.