Kanoon I 2, 6746 Volume II Issue 41 December 2, 1996
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A Weekly Online Publication of the ZENDA Assyrian Newsagency
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T H I S W E E K I N Z E N D A
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The Lighthouse...................... Two Thousand Year
Old Batteries
Good Morning Bet-Nahrain............ Turkey blocks aid
access
US to evacuate more from the North
Surfs Up............................ "Aziz is not Assyrian..."
Surfers Corner...................... ZENDA references
News Digest......................... Assyrian electronic
bookstore
Cultural Exhibition in Finland
UN approves Iraqi oil deal
Calendar of Events.................. No new entry
Entracte............................ New Year's
Eve Parties in California
Intelligentsia...................... Classes, Lectures,
and Seminars
Assyrian Surfing Posts.............. An Assyrian
Online Bookstore
Pump up the Volume.................. Foreign &
Alien
Back to the Future.................. Domestication
of Animals
Henry Weiss collection from Syria
Literatus........................... Assyrian convention
of 1968
This Week in History................ Alphonse Mangana
Bravo............................... Rossini's
Semiramis Opera
The Directory....................... News Sources
Bshena.............................. San Jose
Salute.............................. Firas, Adnan
and Christoph
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THE L I G H
T H O U S E
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TWO THOUSAND YEAR OLD BATTERIES
In 1939, Dr. Wilhelm Konig, a German archaeologist employed
by the State
Museum in Baghdad, Iraq, found several unusual pots while
digging at Kujut
Rabuna, a village southeast of Baghdad. These clay
pots were six inches
high and contained a copper cylinder five inches high
and one and a half
inches in diameter. The edges of the copper cylinders
appeared to be
soldered with a 60/40 lead-tin alloy comparable to the
solder in use today,
and their bottoms were capped with copper discs and sealed
with asphalt.
Another insulating layer of asphalt sealed the tops of
the pots and was
also used to hold in place iron rods suspended into the
center of the
copper cylinders. The rods showed unmistakable
evidence of having been
corroded by an acid solution, long since evaporated.
In 1947, Willy Ley, working with Willard Gray of the General
Electric High
Voltage Laboratory in Pittsielf, Massachusetts, constructed
a duplicate
model of the ancient clay pot cells. He discovered
that when he added
copper sulfate, acetic acid or citric acid- all of which
were well known
two thousand years ago- the cells produced one and a
half to two volts of
electricity.
Near Tel Omar, also near Baghdad, more of these clay pot
cells were
uncovered. With them were found thin copper and
iron rods which may have
been used to connect the cells into a series in order
to produce a stronger
voltage.
Ten other cells were also discovered at Ctesiphon- in
proximity to the city
of Baghdad - by Professor E. Kuhnel of the Staatliches
Museum in Berlin.
These were broken down into their component parts, as
though they had been
mass-produced and their manufacturing had been interrupted
before
assembling the pieces into working batteries.
Yet these pots, dating between 500 B.C. and 500 A.D. are
not the only
evidence of the existence and use of electricity in ancient
Mesopotamia
(Bet-Nahrain). Amongst the Babylonian ruins, dating
back to 2000 B.C. many
artifacts have been found that are covered with sheets
of gold and/or
silver so thin that could only be done by an industrial
process called
electroplating, developed in the nineteen-hundreds [A.D.]
.
Dr. Robert Karoukian
Nineveh Magazine, Vol 3, #5
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G O O D
M O R N I N G B
E T - N A H R A I N
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TURKEY BLOCKS AID ACCESS TO NORTHERN BET-NAHRAIN
(ZNUP: London) The relief agency Save the Children appealed
last Friday for
help in gaining access to northern Bet-Nahrain after
Turkey halted
non-governmental organizations from crossing its border
into the
conflictive region. "Since the program's inception, Save
the Children
International staff has traveled through Turkey
in order to reach the northern region of
Iraq," an agency statement said. "However, the Turkish
authorities withdrew
this entitlement in August of this year, and Save the
Children has not been
successful in finding an alternative route into the region,"
it said.
"Without help to secure a route in and out of the country,
and greater
protection for locally employed staff, the agency is
worried that it may
soon be forced to withdraw from its program and warns
that this may be a
further step toward the disintegration of practical aid
to the region," it
said. Because of a U.N. air embargo on Iraq and tensions
between the Iraqi
government and Kurdish groups fighting for control of
northern Iraq, Turkey
is the only reliable route for reaching northern Bet-Nahrain.
Save the
Children spokeswoman Tracy Mcgeah told United Press International
that aid
workers have not been granted Turkish visas since August,
with no
explanation. Save the Children has been operating in
Iraq since the "safe
haven" was set up in 1991, at the end of the Gulf War.
The agency helps
displaced people and children, rebuilds villages and
towns and offers
support in widowed households.
US WILL EVACUATE THOUSANDS MORE FROM NORTHERN IRAQ
(ZURU: Washington) The State Department said it will evacuate
thousands
more Kurds and others to the United States from northern
Iraq, because they
were at risk from Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
Spokesman Glyn Davies
said some 5,000 people- employees of U.S.-linked non-governmental
organizations (NGOs) and their families - would be taken
to neighboring
Turkey and then flown to the Pacific Ocean island of
Guam for processing to
enter the
United States. The move follows the pattern of two previous
evacuations
from Western-protected northern Bet-Nahrain. About 2,100
aid workers
employed by the U.S. government were taken out in September,
followed last
month by some 600 Iraqi opposition figures. The latest
group consisted of
employees of 24 NGOs that were either U.S.-funded or
U.S.-based, or both,
together with immediate family members. Many NGO workers
fled their towns
in the mountainous region when Saddam's troops entered
the area at the
invitation of Massoud Barzani's Kurdistan Democratic
Party.
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S U R F S
U P !
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"Tarik Aziz is not an Assyrian. Nor is any person who
calls oneself an Arab,
practices Arabisim, promotes destructions of Assyrian
villages and churches
and systematically creates programs to wipe out the general
social structure
of Assyrians throughout the region. I believe that
granting the name
Assyrian to Tarik Aziz is not different from accepting
Saddam, the killer,
as being the successor of Sargon the King!
The problem here is not Tarik Aziz's national origin.
It is the undermining
of the political struggle of those dear Assyrians
who lost their lives for
insisting to BE Assyrian. It is the insensitively towards
those Assyrians
who have placed their lives, today, at the front,
to defend the name
ASSYRIAN. Granting characters like Tarik Aziz the name
Assyrian is a bad
example of promoting ASSYRIANISIM. The root cause of
all this remains to be
dealt with..."
Arbil Bet-Shliemoun
San Jose
***************
"I really don't understand the protests against calling
Aziz an Assyrian.
An Assyrian is an Assyrian whether he admits it or not.
If we adhere to the
rule that an Assyrian is one who is a nationalist, we'd
be down to a few
thousand (perhaps even hundreds). There is nothing wrong
with noting that
Tariq Aziz is an Assyrian - though one who is not well-liked,
even detested.
But we can't go around pointing people out of our nationality
simply
because they are Ba'athists or communists or gays or
whatever. An Assyrian
is an Assyrian regardless of what he says (just take
a look at Chaldeans
and Syriacs!)."
Robert W. Dekelaita
Chicago, Illinois
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S U R F E R S
C O R N E R
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To our readers:
ZENDA uses the simple method of "Journal-Volume Number-Author"
or "News
Agency-City" in documenting references to our news items
and articles.
(Nabu Quarterly,
Vol I, #2, Jasim)
(ZNUP: Ankara)
United Press International, Ankara-Turkey
This is generally very economical in space and time.
Also, to separate our
reader's personal notes from a ZENDA commentary we print
our entries inside
a [ ]. If you wish to know more about the source of one
or more of our
articles, including our "ZENDA notes", please contact
us at
zenda@ix.netcom.com.
Staff of ZENDA
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N E W S
D I G E S T
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BAAS ... THE FIRST ASSYRIAN ELECTRONIC BOOKSTORE
(ZNDA: Chicago) The Assyrian Academic Society in Association
with
amazon.com books, which was featured in Fortune magazine
as well as CNN,
have made an
agreement to create the first, and perhaps the largest,
Assyrian electronic
bookstore in the world. The Bookstore of the Assyrian
Academic Society
(BAAS) has over one thousand books relating to the fields
of Assyriology,
Middle East and Syriac studies. For every book
purchased, a small
percentage of the proceeds will go to fund The Assyrian
Academic Society's
Syriac book publishing project. To receive a copy of
BAAS catalog contact
Assyrian Academic Society at 847-537-9654 (in U.S.) or
access BAAS at:
http://miso.wwa.com/~aas/books.html
$2.00 plus shipping and handling
ASSYRIAN ART AND CULTURE EXHIBITED IN FINLAND
(ZNDA: Finland) Recently the Assyrian community of Oulu,
Finland in
cooperation with the local United Nations agencies and
the "orginaisations"
of the city of Oulu produced the first public event of
their
newly-established Assyrian group. For two weeks,
members of this small
Assyrian organization, delivered and performed lectures,
songs, and dances
to large crowds of non-Assyrians in several schools and
community centers
of the city of Oulu. The Assyrian community of
Oulu, numbering less than
one hundred, has been actively engaged in promoting Assyrian
culture and
traditions among the non-Assyrian communities in Finland.
US & UN PLAN TO IMPLEMENT IRAQI OIL DEAL
(ZNUP: UN) Having accepted U.N. conditions, according
to the United States,
Iraq may sell up to $2 billion worth of its oil twice
a year for
humanitarian purposes. The conditions include free
movement within Iraq of
food distribution monitors, the posting of oil experts
at Iraqi oil
terminals and the deployment of about 200 monitors to
ensure the equitable
distribution of food. One remaining unsolved issue is
an oil pricing
mechanism that has to be approved by a panel dealing
with U.N. sanctions on
Iraq, which comprises of members of the U.N. Security
Council. U.N.
Resolution 986, known popularly as the oil-for-food deal,
allows Iraq to
sell $2 billion in oil over a six-month period. The United
Nations will
appropriate the money to buy food and medicine for Iraqi
people.
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C
A L E N D A
R OF E V
E N T S
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Thru April 6
The Ain Ghazal Exhibit
Smithsonian Institute
Arthur M. Sackler Gallery
Washington D.C.
Dec 7
The Nineveh Choral Concert
Conducted by Nebu Issabey
Assyrian American Association of Southern California
Assyrian Hall
5901 N. Cahuenga Blvd.
North Hollywood, California
8:00 p.m.
For ticket information:
Walter Ebrahimzadeh (909) 625-2533
Catherine Babayan (714) 750-7751
Elenor Orshan
(805) 292-2982
Kardella Lazar (818)
344-9748
AAA of Southern CA (818) 506-7577
Jan 15
Ashur & Marduk: The State Gods of Assyria & Babylonia
Lecturer: G. Frame
Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations
University of Toronto
St. George campus
Toronto, Canada
8:00 p.m
Mar 12
Guardians of the Gate: The Assyrian Winged Colossi
Lecturer: A. Harrak
Near and Middle Eastern Civilization
University of Toronto
St. George campus
Toronto, Canada
8:00 p.m
April 9
Recent Excavations at Gordion, Turkey:
An Achaemenid Persian Imperial Town in Central Anatolia
Lecturer: T.C. Young, Jr.
Royal Ontario Museum
Toronto, Canada
8:00 p.m
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E N T R A C T E
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Dec 31
New Year's Eve Party
Red Lion Inn Hotel
San Jose, California
Entertainers: Sooren & Edmond
New Year's Eve Party
Hilton Hotel- LAX
Los Angeles, California
Entertainers: Ogen & Black Cats
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I N T E L L I G E N T S I A
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Mondays
Assyrian History Class
Fall 1996 Session
"Assyrian Biographies"
Instructor: Wilfred Alkhas
BETA: Assyrian American Association of San Jose
20000 Almaden Road
San Jose, California
7:30-9:00 pm
Info: Wilfred_Alkhas@3mail.3com.com
Fridays
Assyrian Educational & Cultural Club at
Modesto Junior College
1:00 pm
Founders Hall 108
Modesto, U.S.A.
Saturdays
Nisibis School
10:30-1:30
The Church of the East
Toronto, Canada
Nisibin School
10:00-12:00 pm
BETA: Assyrian American Association of San Jose
San Jose, California
SUNDAYS
Assyrian Boy Scouts
Assyrian American Association of Southern California
Assyrian Club
5901 Cahuenga Blvd
North Hollywood, California
9:30am to 12:30pm
Contact Sargon Gewargis @ fishtale@juno.com
(818) 891-3705 after 7:30 pm
Assyrian Student Union
California State University, Northridge
Assyrian American Association of Southern California
Assyrian Club
5901 Cahuenga Blvd
North Hollywood, California
6:00pm
Contact Sargon Gewargis @ fishtale@juno.com
(818) 891-3705 after 7:30 pm
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A S
S Y R I A N S
U R F I N G P
O S T S
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The Bookstore of the Assyrian Academic Society
http://miso.wwa.com/~aas/books.html
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P U M P UP THE V O L U
M E
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ENGLISH
ASSYRIAN
Foreign nookh/raa/ya
[M]
nookh/re/ta
[F]
Alien
baar/raa/ya
[M]
baar/re/ta
[F]
ALSO
akh/sna/ya [M]
akh/sne/ta [F]
____________________________________________________________________________
F = Feminine M = Masculine
P = Plural
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B A C K TO THE
F U T U R E
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B.C. (X)
DOMESTICATION OF ANIMALS IN BET-NAHRAIN
Dog 11,000 BC
Goat 8,500 BC
Sheep 8,000 BC
Pig 7,500 BC
Cattle 7,000 BC
Cat 7,000 BC
Donkey 4,000 BC
<< Cultural Atlas of Mesopotamia, Roaf >>
A.D. (1978) Dr. Harvey Weiss of Yale collects over 98,000
artifacts in
Syria from the time of the Assyrian king Shamshi-Adad.
<< New York Times, October 18, 1981 >>
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L I T E
R A T U
S
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PROGRAM OF THE 35TH ANNUAL ASSYRIAN
AMERICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION
AUGUST 1968
held in Turlock, California
Thursday, August 29
Open House 7:30 pm Free
Friday, August 30
Dance Party 9:00 pm $6.00 per person
Saturday, August 31
Dance Party 9:00 pm $6.00 per person
Sunday, September 1
Presidential Ball
$6.00 per person
Monday, September 2
All Assyrian Picnic
$3.00 per person
Package deals for all above events $20.00- saving $5.00
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T H I S W E E K
I N H I S T O R
Y
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December 5, 1937: dies, Alphonse Mangana, Assyrian
linguist noted for his
contributions to the study of ancient Aramaic and Arabic
languages,
author of several books and articles in related fields.
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B R A
V O
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The story of Queen Semiramis (Shamiran) of Assyria who
reigned in the 9th
century B.C. has inspired composers of opera to write
over 30 full length
operas. One of these was by the Italian composer,
Rossini, whose exciting,
dramatic composition turned out to be one of his most
successful works.
<<Nineveh Magazine, Vol 3, #6>>
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the D I R E C T O R
Y
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ZNAD (Assyrian Democratic Organization)
ZNAM (Archeology Magazine)
ZNAP (Associated Press International)
ZNBN (Bet-Nahrain Inc/ KBSV-TV "AssyriaVision")
ZNDA (Zenda: zenda@ix.netcom.com)
ZNNQ (Nabu Quarterly)
ZNNV (Nineveh Magazine)
ZNRU (Reuters)
ZNSJ (San Jose Mercury News)
ZNTM (Time Magazine)
ZNUP (United Press International)
ZNUS (US News & World Report)
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W E L C O M
E T O Z E
N D A
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Zenda welcomes our new on-line subscribers from:
PERSONAL ACCOUNTS
San Jose, California [3]
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S A L
U T E
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Zenda wishes to thank the following individuals &
organizations
whose contributions appear in this issue:
Firas Jatou
Chicago, Illinois
Christoph Aktas Sunnyvale, California
Adnan Bet Ishaia Oulu, Finland
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Our Next Issue will appear on Monday, December 9, 1996.
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