Tesqopa

Tesqopa (Tel Eskof or Tel Skuf or Tall Asqaf) (Syriac: ܬܠܐ ܙܩܝܦܐ‎; Arabic: تللسقف‎) is an historically Assyrian town in northern Iraq with a population of 11,000 most of whose inhabitants are Assyrians belonging to the Chaldean Catholic Church. It is located in northern Iraq located approximately 19 miles (about 28 kilometres) north of Mosul. The town has been uninhabited since August 2014, after an ISIS attack led to its resident flee for Iraqi Kurdistan. It currently has Peshmerga, Dwekh Nawsha and NPO bases as it's 3 kilometers away from the ISIS-frontline.

The Origins of the Name

The name Tesqopa is of Syriac origin "Tilla Zqeepa" meaning the "Standing Hill" in reference to the hill next to it that contains the ruins of an ancient town. The people of Tesqopa are called Tisqopnaye [tis-kohp-na-ey] (singular: Tisqopnaya) (Syriac: ܬܣܩܘܦܢܝܐ‎) (Arabic: تللسقوفي‎).

History

Tesqopa is not mentioned in Thomas of Marga's Book of Governors (c.840) or any of the other early monastic histories of the Church of the East, and may well have been founded as late as the Seljuq period, perhaps in the eleventh century. It is first mentioned as an Assyrian Christian village in a thirteenth-century poem by the Assyrian writer Giwargis Warda. This poem describes its sack by a raiding band of Mongols in November 1235 and the destruction of its church of Mar Yaʿqob the Recluse.