Qaraqosh

Qaraqosh (Syriac: ܒܝܬ ܟܘܕܝܕܐ; Arabic: قره قوش, romanized: Qarah Qūsh), Literally meaning Black Bird also known as Al-Hamdaniya (Arabic: الحمدانية, romanized: al-Ḥamdāniyya) or Bakhdida (Syriac: ܒܓ݂ܕܝܕܐ; Arabic: بخديدا, romanized: Bakhdīdā), is an ethnically Assyrian city in Iraq within the Nineveh Governorate, located about 32 km (20 mi) southeast of the city of Mosul and 60 km (37 mi) west of Erbil amid agricultural lands, close to the ruins of the ancient Assyrian cities Kalhu and Nineveh. It is connected to the main city of Mosul by two main roads. The first runs through the Assyrian towns of Bartella and Karamlesh, which connects to the city of Erbil as well. The second, which was gravel before being paved in the 1990s, is direct to Mosul. All of its Assyrian Christian citizens fled to the Kurdistan Region after the ISIS invasion on August 6, 2014. The town was under control of ISIS until October 19, 2016, when it was liberated as part of the Battle of Mosul after which residents have begun to return.

Local Assyrians, who are ethnically distinct from Arabs and Kurds, speak the Qaraqosh dialect of Northeastern Neo-Aramaic.