{"id":5848,"date":"2026-03-18T19:10:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T02:10:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/?p=5848"},"modified":"2026-03-18T19:28:24","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T02:28:24","slug":"kurdistans-mystical-tanbur","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/?p=5848","title":{"rendered":"Kurdistan&#8217;s Mystical Tanbur"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Kudish Tanbur being played in Hewler (Erbil), Kurdistan (Iraq)\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/BLshQEf-v4o?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>New York- <\/strong>Something I happened in my years covering the era of the terror wars known in the Anglosphere more formally as Operation Inherent Resolve-more simply the war against the so-called Islamic State-was the mystical sound of the tanbur. The tanbur is a long-necked lute played in traditional Kurdistani music across greater Kurdistan. Its precise origins are lost to time but the Penn Museum in Philadelphia has a good piece on the i<a href=\"https:\/\/www.penn.museum\/sites\/expedition\/the-ottoman-tanbur\/\">nstrument&#8217;s history here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The tanbur has an entrancing sound that can bring from a hot war zone to a llabyrinthine Sufi journey in your heart and mind. Away from the frontlines during that period of tumult, I would encounter someone playing the soothing scales of this enigmatic instrument. One afternoon, I was wandering around the base of Hewler;s [Erbil&#8217;s] millennia old citadel and found myself in a carpet shop wth this guy just leisurely strumming his very modern iteration of this historic sound. Just as the azan begins outside, the song gently concludes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"504\" height=\"378\" src=\"https:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Erbil-citadel.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-5854\" style=\"width:816px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Erbil-citadel.jpg 504w, https:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Erbil-citadel-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Erbil-citadel-150x113.jpg 150w, https:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Erbil-citadel-260x195.jpg 260w, https:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Erbil-citadel-160x120.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 504px) 100vw, 504px\" \/><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>New York- Something I happened in my years covering the era of the terror wars known in the Anglosphere more formally as Operation Inherent Resolve-more simply the war against the so-called Islamic State-was the mystical sound of the tanbur. The&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"more-link-p\"><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/?p=5848\">Read more &rarr;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5854,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,40],"tags":[1099,1106,1471],"class_list":["post-5848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-iraq","category-kurdistan","tag-iraq","tag-kurdistan","tag-tanbur"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Kurdistan&#039;s Mystical Tanbur - The War Diaries<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/?p=5848\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Kurdistan&#039;s Mystical Tanbur - The War Diaries\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"New York- Something I happened in my years covering the era of the terror wars known in the Anglosphere more formally as Operation Inherent Resolve-more simply the war against the so-called Islamic State-was the mystical sound of the tanbur. 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