Nairi

Assyrian name for a region and group of tribes in the Armenian Highlands

Nairi (, also Na 'i ru) was the Akkadian name for a region inhabited by a particular group (possibly a confederation or league) of tribal principalities in the Armenian Highlands, approximately spanning the area between modern Diyarbakır and Lake Van and the region west of Lake Urmia. Nairi has sometimes been equated with Nihriya, known from Mesopotamian, Hittite, and Urartian sources. However, its co occurrence with Nihriya within a single text may argue against this. However, the exact relationship between Urartu and Nairi is unclear. Some scholars believe that Urartu was a part of Nairi until the former's consolidation as an independent kingdom, while others have suggested that Urartu and Nairi were separate polities. The Assyrians seem have continued to refer to Nairi as a distinct entity for decades after the establishment of Urartu, until Nairi was totally absorbed by Assyria and Urartu in the 8th century BCE.

According to Trevor Bryce, the Nairi lands were inhabited by "fierce tribal groups" divided into a number of small principalities. According to Bryce, parts of Urartu, a state of Nairi, corresponded to the Azzi of Hittite texts from the same period. The names of twenty three Nairi lands were recorded by Tiglath Pileser I (r. 1114–1076 BCE). Their southernmost point was Tumme, known to have been south west of Lake Urmia, and their northernmost point was Daiaeni. Other inscriptions describing Tiglath Pileser's campaign number the defeated kings at thirty or sixty. In 882 BCE, Assurnasirbal II invaded Nairi, which at the time comprised four polities: Bit Zamani, Shubru, Nirdun, and Urumu/Nirbu. These regions all had their own kings. In particular, Assurnasirbal conquered the fortified city of Madara, along with sixty other "cities" ruled by a certain Lapturi. Bryce states that some of his "royal inscriptions indicate that the term [Nairi] now also denoted a specific region to the southwest of Lake Urmia, centred on the land of Hubushkia." The exact location of Hubushkia is uncertain. Shalmaneser pursued Kakia, king of Nairi and Hubushkia, into the mountains, subsequently slaughtering his army and forcing him to surrender. In Mirjo Salvini's view, despite their identification in some sources, Urartu and Nairi referred to separate entities until the expansion of the former in the late 9th century BCE. Others regard this hypothesis skeptically; for example, Warren C. Benedict points out that there is no evidence of the presence of Hurrians in the vicinity of Lake Van. Linguistic evidence suggests that speakers of Proto Armenian were present in the Armenian Highlands at least as early as the beginning of the 1st millennium BCE. According to Lorenzo D'Alfonso, the Nairi tribe Tuali may have moved west and founded the Iron Age neo Hittite kingdom of Tabal.