Like their neighbours the Armenians, the Assyrians owe the perpetuation of their nationality during the last 1,500 years or so to, the existence of their national Church. This, under a succession of bishops, in which each prelate was followed, as far as possible by, his nephew, has kept the Assyrian race from melting into the surrounding Moslem masses much in the same way as the indomitable Vladikas, or Prince-Bishops of Montenegro kept alive the national spirit of that principality against centuries of Turkish onslaught.

-- The London Times, 20 April 1920.