37 places · 13 regions · source-cited

A map of a people, from Lalish outward.

Every Yazidi sacred site and community on one map — the sanctuary of Lalish, the shrines of Sinjar, the temples of the Caucasus, and the diaspora that now reaches from Germany to Nebraska. Each marker opens a sourced place page.

Sacred centre
Lalish
On the regional map
24 sites
Homeland & diaspora
37 places

Regional locator

The homeland and the Caucasus

A schematic locator, not a survey map: positions are approximate and no boundary is drawn or implied. The diaspora is listed in full below.

Lalish — SanctuarySheikhan (Ain Sifni) — Community townBa'adre — Community townBashiqa — Community townBahzani — Community townSinjar (Shingal) — Community townMount Sinjar — Sacred mountainShrine of Şerfedîn — Shrine / mazarSnûne — Community townKocho — Memorial placeTil Ezêr (Qahtaniyah) — Memorial placeDuhok — Community townKhanke — Displacement siteSharya — Displacement siteAfrin — Community townJazira (Amuda) — Community townBatman — Community townBeşiri — Community townMidyat — Community townMardin — Community townViranşehir — Community townAknalich Temples (Ziarat & Quba Mêrê Dîwanê) — Diaspora templeAragatsotn Yazidi villages — Community townSultan Ezid Temple, Tbilisi — Diaspora temple

Sacred places

Communities

Diaspora markers sit off the regional frame — find them in the directory.

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Search sites and communities

Works without JavaScript. With it enabled, the map and the directory filter together as you type.

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Pre-publication reference set. This 37-place launch dataset is technically complete; coordinates are approximate and descriptions still require the named Yazidi-affiliated or specialist reviewer the site’s editorial gate calls for.

Full directory

6 places shown

6 places shown.

The Iraqi homeland

Sheikhan, the Nineveh Plain, Sinjar, and the displacement belt around Duhok.

Sinjar (Shingal) The western heartland and its sacred mountain.

Community town Snûne Sinûnê A town on the northern side of Mount Sinjar and one of the larger return points in the district. Community town Sinjar (Shingal) Şingal The principal town of the Sinjar region and the heartland of Yazidi life in western Nineveh. Memorial place Kocho Koço A village south of Sinjar that has become a memorial to the 2014 genocide. Memorial place Til Ezêr (Qahtaniyah) Til Ezêr A Ba'ath-era collective town south of Sinjar and the site of the deadliest bombing of the Iraq war in 2007. Shrine / mazar Shrine of Şerfedîn Şerfedîn The most important sanctuary on Mount Sinjar, second only to Lalish for the Yazidis of Shingal. Sacred mountain Mount Sinjar Çiyayê Şingalê The sacred massif above the Sinjar plain, dotted with shrines and a place of refuge during the 2014 siege.

How to read this map

A locator, honestly labelled

The map exists to show relationships — how close the Sinjar shrines sit to the mountain, how far the Caucasus temples lie from Lalish — not to fix exact positions or take any view on a border.

  1. 01
    Schematic projection

    Positions use an equirectangular projection corrected for latitude, so the scale bar reads the same across the frame. Coordinates are approximate and given on each place page.

  2. 02
    No borders drawn

    Country names appear only as faint orientation. In line with the site’s neutrality rule, no national or internal boundary is drawn or implied, including around contested Sinjar.

  3. 03
    Distance from Lalish

    Each place page gives its great-circle distance and direction from the sanctuary at Lalish, the reference point from which the whole map is measured.

  4. 04
    Memorial restraint

    Places scarred by the 2014 genocide are recorded factually and run ads-off, linking to the Genocide, Displacement & Justice section rather than repeating detail here.

Named authorities

Sources and verification

Descriptions are editorial syntheses, never quotations. Each place page shows a smaller, type-specific source set.

Eszter Spät

The Yezidis

Saqi, 2005, with later fieldwork on persecution, displacement, and ritual change. Used for contemporary community and displacement context.

Garnik Asatrian & Victoria Arakelova

The Religion of the Peacock Angel

Routledge, 2014. Reference for the Yazidis of the Caucasus — Armenia, Georgia, and the communities that spread into Russia.

IOM Iraq

Displacement Tracking Matrix

Institutional source for displacement and return figures across Sinjar, Duhok, and the Nineveh Plain. Figures move and require re-verification at publish time.

Dataset version 1.0.0 · Built 18 August 2026 · XML place sitemap