though Syriac Christian authors in this period increasingly wrote in Arabic. The emergence of spoken Neo-Aramaic is conventionally dated to the 13th century, but a number of authors continued producing literary works in Syriac in the later medieval period. Because Assyrian, alongside Turoyo, is the most widely spoken variety of Syriac today, modern Syriac literature would therefore usually be written in those varieties. The conversion of the Mongols to Islam began a period of retreat and hardship for Syriac Christianity and its adherents, although there still has been a continuous stream of Syriac literature in Upper Mesopotamia and the Levant from the 14th century through to the present day. This has included the flourishing of literature from the various colloquial Eastern Aramaic Neo-Aramaic languages still spoken by Assyrians. This Neo-Syriac literature bears a dual tradition: it continues the traditions of the Syriac literature of the past and it incorporates a converging stream of the less homogeneous spoken language. The first such flourishing of Neo-Syriac was the seventeenth century literature of the School of Alqosh, in northern Iraq. This literature led to the establishment of Assyrian Aramaic as written literary languages. In the nineteenth century, printing presses were established in Urmia, in northern Iran. This led to the establishment of the 'General Urmian' dialect of Assyrian Neo-Aramaic as the standard in much Neo-Syriac Assyrian literature up until the 20th century. The Urmia Bible, published in 1852 by Justin Perkins was based on the Peshitta, where it included a parallel translation in the Urmian dialect. The comparative ease of modern publishing methods has encouraged other colloquial Neo-Aramaic languages, like Turoyo, to begin to produce literature. See also Assyrian people Aramaic Syriac alphabet Syriac language Notes References Sources Remarks on the Historical Background of the Modern Assyrian Language, Geoffrey Khan, University of Cambridge Maclean, Arthur John (1895). Grammar of the dialects of vernacular Syriac: as spoken by the Eastern Syrians of Kurdistan, north-west Persia, and the Plain of Mosul: with notices of the vernacular of the Jews of Azerbaijan and of Zakhu near Mosul. Cambridge University Press, London. External links Latin Alphabet on Wikiversity Assyrian Neo-Aramaic alphabets at Omniglot'' Semitisches Tonarchiv: Dokumentgruppe "Aramäisch/Neuostaramäisch (christl.)". Syriac-English dictionary & French Eastern Aramaic languages Christian Northeastern Neo-Aramaic dialects Languages of Iraq Languages of Syria Languages of Iran Languages of Armenia Languages of Georgia (country) Languages of Turkey Fusional languages Stress-timed languages Subject–verb–object languages Subject–object–verb languages Verb–subject–object