 Historically speaking, Mandaeism is one of the ancient religions of Mesopotamia and one of the earlier known monotheistic religions, along with Abrahamic faiths and Zoroastrianism.Mandeans (like the Assyrians) are of indigenous ancient Mesopotamian heritage, and speak their own dialect of Aramaic, known as Mandaic.The Iraq Mandaean (and Sabian) community, in the pre 1990 gulf war period, was the most important in the world with 30,000–50,000 of the 70,000 total living in the country mainly in the area around the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.