Greek and Turkish similarities

Diego   Wed Jan 10, 2007 9:02 pm GMT
I have always been intrigued by the expansion of Ottoman Empire and its influence on people, nations, languages and in this case the Greek language. How deep and hard has this invasion of Turks (ottomans) has shapped todays Greeks and spoken Greek language? Can this ruling of Greeks from Turks which lasted for more than 500 years and its influence on people and language can be measured somehow, in order to create some kind of "scale of transformation" that could be used on other languages and people? What do you guys think?
Guest   Wed Jan 10, 2007 9:37 pm GMT
All the languages in Balkans have turkish and arabic loanwords.
as spanish have arabic.
However the ottomans took also,not just gave.
Thetis   Wed Jan 10, 2007 10:24 pm GMT
I am from Kerkyra(Corfu).
Ionian islands in western Hellas were never occupied by Ottomans.
So the greek we speak has more Italian words like "arivaro"-arrive.
The greek refugees from Ionia and Anatolia have more ottoman words.
billgregg   Wed Jan 10, 2007 11:30 pm GMT
Not exactly on topic, but I find the post-Roman history of Anatolia interesting. I get the feeling that there's very little awareness of how hellenized it was for a 1000 years or so. For a time after the Slavs invaded the Balkans, it seems to have been the core of the Byzantine Empire and the Greek-speaking world rather than the lands we refer to as "Greece" today.

If Manzikert had had a different outcome in 1071, "Greece" today might encompass everything from Epirus to Pontus, and Greek would be one of the major languages of Europe, at least in terms of the number of speakers.

I wonder if anyone has done research into exactly how the Turkification of the peninsula was accomplished--what portion of it is due to immigration of Central Asian Turks, and how much is due to conversion to Islam and assimilation into the dominant (Turkish) culture during Ottoman times. My feeling is that it was more due to assimilation than immigration, but I have nothing to back that up.
Elen   Thu Jan 11, 2007 10:45 am GMT
@billgregg

The Decline of Medieval Hellenism in Asia Minor and the Process of Islamization from the Eleventh Through the Fifteenth Century.

http://www.amazon.com/Medieval-Hellenism-Islamization-Eleventh-Fifteenth/dp/0520057538



Greek words in turkish.

σκελετός skeletos iskelet skeleton

κλειδί kleidi kilit key

χάρτης hartis harita map

χορός horos horon folk dance


Turkish words in greek.

rusfeti rüşvet bribe

musafiris misafir guest

handaki hendek ditch, trench

habari haber news
Seljuk   Thu Jan 11, 2007 7:21 pm GMT
I am a Turkish but I didn't know those words were borrowed from Greek into Turkish ;) I didn't know that many words we have borrowed from Greek but I know Greeks have borrowed from us many words.Turkish people really are getting more and more European day by day.You can't guess how quickly Turkey is getting europenized unless you live in Turkey.There are so many English words all over Turkey, people learn English unintentionally really here.By the way I believe that IT IS A REAL SHAME OF EUROPE TO GET BULGARIA AND ROMANIA INTO EU BUT NOT TURKEY!They are certainly not any more developed than Turkey.By the way, I really like the way of Turkish and Greek people's friendship.
Yun   Thu Jan 11, 2007 9:42 pm GMT
Merhaba kardeş yavaş yavaş avrupalılaşmak.Yeni jenerasyonu geliyor. :)
Calliope   Thu Jan 11, 2007 10:18 pm GMT
"By the way I believe that IT IS A REAL SHAME OF EUROPE TO GET BULGARIA AND ROMANIA INTO EU BUT NOT TURKEY!They are certainly not any more developed than Turkey.By the way, I really like the way of Turkish and Greek people's friendship."

It's all politics, Seljuk... I would also love to see all those political issues resolved and Turkey in the EU soon. I've had a couple of Turkish friends in the past (penpals really, but I'd rather think of them as friends), and of course we discussed cultural stuff and all - learning about Turkey was very interesting for me. I would definitely visit, first chance I'd get. (I'm Greek, btw).

As far as politics are concerned... my view has always been that as people, we get along great and there is no bad blood between us. Politicians always have their agendas everywhere in the world, and that's the only thing that has ever caused trouble, not how people really feel and think. I remember seeing a documentary about the population exchange that took place the last century, and it was amazing... Greeks were sad to leave Turkey, Turks were sad to leave Greece, and the neighbours and friends of both were sad to see them go... shows you how people got along great in those mixed communities, but politics screwed it up...

Oh as for the loans... well, we're neighbours and we have a lot of common history. It only makes sense that we borrowed both ways, linguistically and culturally speaking. And as some people have said before, we both have the same excellent taste in food. :-)

Btw... some people claimed our languages are mutually intelligible... I insisted they are not. What do you think? :-)
Erol   Sat Jan 13, 2007 6:32 am GMT
To billgregg , Elen & other friends that are interested;

Oh boy , did I make ethnical , cultural , religious , linguistical etc. researches about these two lands called "Greece" & "Turkey" today?

But this is very extensive. So I can summarize it as , much as possible .

I feel excited when someone asks about these two sisters that are connected in heart & body , but are capricious to each other time to time , due to the artificial concepts happened in the history unfortunately.

The "ancient Turks" and today's "Anatolian-Thracian Turks" are quite different people culturally , ethnically , etc.

How "ancient Turks" came through Iran in 1071 & mixed along the way , as they did thousands of years. They were not that many in comparison with huge population of Anatolia-Roumelia (Balkans, Thrace etc.) , but they were very organized and skillful war-like people with high swift war machines at those times. So the skill to win wars is not the bulk of numbers , but the strategy to use your sources. And the "ancient Turks" just did that.

Was this the first time Eastern Roman-Byzantine Empire dealt with turkic states & tribes?

No, they did that all along , but not from the east so much . It was mostly from the west from Balkans , like Huns , Avars , Bulgarians , Kuman-Kypchaks , Pecheneks , etc. All these pagan-shamanistic free war-like entities were either dissolved themselves or one way or another assimilated or passified at the end or joined forces with either Western Roman or Eastern Roman Empires.

There were Kumans , Pecheneks that were settled into Balkan-Anatolian territories of Byzantine E. by the permission of Byzantine Emperors and mostly assimilated successfully.

Not this time , this was Seljukid Empire & the royalty was sophisticated effected from Central Asian & Persian Empires , but most of the common people were not naturally and had important nomadic population , along with the settled ones.

Just a short a while ago converted its population partially to this very organized sophisticated religion-culture called Islam from their nothern Eurasian pagan-shamanistic background.

To be continued...
Seljuk   Sat Jan 13, 2007 2:55 pm GMT
Hi Calliope and others,
First, Turkish and Greek are mutual intelligible as much as Chinese is with Russian.What I'm trying to say is Turkish and Greek can never be explained to be mutual intelligible.If they are so, I'm too stupid not to understand even a word of Greek.But I'd want to, really.Greek has derived from Hellenic and Turkish from Ural-Altai.They have no similarities as for their grammar.Turkish is agglutinating, you add many suffixes at the end of words.For instance you say "Çekoslovakyalılaştıramadıklarımızdan mıydınız?" when you want to say "Are you one of those whom we couldn't convert into Czechoslovak?" in Turkish.Greek is such a great and marvellous language.I like it very much.I'd want to learn it but it is both difficult and unnecessary in Turkey unless you live in Edirne, Kırklareli or İzmir.There are some Greek immigrants in some parts of Turkey.One of them is at my class.I daren't learn such a difficult language for the sake of 10 million people in Greece.But if you look the terms of pleasure, it is worth trying.I love Greek's "s" sound very much.The "s"s are everywhere in the language ;) I memorized a song in Greek, Esena Mono.I can sing it but i don't know the exact meaning of it.By the way our musical culture is so close that many Turkish and Greek singers make a duet with the other race.I voted for Greece at Eurovision last year.
Katerina   Sat Jan 13, 2007 4:09 pm GMT
I watch "Yabanci Damat" (the foreign bridegroom)(Xenos Ğambrόs)/
Ta sinora tis aghápis - sınırleri sevgin (The fronts of love) in greek version

I love all the actors of this turkish serial,especially the turkish grandfather Memik Dede and the greek grandmother Eftalya nine :)

and the song of the serial is very good

585.000 greek tourists visited Turkey in 2005.

Barış = Iríni :-)
Seljuk   Sat Jan 13, 2007 8:03 pm GMT
Hi Katerina! I'm proud of speaking to Greeks in such a topic.I thought Greeks and Turkish people had always been fighters against each other.It's really very nice to be able to speek a Greek after all the debates about Cyprus.I didn't watch any of the series Yabancı Damat.But all my friends liked and watched it.We have shared many things throughout the history and I hope we'll go on.By the way, what do you think about Survivor?Do you watch it?Kalispera...