The Number One Thing that DID NOT Originate from Turkey?

Turkeys. Yeah, I got a chuckle out of the irony there.

So, wanna know why we call them turkeys? Here ya go.

Apparently when Europeans were first trampling through North America, they incorrectly identified the wild native birds as Asian guinea fowl, or what was known then as a Turkey hen and Turkey cock (hey…that’s what it says, don’t look at me like that), because it was imported to Central Europe through Turkey (of course, it wasn’t Turkey then, it was the Ottoman Empire, so now I’m super confused). Eventually, those crazy Europeans just shortened the bird’s name to turkey, and that stuck as the name of the bird.

(And did you know that a group of turkeys is called a rafter? Seriously!)

My Turkish students are not super crazy about sharing a name with our fabulous bird. They keep asking me: Why don’t you call us by our real name: Türkiye? I tell them there are two reasons: A. No one in the U.S. knows how to pronounce the umlaud (ü). And B.) What do they call us? A.B.D., which translates to: Amerika Birlesik Devletleri (United States of America). Every country calls other countries by their own special names.

Finally, Turkey as we now know it became a nation in 1923. Turkish students, I ask you this: You knew we were calling the birds turkeys then, but you chose to name your country Turkey anyway. So really, where does the blame lie?

Crazy Things That Apparently Originated in Turkey: Number Four!

Yes, Turkey is famous for things like baklava, yogurt, and Turkish kebab. But let’s delve a little deeper, shall we? Here are my top four Turkic items, in order, Letterman style.

NUMBER FOUR: Blue eyes. This one might actually be true. See my blog on blue eyes below. (Just look for the big blue eye.)

Crazy Things That Apparently Originated in Turkey: Number Three!

NUMBER THREE: Santa Clause. Oh yeah, did I mention that Santa’s Turkish? Well, actually, he was Byzantine. But if someone ever lived in Turkey or moved to Turkey, or really liked Turkey (slight exaggeration), they’re basically Turkish. This one is actually true as well, though I’ll admit that Santa Clause has some crazy complicated roots. But let’s stick with the Christian ones. Saint Nicholas of Myra is considered the primary inspiration for the modern-day St. Nick. He was a 4th Century Greek Christian Bishop in Lycia (pron: Lyshia), a province of Byzantine Anatolia…and now known as Turkey. St. Nick was famous for his generosity and giving gifts to the poor–legend says he even gave three poor girls a dowry so they could get married and not have to go into prostitution. Now that’s my kind of saint.

Anyway, of course there are pagan roots to Santa Clause as well, like his connection to the god Odin, but that’s another topic. (But I have to ask, who do you think he looks more like, St. Nick in the fresco, or Gandalf, ahem…I mean Odin, to the right?)

The most important thing is that St. Nick’s tomb is still in Turkey in Demre (Ancient Myra). Unfortunately, in 1084 a bunch of pesky Italian merchants who were keen on St. Nick pushed past the monks living at the monastery there and raided the sarcophagus. They stole the remains and whisked them off to Italy, where they now remained sealed in a cathedral in Bari,  because for some reason Italy has to have everyone’s friggin’ remains in their cathedrals. Pesky Italians! Must everything in Turkey relocate to Italy? Is someone still grumpy about losing Constantinople? 

To check out the church and more about the story, click here.

Crazy Things That Apparently Originated in Turkey: Number Two!

NUMBER TWO: The Christmas tree decoration ritual. Oh yeah, it’s from Turkey. Apparently, even though almost everyone agrees that the christmas tree decoration originated in pre-Christian England or the Germanic peoples, archeologist Muazzez Ilmiye Çığ(nope–I can’t pronounce it either) has a new opinion to share: Turks invented the Christmas tree.

Çığ argues that the ritual stems from the Turkish tradition of the wish-making tree. Apparently people put special things for God under a white pine around the time of the winter solstice (Dec. 22nd), in hopes of getting blessed by God the following year. They also tied special cloths on the tree’s boughs, much like putting on ornaments. All of this was part of small festivities to celebrate the sun (like oh so many other pagan traditions), and people would “clean homes, sing folk songs, eat special foods and put on festive clothing.”

But here’s where he gets really convincing. Apparently this was a ritual originally practiced in Turkic Central Asia, then migrated to the Anatolian region (what is now Turkey). The birth of Jesus never used to be celebrated with a Christmas tree, but when the Council of Nicaea met in 325 A.D. (yes, in Turkey), it’s possible that these traditions began to sneak their way through Europe. (Okay, it didn’t quite sneak; Çığ says that it was Hunnish warriors that introduced it to Europe, so I’m guessing some murderous pillaging came along with it: Bow before my Christmas tree or I’ll chop off your head!).

Not everyone is down with this theory–in fact even some Turkish historians consider it wishful thinking. While there’s certainly some serious fact checking to do…it’s definitely interesting! Still not a believer? For more on the topic, click here.

Crazy Things That Apparently Originated in Turkey: Number One!

And the NUMBER ONE most astonishing thing that came from Turkey is…(drum roll please…)

Native Americans are Turkish. Yup. You can even see pictures of Native Americans hanging on some walls around Turkey. I kid you not. Here’s the deal. A university in Istanbul recently (2008) held a symposium in the U.S. that explored the genealogical connections between Turks and Native Americans. All kinds of well-respected Turks from American and Istanbul universities presented their case on this topic.

Basically, they posited that Turks from Central Asia migrated over the Bering Strait thousands of years ago and settled in the Americas. They go on to say that some of the Native Americans of today descend from this group of people of Turkish origin. One way you can tell—they say—is by looking at commonalities in the language. For example in Eskimo, the word kayak means boat, while in Turkish, kayak means skiing, but kayık means boat. (Bore yourself to death on this topic here.) They’ve also looked at DNA and Y-Chromosomes…etc. Anyway, it’s actually pretty darn convincing as well. You can a five-minute presentation on this topic in the You Tube below.

But let’s just pause for one moment, people. Native Americans. Are. Turks.

Really?

I have to say though, that the head Native American who attended the symposium soundly rejected these theories, stating that the language commonalities (over 300 Turkish words had cousins in Native languages) were a result of possible Native American migration that occurred in reverse, when Native Americans went back over the Bering Strait to Central Asia.

Come on, now, seriously? Is that the best you can do? Why would anyone return to Northern Russia? That’s crazy talk.

I am a genetic mutant

Today I had a pretty exciting event on my social calendar. You ready for it? Well, first I gave a final exam–woo hoo! Then I went with two of my students downtown to buy a new projector for one of our classrooms. I drank tea and got to speak some horrible Turkish (though my student said my pronunciation was really good…probably because I say the same words over and over again). Then…and here’s where it gets super exciting (or eggziting, as my students say)…then we went out to dinner! Having dinner companions is pretty amazing for me, quite frankly, I’m pretty much a hermit these days (not by choice).

Anyway, on our way out of the cafe, one of my students commented: “Teacher…everyone is looking at you. You want to know why? Because you are blonde.” Then he went on to say that maybe it was because I also had blue eyes. “It is very eggziting for people (read: males) in Turkey,” he said. Now, you may or may not agree that I’m a blonde, but that’s besides the point. The point is that I’m a genetic mutant.

What, you say? Mutant, you say? Well, my student later went on to tell me that one of my colleagues had said that people with blue eyes have a genetic mutation. We’re all supposed to have brown eyes. Of course, I heard that and thought that he was just being hegemonic (that was for you, Fielding) but then I decided to look it up. And you know what, folks? He was right!

Turns out the university of Copenhagen did some research on blue-eyed folk and discovered that they all have one common ancestor (they haven’t tracked down her name yet though…sorry). In 2008, Hans Eiberg and his buds published an article Human Genetics that stated that discovered that (ready for this?)”a mutation in the 86th intron of the HERC2 gene, which is hypothesized to interact with the OCA2 gene promoter, reduced expression of OCA2 with subsequent reduction in melanin production.”

Though it’s quite possibly the most horrifying sentence I’ve ever read, it’s basically saying that a mutation caused blue eyes. They then go on to say that this mutation can be tracked down to a single individual in the Near East or Black Sea region 6,000 to 10,000 years ago. Which is just great–yet another thing that Turks can claim originated in Turkey: blue friggin’ eyes. (Turks are crazy for saying everything originates here, but that’s a separate blog post.) Originally, it turns out we all had brown eyes. My colleague was right.

(Of course, he later went on to say that only clever people were bald and ordinary people have hair, but…we’ll skip that one. And yes, he’s bald.)

Apparently blue eyes are even becoming more rare in the United States. A 2002 study showed that 33.8% of the population born from 1936 to 1951 has blue eyes, down from 57.7% for those born from 1899 through 1905. Now only one in six children are born with blue eyes people! That’s 22.4% of white Americans! Thanks ethnic blending…way to go. Why did we have to get all p.c. and allow intermarriage again?*

But let’s quit all this depressing talk about my vanishing mutant race. Here’s the thought I really want to leave you with…was it really a genetic mutation that cuased blue eyes?

Or was it…ALIENS???

This blog post was written solely with “facts” from Wikipedia. Feel free to disprove me. Please.
*Note: Writer is being sarcastic here. See through it, please. (<–you never know, people. Really.)
P.S. Why are eyes so creepy all by themselves?