Category: Turkey

TURKISH LANGUAGE AND THE NATIVE AMERICANS
The Name TURK In Ancient History by Dr. Polat Kaya

Traces of the Altaic Words “ATA”, “APA”, “ANA” and
Their Derivatives in the Languages of Some of the Native Peoples of Americas

By: Polat Kaya

Abstract
In early 1980s, out of curiosity, I was wondering about a possible existence of an affinity between Altaic Languages and the native languages spoken in the Americas. So I made a research, (although not as a linguist), with the hope of finding some living words presently used in Turkish and also in the languages of the Native Peoples of Americas. After all thousands of years ago, the ancestors of both the Turks and those of some of the Native Peoples of the American continents shared the same geographic area in Central Asia and Siberia. I wrote a paper about my findings through my research entitled “Probable Existence of a Linguistic and Cultural Kinship Between the Altaic Peoples and the Native Peoples of Americas.” The following is a rearrangement of the original paper.

1. Introduction
In my search I used the following facts and/or assumptions:

1a) Turks and their ancestors are Central Asiatic (particularly Altaic) people. The ancestors of Turks have lived in this part of the world (i.e., Central Asia and most parts of Siberia) not only throughout the known history, but most likely for thousands of years before that in the distant past. From Central Asia they have migrated to other parts of the world. At present, many ethnic Turkish people live in Siberia all the way up to the Kara Sea north of Ural Mountains, to East Siberian Sea and to the Bering Straight in the east as well as in Central Asia.

1b) The ancestors of most of the Native Peoples of North, Central and South Americas are known to have migrated from Asia through the Bering Sea many thousands (10000 or more) of years ago.

1c) In view of these facts, it is very likely that in the distant past, the ancestors of some of the Native Peoples of Americas and the ancestors of Turks and other Altaic peoples lived in the same or adjacent geographic regions of Central Asia and/or Siberia. If so, it is again very likely that all these peoples could have been members of the same people or closely related people who spoke the same language or closely related languages. Due to their possible relationship with each other in the distant past, one is inclined to think of probable existence of some cultural and linguistic relationship between these peoples, in spite of the fact that while some members stayed in their homelands in Asia, the others left Asia and went to North America.

1d) All languages are dynamic and subject to change in time. Similarly, a proto-Altaic language spoken by the members of an Altaic community who became separated from each other, in time by thousands of years and in space by thousands of kilometres, would definitely develop independently of each other in a way that when examined at present, they would appear alien to each other. In present times, it would be difficult for people who speak such languages to communicate with each other with the present form of their languages.

1e) However, in spite of this independent development of the languages of the Native Peoples of Americas and the Altaic Peoples, there may still exist in both groups of languages some living words that may be used to express the same meaning in the same way as before. There should still be some living words as “linguistic artefacts” which are reminiscence of the language that these ancient people spoke while they were all living in Asia.

1f) In any language, the first two words that a child learns in his/her mother tongue are probably the ones that correspond to the words “father” and “mother”. These two words are repeated in each person’s life time, particularly early in age, so frequently that they become permanently embedded in everyone’s memory. These two words are the most likely ones to be passed on from generation to generation during the life times of languages that may live thousands of years. Although, peoples of the same ethnic origin may become separated from each other and live in different parts of the world for long duration of time, yet their present languages may still retain these two words either in their original form or in a form which is similar to or a derivative of the original form. In spite of the evolutionary forces that act upon a language and cause changes in its structure and in the pronunciation of its words, one can still recognise these two words in languages which are related to each other.

1g) Turks being Altaic people of Central Asia are the lucky and proud inheritors of the Altaic words “ata”, “apa” and “ana” through their Turkic languages.[1] [2] [3] In this set of Altaic words, the first two have been used for “father”, “ancestor” and “old man” and the last one for “mother” throughout the history by different Altaic groups of peoples. Where ever the ancestors of Turks have migrated from their original homelands in Central Asia, they have carried with them these words as “linguistic artefacts” of their Altaic language to their new destinations. In their new homelands, they have passed these words to generation to generation up to the present time. The preservation of these words would particularly be highly likely if the speakers of the language were a dominant group with respect to their new neighbours. In this case, they would not only retain particular features of their language but it is quite likely that they would influence the languages of their new neighbours. On the other hand, if they were not as strong as their new neighbours in the new homelands, it is also likely that their language would be influenced by the languages of their neighbours. In any case, there would be some degree of cross pollination between the languages of people interacting closely with each other. With these suppositions, I feel that it would be very appropriate to use the Altaic words “ata”, “apa” and “ana” and their derivatives as reference linguistic artefacts to trace the footsteps of the ancestors of Turks and other Altaic peoples.

1h) In addition to these basic words which do not easily change in time, one could also use as reference the names for some things that influence the lives of people to the degree that people tend to regard them highly and/or worship them in their every day life. People could take with them the names of such things as the Sun, the Moon, stars, gods, mountains, rivers, living things, etc. , wherever they go. Therefore, the names for such objects could also be used as reference linguistic artefacts to trace people.

1i) In Turkish, the two words that have been used interchangeably for “father”, i.e., the words “ata” and “apa” could go through some transformation in time. Particularly, the phonemes “t” in “ata” and “p” in “apa” would tend to change into consonants “d” as in “ada” and “b” in “aba” respectively. This is noted to be so in various dialects of Turkish.

1j) The Altaic word corresponding to the word “mother” is “ana”. A probable derivative of this word may be the word “ama” for “mother” which seems to be related to the Turkic word “meme” meaning mother’s breast. For any child, “meme” is nothing but the “mama” or “ama” and hence “ana”. In dialects of a proto-Altaic language, the word for “mother” could have been “ana” or “ama”. By having “n” in “ana” change into “m”, the word “ama” would result; similarly, by having the “m” in “ama” change into “n” would make the transformed word “ana”. We will probably never know the exact nature of the relationship that may have taken place in history between the words “ana” and “ama”. However, it seems that, throughout the historic development of the Altaic languages and thus of Turkish, “ana” is the word which is used most dominantly to mean “mother”.

1k) Derivative words based on “ata”, “apa” and “ana” are used to express various kinship’s, particularly, for “father’s father”, “father’s mother”, mother’s father” and “mother’s mother”. Table 1 below lists some of the possible derivative words based on these words. Turkish as an Altaic language, has used some of these derivative words not only in its archaic form but also in its present spoken dialects.

1l) In phonetic languages such as Turkish in Altaic languages, the consonants in a given word make up the skeleton of each word while vowels in the word provide its proper sounding. However as the language develops in time, the vowels in a word may change into other vowels such as “a” into “e”, “o”, “u” while consonants of the words, in general, would tend to maintain their identity in the word through time.

1m) One should also note that each one of the derivative words from these Altaic words would readily go through transformations as people use and repeat them from generation to generation. For example, in the word “ataata” for “father’s father”, one of the vowels “a” in the middle of the the word would tend to be dropped off and the new form of the word would be “atata”. In time, the word could go through further transformations and may take the possible derivative forms of “taata”, “tata”, “tate”, “tatI”, ‘tete”, “tat” and in the case of “adaada”, it could transform into “adada”, “dada”, “dede”, “dadI” “dad”, etc.. In time, some of these derived words will be used to mean not only the “father’s father” but also to mean “ancestors”, “father”, “old man” and “man”. There are living examples of such usage in Turkish and in other Altaic languages. In my research, I have found evidence that the Altaic words “ata”, “apa” and “ana” and their derivatives are used in considerable number of languages spoken by the Native Peoples of North, Central and South Americas. My findings are listed in Table 2 where I have listed the languages which use these words and the names of the Native Peoples of Americas who speak these languages with appropriate references.

Table 1.

Basic Form	Derivatives from basic words in likely transformations
Father, ancestor:
ata	ada, ta, da
apa	aba, pa, ba
Mother:
ana	na
Father’s father:
ataata	atata, tata, tatI, tat, tete, tet
adaada	adada, dada, dadI, dede, dad
apaapa	apapa, papa, papo, pap
abaaba	ababa, baba, babi, babo, bab
Mother’s father:
anaata	anata, nata, nat
anaada	anada, nada, nad
anaapa	anapa, napa, nap
anaaba	anaba, naba, nab
Father’s mother:
ataana	atana, tana, tan
adaana	adana, dana, dan
apaana	apapa, napa, nap
anaaba	abana, bana, ban
Mother’s mother:
anaana	anana, nana, nane, nanI, nano, nene, neni, nine, nan, nen

Table 2.

Item	Language	“father”	“mother”	Notes. No.	Location
1	Turkish	ata, apa, baba	ana, anne	[1] [2] [3]	Turkey, many regions of Asia
2	Eskimo	atataq	ananaq	[4]	Canada, Greenland
3	Aleut	adaq	anaq	[5]	Aleutian Islands, Alaska
4	Wahtoktata	antcha	ehong	[6]	W. of Missouri river, USA
5	Konza	etahceh	enah (*t1)	[6]	N. of Missouri river, USA
6	Omaha	dada	ehong	[6]	Central Plains, USA
7	Sioux	atcucu	huco	[6]	Dakota, USA
8	Minnetare	tanta	eka	[6]	USA
9	Pawne	ateash	aterah (*t1)	[6]	Kansas, USA
10	Cherokee	atotuh	atsIng	[6]	Oklahoma, USA
11	Cherokee	udoda	uji	[7]	South Appalachians, USA
12	Winnebago	chache	nahne (*t1)	[6]	Wisconsin, USA
13	Puan / Nippegon	chache	nahne	[6]	USA
14	Naudowesses of Carver	ahta (*t1)	enah (*t1)	[6]	USA
15	Hennepin	ahta	enah	[6]	USA
16	Cree	o:hta: (*t1)	ka:wIy	[8]	Canada
17	Fox Cree	osa	ane:he (*t1)	[8]	Canada
18	Plains Cree “Y” dialect	nohtawe (my father)	ni kawe (my mother)	[9]	Canada
19	Menomini	o:hna (*t1)	kIah?	[8]	Great Lakes, Canada; Wisconsin, USA
20	Micmac	tatat	gIju	[8], [10]	Maritime Prov., Canada
21	Algonquin	papam, tatag	mam, ma:ma:, mamay	[8]	Ontario, Canada
22	Kenora Indians	ta:ta:	—	[8]	Canada
23	Kekchi	yuwa	na	[11], [12]	Guatemala
24	Quiche	tat	nan?	[11], [12]	Guatemala
25	Ixil	pap	nan	[11], [12]	Guatemala
26	Aguacetec	ta	na	[11]	Guatemala
27	Wappo	oayao	naoa	[13]	California, USA
28	Miwok	oappI	ounu	[12]	California, USA
29	Callam & Lumni	IaIIn	tan	[15]	Washington territory, USA
30	Chinook	tlkamama	tlkanaa	[16]	Oregon, Wash. USA
31	Hidatsa	ate, tatIs	hIdu, hu	[17]	North Dakota, USA
32	Cahuilla	na, taata	ye	[18]	California, USA
33	Otchipwe	papa, baba, dede, n’otta	?	[19], [20]	Southern Ontario, Canada
34	Mutsun	appa	anna?	[21]	Alta Calif., USA
35	Yucateco	yum	naa, na	[22]	Mexico and Guatemala
36	Papago / Pima	apapa	je’e	[23]	Southwestern USA
37	Navaho	ta	ma	[24]	Arizona, USA
38	Biloxi	adI	unnI	[25]	Gulf Coast, USA
39	Tsimshian	ap, ab	nay	[26]	USA; B. Colombia, Canada
40	Aguaruna (Jivaro)	apa	duku	[27], [28]	Peru, S. America
41	Iquito	—	nanI	[27]	Peru, S. America
42	Candoshi	—	ataatam	[27]	Peru, S. America
43	Nahuatl (Aztec language)	tahtlI (*t1)	nantlI	[29], [30]	Mexico
44	Quechua (Inca language)	tayta	nanagash	[31]	Peru, S. America (*t2)
45	Cayapa	apa	mama	[27]	Ecuador, S. America
46	Colorado	apa	mama	[27]	Ecuador, S. America
47	Auca	naenae	mama	[27]	Ecuador, S. America

(*t1) In these words where the consonant “h” appears and follows a vovel such as “a” or “o” or “u” seems to be a relic of transcribing these words under the influence of English. Without the “h”, the affinity of these words to the respective Turkish words are very much obvious.

(*t2) Tarma Quechua is the native language of the province of Tarma which is north of the capital city Lima of Peru. This language is a variety of the Inca language QUECHUA. In Tarma Quechua of Peru, “nana = a woman’s sister” and “nanachIkaq = sister”; “taytancI = grandfather”; “taytacha = young gentleman”; and “tayta inti = father sun”. Affinity between these words and the Turkish “ata” and “ana” should be noted.

2. Additional Examples of Words Indicating to a Common Past

In addition to the Altaic words “ata”, “apa” and “ana” listed in Table 2, some other living words also point to the existence of a common linguistic kinship between the Altaic languages and the languages of some of the Native peoples of Americas.

2a) In Aztec language (the Nahuatl), in addition to the Nahuatl words “tahtlI” and “nantlI” corresponding to the Altaic words “ata” and “ana” respectively, we observe the word “tepetl” or “tepec” meaning “hill” which is the same both in the meaning and word structure as the Turkish word “tepe”. There seems to be many mountains and/or hills in Central and South America which are named with a name suffixed or prefixed with the word “tepec”. For example, in Mexico we have: “Chapultepec”, Agaltepec, Citlaltepec, Coatepec, Ecatepec, Jamiltepec, Oaxtepec, Ometepec, Quiotepec, Tehuantepec, Tututepec, Tepecoacuilco, Tepetitan and Tepexpan. In El Salvadore: Cojutepeque, Lago de Coatepeque, Igualtepeque. In Guatamala: Jilotepeque, Ixtepeque and in Brasil Sierra Tepequem. Similarly, in Turkic geography where Turkic and other Altaic people live, we have many hills and/or mountains named in the same manner such as Aktepe, Kultepe, Kartaltepe, Goktepe, etc..

2b) In archaic Turkish, the word “kın” and in modern Turkish the words “gün” or “güneş” are the words for both the “sun” and “day”. The Mayan people also call both the “sun” and “day” with the word “kin”.[34] In Mayan calender, a year was divided into 18 months and each month into 20 kins. It seems that these two words of totally different languages have also some historical common background. Additionally, it is noted that Turkish speaking Altaic peoples associated the word for “sun” and the word for “day” very closely with each other by expressing both concepts with the same word. Similar expressions seem to exist In Mayan languages.[34] In archaic Turkish, the name for the constellation “Ursa Major” is “Yitiken”. In this word, the first part “yiti” means “seven” and the last part “ken” is a changed form of the word “kun”, i.e., the “sun”. Thus, in the language of Altaic people, the word “yitiken” would mean “seven suns” where the concept of “sun” and a “star” was probably considered to be the same.

2c) In Inca language Quechua, the “sun god” and hence the “sun” was called “Inti”. In the word “Inti”, the prefix “in” stands for “my” and “ti” stands for “father”; hence, the word has the meaning of “my father”. Since the Incas were “sun” and “ancestor” worshippers like most of the Altaic peoples including Turks, finding an image of the Altaic word “ata” in the Inca word “inti” is pleasantly surprising. It should be noted that the Inca word “tayta” and the Turkish word “ata” have the same meaning, i.e., “father” and similar linguistic form (see item 44 in Table 2).

2d) Inti the Sun God was the ranking deity in the Inca pantheon like the Tengri among the Altaic people. It was represented by Incas with a human face on a ray-splayed disk. He was considered to be the Incas’ divine ancestor.[34]

2e) In Inca language Quechua, Incas used to call one of their low order Creator-God as “Ataguju”.[34] It should be noted that the initial part of this word is suprisingly the Altaic word “ata”. In this case it probably stands for “sacred ancestors”.

2f) In Inca society, unmarried princes of royal blood were called “Augui”. On marrying, they became “Inca” or “Atauchi”.[35] It is only reasonable to call an adult man “atauchi” after being married, because, it is most likely that he will become an “ata”, i.e., “father”. So, again we see the images of the Altaic word “ata” in another Quechua word meaning “father”.

2g) It seems that during the long development process of the languages of Native Peoples of Americas, some of these words may have changed positions. In other words in some cases, the words used to express male kinship in one language may be used for female kinship or visa versa. For example, the native Candoshi people of Peru use the word “ataatam” for “my mother”.[27] In this case it definitely there has been a reversal in the usage of the word from the original meaning of “father’s father” as it is in the present day Turkish, to the meaning of “my mother” in Candoshi.

2h) In Aleut Language, in order to make the nominative dual of the noun, the suffix “kik” is added to the apocopated nominative of singular of nouns.[5] For example, In the Aleut language, “adaq” is father and “ada” is its apocopated form. Thus for “two fathers”, the composite word “adakik” is used. In Turkish, “two fathers” would be expressed by the expression “iki ata” or “ikki ata” where the word “iki” or “ikki” represents the number two, i.e., the “dual” state. In these examples, not only the word for “father is the same but also the word representing the “duality” is the same in both languages. Hence, it appears that the Altaic word “iki” or “ikki” and the Aleutian suffix word “kik” have a common background.

3. Structural Similarities of Altaic Languages and Some of the Native Languages of Americas

3a) Structurally, the Altaic languages such as Turkish and some of the native languages of Americas resemble to each other very closely as agglutinating languages. For example, J. R. Andrews describes the Aztec language Nahuatl by saying that “sentence word” is the basic structure of the Nahuatl language.[29] By “sentence word” is meant a word that contains within itself all the nuclear constituents necessary for a complete sentence. Turkish, similar to Nahuatl, is one such language. Additionally, they follow the vowel harmony rule, although it seems to be more so in Turkish than the native languages in Americas. Both the Nahuatle and Turkish are such languages. Such similar infrastructure of languages that develop by peoples who are separated from each other in time and space can not be attributed to total random processes that shape independent languages. I feel that such languages having similar sentence formation must have had a common history some time in the distant past.

3b) In Altaic languages the gender for the third person singular and plural is not indicated. For example, in Turkish, only one word, i.e., “O” as the personal pronoun for third person singular corresponds “he/she/it” in English. The referred gender of the subject is understood from the context of the sentence. It is known that considerable number of the languages in the Americas, the genderless word “O”, or “U” or “NO” is used to indicate “he/she/it”. For example, the Cree language in Canada use “O”, the Quiche and Achi languages in Guatemala use “U”. The Micmacs of Eastern Canada use “O-” as prefix for “his/her/its” such as “Oochul” for “his father”, and “Ookwijul” for “his mother”.[34] The Turkish word “O” and the “O” used in this examples of the some native languages of Americas seems to be related to each other, again indicating the presence of a common background in the distant past.

3c) The general title given to Mayan priests was “ahkin” or “akin” meaning “he of the sun”.[34] In this word, the first part “ah” or “a” is reminiscent of the Altaic personal pronoun “O” for the third person singular and the second part “kin” is the same as the Altaic word “k�n” for sun. Again one is surprised to find so complete a resemblance between these words that such a resemblance cannot be attributed to random linguistic development. Such close resemblance must be indications of a linguistic and cultural kinship between these languages coming from a common historical background in the distant past.

3d) J. R. Andrews describes the formation of one kind of adverbial adjunct of manner in Nahuatl as follows: “One type of derived adverbial of manner is formed from a preterit theme of a verb combined with the suffix ‘-ca’. Such words are translationally equivalent to English adverbs ending in ‘-ly’”.[29, p. 30] This formation of adverbs by use of the suffix “-ca” in Nahuatl has exact correspondence in Turkish. In Turkish, the suffix “-ca” or “-ce” is used, following the vowel harmony rule of Turkish, in the same way to form adverbs of the same kind.

Few examples are as follows: In Nahuatl (N): chicahua -> chicahuaca, Turkish (T): saglam -> saglamca, English (E): strong -> strongly; N: chipahua -> chipahuaca, T: temiz -> temizce, E: clean -> cleanly; N: ihciuh -> ihciuhca, T: �abuk -> �abukca, E: quick -> quickly; N: ichta -> ichtaca, T: gizli -> gizlice, E: secret -> secretly; N: cualan -> cualanca, T: kIzgIn -> kIzgInca, E: angry -> angrily.

In Turkish, the personal pronoun for third person singular is not represented with a suffix or prefix in verb conjugations, as is the case in “gelir, geliyor, or geldi, gelmi$”, etc. A similar grammatical rule as this one is also used in a similar way in the languages of some of the Native Peoples of Americas. The Nahuatl, i.e., the Aztec language, the Aleutian, the Eskimo and Cree languages may be sited as examples.

4. Some Examples for Probable Cultural Kinship

4a) Altaic military and Inca administrative systems were based on decimal system. In Inca administrative system, the administration was based on household units of 10, 50, 100, 500, 1000 10000 and 40000.[35] Each unit had an official assigned to be in charge of the unit. The official in charge of one of four-quarters of the Inca empire was called “Apu-Cuna” or “Hatun Apu-Cuna”. At the top of the administrative pyramid was the emperor called “Sapa Inca”. In this organisation, the following aspects may be noted:

The first is that the system was decimal system like the Turkish military system which has always been based on units of 10, 50, 100, 1000 and 10000 soldiers and/or horse-mounted cavalry. The names of the officials were “onbashi, ellibashi, yuzbashi, binbashi and tumenbegi” respectively. It seems that decimal system of numbering was known to both of these communities which had no contact with each other in the known history.

Secondly, the decimal system was applied to organise the community and/or the military in manageable groups. Could this be the result of a random process of social development or was there an historically known knowledge common to both people? It is quite likely that the decimal system of numbering and its application to social organisations of peoples may have been known to the ancestors of the Altaic peoples as early as 10000 or more years ago. It is up to the scholars of different fields of science to work and discover the truth related to this striking correspondence in the culture of two well separated groups of peoples.

Thirdly, we also observe the presence of the Altaic word “apa” in the names of the Inca supreme administrators. Is this also the result of a random process? Additionally, the Inca (Quechua) word “Hatun” means “great, big” and is added as adjective to the names of Inca leaders to describe their greatness. Similarly in Turkish, the words “Hatun” and “Katun” are used as the title given to the wife of “Great Hakan”, i.e., the empress (or the first lady, i.e., whatever may be one’s preference) of the Turkish people. In present day Turkish, the word “kadin” is a changed form of “katun” or “hatun”. In fact in present day Turkish culture, it is not unusual to hear among elderly married couples, man calling his wife as “hatun”. It is also interesting to note that one of the highest ridges of the contemporary Altai mountains in Central Asia is known by the Turkic name “Katun”,[36] towering more than 4000 meters. Probably we will never know whether the name of this lofty mountain had any thing to do with word “Hatun” or “Katun” of Turkish language or the word “Katun” of Inca language.

4b) Altaic words “Otuken”, Mongolian word “Utigin” and Chorti word “Uteq’uin”. The archaic Turkish word “OtUken” is frequently mentioned as the name of a “divine or sacred place” in Turkish epic writings of “Kul Tigin”, “Bilge Kagan” and “Tonyukuk” and also in Kutatgu Bilig.[37] In the Altaic language of Mongolian, the word “Utigin” is also the name given to a “god of certain place”. On the other hand, in the Mayan language of Chorti in Guatemala, the word “Uteq’uin” means “heaven”. The last part of this word, i.e., “q’uin” means “sun” in Chorti. Similarly, the “-ken” in the Turkish word “Otuken” and “-gin” in the Mongolian word “Utigin” may be taken as versions of “kun” or “gun” meaning “sun”. It should be remembered that Altaic regions in Asia were the places where Shamanism were practised very widely. In Altaic shamanism “Sun” and “sky” worshipping is quite dominant. Turkish “Gok Tengri” is the “god sky”. In view of these observations, Turkish “Otuken”, Mongolian word “Utigin” and Chorti word “Uteq’uin” seem to have something in common. That is they are all related to “sun” and a sacred place such as “heaven” and a “place where god “dwells. Turkish and Mongolian are related to each other because they are both Altaic languages and their speakers have interacted with each other throughout the history. The respective words could have been borrowed from one another. But there was no way that these Altaic words could have influenced the formation of the word “Uteq’uin” in Chorti or vice versa unless all these words have historically something in common with each other.

5. Conclusion

Ancient Central Asiatic peoples, among them the ancestors of Turks, are known to have migrated from their homelands in steps of Central Asia and Siberia to east, west, north and south. It is also known that the Native peoples of Americas have migrated from Asia to their new homelands in the Americas thousands of years ago. However, in the known history, the ancestors of Turks and the ancestors of Native Peoples of Americas are not known to have made contact with each other. Yet in spite of this fact, it is surprising to see that Turkish, as a member of the Altaic languages, should have common living words with some of the native languages of Americas. The presence of these words in these languages can not be attributed to random and independent development of these languages in two widely separated continents. I believe their presence is a definite indication of the existence of linguistic and cultural kinship between the ancestors of Turks and the other Altaic peoples and the ancestors of some of the Native Peoples of Americas that they had while they were living in the steps of Central Asia and Siberia before they were separated some 10 000 or more years ago. It may be that some readers may find this conclusion as hasty. But I am confident that further studies by scholars will establish the validity of my view.

This study is a small first attempt, in its own way, that uses the Altaic words “ata”, “apa” and “ana” to trace the ancestors of Altaic peoples among the Native peoples of the Americas. After this study, I have become a believer that these Altaic words are not only very effective tracers of the movements of ancient Altaic peoples, but also are among the oldest living words in human languages. Their wide spread use in native languages of Americas as well as in Altaic languages in Asia is a testimony to this observation.

Notes
1. A. Vahid Moran, Turkce-Ingilizce Sozluk (A Turkish-English Dictionary) (Istanbul: Turkish Ministry of Public Instruction, 1945).

2. Sir Gerard Clauson, An Etymological Dictionary of Pre-Thirteenth Century Turkish (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972).

3. Gunnar Jarring, An Eastern Turki-English Dialect Dictionary (n.p., 1964).

4. Arthur Thibert, O.M.I., English-Eskimo, Eskimo-English Dictionary (Ottawa: Canadian Research Centre for Anthropology, Saint Paul University, 1972).

5. Richard Henry Geoghegan, The Aleut Language, ed. Fredericka I. Martin (United States Department of Interior, 1944).

6. Edwin James, Account of an Expedition from Pittsburgh to the Rocky Mountains, vol.2, (1823).

7. Durbing Feeling, Cherokee-English Dictionary.

8. George F. Aubin, A Proto-Algonquian Dictionary (Ottawa: National Museum of Canada, 1975).

9. Ann Anderson, Plains Cree Dictionary in the Y dialect (Edminton, 1971).

10. Albert D. DeBlois and Alphonse Metallie, English-Micmac Lexicon (Ottawa: National Museum of Man Mercuri Series, 1983).

11. Marvin K. Mayers, Languages of Guatemala (The Hague: Mouton, 1966).

12. Edna Nunez de Rodas, Directora de Insttuto de Antropologia e Historia de Guatemala, private communication in 13 August 1985.

13. Jesse O. Sawyer, English-Wappo Dictionary (Carleton University Library No.: P25.C25, vo. 43).

14. Catherine A. Callaghan, Lake Miwok Dictionary (Carleton University Library No.: P25.C25, vo. 39).

15. George Gibbs, Alphabetical Vocabularies of the Challan and Lumni Languages, Shea’s Library of American Linguistics, vol. XI, (New York: AMS Press, 1863; Cramoisy Press, 1863).

16. George Gibbs, Alphabetical Vocabulary of Chinook Language (Minneapolis, Minnesota: Ross & Haines, n.d.).

17. Washington Matthews, Grammar and Dictionary of the Language of the Hidatsa (New York: Cramoisy Press, 1873).

18. H. Jakop Seiler and Kojiro Hioki, Cahuilla Dictionary (Morongo Indian Reservation, Banning, CA: Malki Museum Press, 1979).

19. R. R. Bishop Baraga, A Dictionary of Otchipwe Language (1878; reprint, Minneapolis, Minnesota: Ross & Haines, 1966).

20. G. L. Piggott and A. Grafstein, An Ojibwa Lexicon, (Ottawa: National Museum of Man Mercuri Series, 1983).

21. Rev. F. Felipe Arroyo De La Cuesta, A Vocabulary or Phrase Book of the Mutsun Language of Alta California, Shea’s Library of American Linguistics, vol.VIII, (Minneapolis, Minnesota: Ross & Haines, n.d.).

22. Mauricio Swadesh, Ma. Cristina Alvarez, and Juan R. Bastarrachea, Diccionario De Elementos Del Maya Yucateco Colonial (Mexico, 1970).

23. Dean Saxton, Lucille Saxton and Susie Enos, English-Papago/ Pima Dictionary (Tuscon: University of Arizona Press, 1983).

24. Berard Haile, A Stem Vocabulary of the Navaho Language (Arizona: St. Michaels Press, 1951).

25. J. O. Dorsey and J. R. Swanton, Dictionary of the Bloxi and Ufo Languages (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1912).

26. John Asher Dunn, A Practical Dictionary of the Coast Tsimshian Language (Carleton University Library No.: PM831 Z5D8).

27. Benjamine F. Olson, (ed.), Studies in Peruvian Indian Languages: I (Oklahoma: Summer Institute of Linguistics of the University of Oklahoma, n.d.).

28. Mildred L. Larsen, Emic Classes Which Manifest the Obligatory Tagmemes in Major Independent Clause Types of Aguaruna (Jivaro) (first article in note 27).

29. J. Richard Andrews, Introduction to Classical Nahuatl, The Aztec Language (Austin: University of Texas Press, n.d.).

30. Arthur J. O. Anderson, Rules of Aztec Language Classical Nahuatl Grammar (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1973).

31. J. F. H. Adelaar, Tarma Quechua Grammar, Texts, Dictionary (The Peter De Ridder Press, 1977).

32. John Gilmary Shea, French-Onandaga Dictionary From a Manuscript of the Seventeenth Century (New York: Cramoisy Press, n.d.).

33. Encyclopedia Britannica, 1974, vol. 9, p. 260.

34. Encyclopedia Britannica, 1974, vol. 13, p. 719-722.

35. Philip Ainsworth Means, Ancient Civilizations of the Andes (New York: Gordian Press, 1964).

36. Encyclopedia Britannica, 1974, vol. 1, p. 640.

37. Abdulkadir Inan, “Yusuf Has Hacib ve Eseri Kutatgu Bilig Uzerine Notlar”, Turk Kulturu, sayi 98, Aralik 1970, p. 114-115.

[This paper is revised from Polat Kaya, “Search For a Probable Linguistic and Cultural Kinship Between the Turkish People of Asia and the Native Peoples of Americas”, Belleten, Cilt: L, Sayi 198, Aralik 1986, Turk Tarih Kurumu Basimevi, Ankara. Also catalogued in Canadiana, Canada’s National Bibliography with the same title as above under Comparative Linguistics, 497, P. Kaya, C87-7257-9 MRDS Pt. 1]

Source:  ireland.iol.ie/~afifi/Articles/turkic.htm

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the Name TURK In Ancient History by Dr. Polat Kaya

July 16, 2012 By admin

Dr. Polat Kaya

In the past and even presently, some people have been claimimg that the name TURK came onto the stage of history only recently. This is intentional disinformation designed to deceive and misdirect people! Contrary to all the denials, the ancient world was dominated by the Turanian Tur / Turk / Oguz peoples, their language and their civilization. But that Turanian world, which lasted for thousands of years, underwent an organized upheaval orchestrated by those who were against the Turanian supremacy. In that upheaval, world history was totally altered by creating new languages from the words and phrases of the one language that was spoken world-wide. That language was the monosyllabic and agglutinative language of Turkish which we find out from the decipherment of the words of some of the Indo-European and Semitic languages. The ancient world was then described with those newly ‘fabricated’ languages along with mythology and tall tales. Anything Turanian was denied, altered, alienated, obliterated and also looted by the organizers of the upheaval. Thus ancient history from the western point of view is a totally distorted, biased, Aryanized, Semitized and Romanized presentation. This upside down presentation of world history needs to be cleaned up and rewritten! Up to now, the world was not aware of this distorted situation.

After having said this, I want to come back to the name TURK. After new languages were fabricated by restructuring the names, words and phrases of an existing Turanian language that the ancient world spoke – the names of the ancient Turanian peoples, their language and their civilization were expressed with newly formatted names in the fabricated new languages. Now the world is viewing a distorted picture of the ancient past where nothing is in its original and authentic form. In this upheaval, names such as TURK, TUR, OGUZ, SAKA (and many more Turanian names) were altered into an unrecognizeable state or were totally erased from ancient history!

1) Let me start with the English word TURKISH. The Turkish form of this is TÜRKÇE (TÜRKCHE). TÜRKÇE is the Turkish word for the English word TURKISH. The Turkish word TÜRKÇE (TÜRKCHE) consists of two parts, that is, “TURK” + “CHE”. The first part TURK is the ethnic identity of the Turk people. The last part CHE (ÇE) is a suffix, which, when used with the name TURK, identifies the Turkish language (i.e., the language of the Turkish people). The English term TURKISH is also made up with two parts. They are “TURK” + “ISH”. Anyone who can read and think can see that the English suffix “ISH” is nothing but the altered and camouflaged form of the Turkish suffix “CHE” (ÇE). Of course, this act of altering the Turkish suffix CHE into English suffix ISH is deliberate alienation that disfigures the word TÜRKÇE and the suffix CHE (ÇE) into an alienated Aryan form which is difficult to recognize as Turkish. In spite of this, we must note that the name TURK is embedded in the English word TURKISH!

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2) Now let me go to the Greek word for TURK. The Greek word for the proper name of TURK is given as TOURKOS which is made up with “TURK” + “OOS”, that is, “TURK” + “OGUZ”. Both of these names are not only Turkish but they are also the ethnic names of the Turkish people – who are TURK people and OGUZ people at the same time. Historians and linguists should know these facts! But the fabricated Greek name TOURKOS has disfigured both the name TURK and the name OGUZ by combining them and restructuring them! These alterations are intentional.

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3) I now come to the Latin term THRACES, or alternatively, THRACUM – both of which describe the inhabitants of the so-called land “THRACE”. [Cassell’s Compact Latin-English English-Latin dictionary, 1962, p. 252].

I will examine this encrypted Latin word THRACUM. When the letters of the term THRACUM are rearranged as “TURCHAM”, we see that the Latin name THRACUM is really an altered form of the Turkish word TURKUM – meaning “I am Turk”. Finding this Turkish word TURKUM (describing the so-called Thracians) embedded in the Latin word THRACUM is not coincidence. Rather, it is due to the fact that somebody in the past intentionally fabricated this Latin word THRACUM from Turkish – and thus, not only disfigured the name TURK but also obliterated it! Under these circumstances, one cannot recognise the name TURK. Although TURK is embedded in Latin THRACUM, it is intentionally camouflaged to make it invisible.

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4) Another form of the Latin name THRACES (or THRACUM) is given as THRAX (singular). THRAX is nothing but the altered form of THRACES and THRACUM. It is also the camouflaged form of the name TURK! The letter X is a bogus symbol which replaces CES and CUM in this case.
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5) Another variation is the Latin word THRACIUS meaning “thracian”. When the word THRACIUS is rearranged as “TURCHIS-A”, we see again that it is an altered form of the Turkish expression TÜRKÜZ meaning “we are Turks”. This unquestionably shows that the ancient THRACIANS were Turks.
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6) The Roman Emperor Titus Manlius Imperiosus Torquatus held three consulships of republican Rome and was also three times Roman Dictator.

One wonders who was this so-called Roman Dictator who took the name TORQUATUS. When we rearrange the name TORQUATUS letter-by-letter as “TURQ-OUS-TA”, we find that it is the altered form of the Turkish name TURK OGUZTU (TURK OGUZDU) meaning “he was TURK OGUZ”. So a three time Roman Emperor used the names TURK and OGUZ as his chosen kingly title and surname. Again this is not coincidence. It is intentional alteration of the Turkish identity and language! We must remember here that the Greek name TOURKOS was also made up from Turkish TURK + OUS meaning “Turk Oguz”.

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7) The Arabs called Turks by the name “ETRAK”. One wonders why the proper national name TURK was changed into ETRAK? Why did it even need to be changed? Here we have a nation who calls itself by the name TURK, yet someone else comes along and says “I am not going to call you TURK. I am going to call you ETRAK”. Similarly, a Roman comes along and says “even though you are a TURK, I will call you THRAX”. There is no logic in this – but there is bias. We should note that both the Arab term ETRAK and the Roman term THRAX not only mean TURK – but they also both contain the name TURK in them.

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8) I will now examine the Latin words TROICUS and TROIANUS – both meaning “the Trojan”, [Cassell’s Compact Latin-English English-Latin dictionary, 1962, p. 258].
When the letters of the term TROICUS are rearranged as “TURCOIS”, we see that the Latin name TROICUS is really an altered form of the Turkish word TÜRKÜZ – meaning “we are Turks”. So the name TURK is still present in ancient history, but someone has buried it out of sight!

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9) Similarly, when the letters of the Roman term TROIANUS are rearranged as “TURANSI-O”, we see that the Latin name TROIANUS is really an altered form of the Turkish word TURANCI O – meaning “he is Turanian”.

Thus, we find that these two Romanized words identify the so-called TROJAN as TURK and TURANIAN. How is it that the so-called historians and linguists cannot see these? Is it because they are conditioned to not see the Turkishness of the ancient world?
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10) I will also examine the Latin term TUSCI, or TUSCORUM, meaning “Etruscans” or “Tuscans”, [Cassell’s Compact Latin-English English-Latin dictionary, 1962, p. 259].

When the letters of the term TUSCORUM are rearranged as “OUS-TURCM”, we see that the Latin name TUSCORUM is really an altered form of the Turkish word “OGUZ TÜRKÜM” meaning “I am Oguz Turk”. This again not only identifies the names OGUZ and TURK in the middle of Europe, but also identifies the so-called ETRUSCAN peoples as being ethnic Turks who lived in central Italy at least during the first millennium B.C.

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11) When the name ETRUSCAN is rearranged as “AN-TURCES”, we find that ETRUSCAN is an altered form of the Turkish expression “AN TÜRKİZ” (GÖK TÜRKİZ) meaning “we are Sky Turks”. Thus, whichever way we examine the Etruscans, we find that they were Turks – contrary to denials. And the Etruscans and their ancestors lived in Europe at least during the first millennium B. C.
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12) In my PELASGIAN paper, I discussed the name Scamander (Skamandrius / Skamandrios) of the House of Troy and Dardania. I showed that the name SCAMANDER had the meanings of:
a) “SAKAMAN’DIR” meaning “he is SAKAMAN”, “he is Saka Turks”.
b) “MEN SAKA’DiR” meaning “I am SAKA”, “I am Saka Turks” and “I am Sea People”, that is, I am the Lord of the Seas!
c) “DENiZCi EREM” meaning “I am sea-going man”.

Furthermore, I showed that the name SCAMANDRIUS, in another meaning, had embedded in it the Turkish expression “AS-DURKMANIS” (AS TURKMANİZ / BİR TÜRKMENİZ) meaning “we are one/peerless Turkman”, “we are one Turk people”. Here again we find the name TURK buried deep down in the name SCAMANDRIUS. This also shows that the name Turk was older than the name SAKA.These Aryanized ancient names show that some people had a strong bias against the name TURK! So they suppressed the name Turk.
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13) In my paper regarding the PELASGIANS, I also discussed the name TEUCER, that is, the son of Scamander, the first king of the house of Troy and Dardania – (i.e., the House of Turoy and Tatar), . In that study, I showed that the deified name TEUCER, son of Scamander, was another altered form of the name TURK.
Even the name of the king ERICHTHONIUS of the House of Troy and Dardania (Tatar Öyü), who is said to be the richest man on earth, embeds the Turkish expression “EYI TURK HANIZ” meaning “we are the good Turk Lords”.

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14) The Chinese called the Turks by the name “TU-CHUEH” that is to say “Gök Türks” or TUKU meaning “Turks”, [“A History of China” by Wolfram Eberhard – (of the University of California), 1969, p. 149-151]. We are told that in Chinese, somehow the letter R can not be pronounced by the Chinese people and therefore it is not voiced. Therefore, R is a silent letter and not used. So we see that even in Chinese, there has been a suppression of the name TURK. When the missing letter R is reinserted back in to the name TU-CHUEH”, it becomes TURCHUEH (TURKUEH) meaning “SkyTurk”. Similarly, when the letter R is reinserted into the name TU-KU, we get the name TURKU. Thus, the name TURK and SKYTURK were in the history of China as well!
The so-called Yang-Shao culture found in China, that is the neolithic potteries with sun paintings and spirals are very much the ancient Turanian culture in China.

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15) Let me also point out two more words: The English word GOLDEN means “made of gold” or “gold like”. This is curious because when the word GOLDEN is examined as “G + OLDEN”, we find that the last part of the name “OLDEN” is actually the altered form of the Turkish word “ALTUN” meaning “gold”. So this so-called word GOLDEN is another fabricated word taken from Turkish and camouflaged as an English word! Note that if the supposedly root word GOLD is examined, the Turkish source word ALTUN is not in it any more. This is because the camouflage is so well done.
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16) Finally there is the English word WOODEN meaning “made of wood”. Curiously, even this word WOODEN is also fabricated from the Turkish word “ODUN” meaning “wood”. Again note that if the supposedly root word WOOD is examined, the Turkish source word ODUN is not visible – because WOOD is not the root of WOODEN. Rather, Turkish ODUN is the root of English word WOODEN!
***

To conclude, it can be said that in the ancient world, some groups were very parasitic towards the Turanian peoples and their civilization. These secretive groups would first infiltrate the Turanian ruling system by befriending them. Then, at the oppurtune time, they would strike from within and take over the Turanian house and claim everything there as their own. At the same time, they would suppress the remaining Turanian peoples, change their Turk identity, their names and religion and then claim them as people not known. For example, this was done to the Turko-Sumerians by the Akkadians some 3500 years ago. Now the world says “we don’t know who the Sumerians were”. The same thing happened to the so-called Egyptians, and the Caananites, and the Anatolians, and the Pelasgians and the Etruscans, etc..
Those Turanians who resisted these alterations and suppressions lost their lives – and thus came to be the so-called Latin term “tyrannicida”, that is, “tyrannicide” which actually means “killing the Turanians”.

Spreading new religions againts the most ancient Sky-God, Sun-God and Moon-God religion of the ancient Turanians was carried out with intense hatred and forceful violence by the invaders. When it was resisted the result was the extermination of the resisting people. They were putdown by derogatory terms such as “Paganus” meaning one who is neither a Christian, a Jew, or a Moslem; one who is a heathen, a rural villager, [Britanica Wold Language Dictionary, 1963, p. 906]. With all of this anti-Turan propaganda being spread around by the religious missionaries, of course the name TURK was altered and suppressed. Even as late as the 1980s, Turks of Bulgaria were being forced to change their names into Christian names.

Similar propaganda games are still being perpetrated against the Turks by “scholarly” sounding publications that are full of sophistry. For instance, there are papers identifying ethnic Turks as Kurds (Kürt) – as if they were ethnically Aryan people who speak an Indo-European or Aryan language – yet this Kurdish language is known to have been artificially constructed by the missionaries.

These “research” papers conveniently find all kinds of references to the name KÜRT (KURD) but no references to the name TÜRK. And then, the name TÜRK is labelled as “problematic” – because they cannot find examples of it in ancient sources. Yet they cannot remember that the name TURK either has been altered or removed from the ancient writings.

So I say, let no one claim that the name TURK is historically problematic. It is the Indo-European and Semitic languages that are problematic since they are not authentic – because they were systematically fabricated from ancient Turkish! Evidently, these later languages were made to divide, confuse and obliterate the ancient Turanian world (see GENESIS 11) while looting everything Turanian! It is they that have a whole lot of explaining to do!

Polat Kaya

17/04/2012