The Turkish Name, The Turkish Race, The Motherland Of The Turks And Their Spread Out
Being one of the eldest and rooted tribes, the Turks are a nation who spread out to Asia, Europe and Africa within their about 4 thousand year old past. Their permanent immigrations from their motherland in Middle Asia shows us that the Turks are also crowded in population, too. Because of their big numbers in population and their active conditions the Turks took an important place in world history.
The Name "Turk": As for the fact that the Turks have been an ancient population, explorers were lead to investigate the name Turk in the eldest history sources. Since the past century many wise man had put forward the view that the Targitas Heredot mentioned among the east tribes, or the "Tyrakae" (Yurkae) for whom it is said they lived on the acres of the "Iskit" or the Togharmans who were mention in the Torah, or the Turukhals (or Turushka) who are encountered in the ancient Indian sources, or the Thraks, or the Turukkus who can be found in the old Front Asian cuneiforms, or the Tiks (or Di) who played role in the Chinese sources in 1000 B.C. and even the Trojans etc. were Turkish tribes who personally wore the name "Turk".
In the Iranian Zend-Avesta narrations which can be found in detail in the Islamic sources and in the Israely origin Torah narratives the name "Turk" was searched at Noah's grandson (son of Yafes) Turk, or the son of Feridun (Threatona) Turac or Tur (Turan derivates from here) were intended to be shown as the first tribes who had the name Turk. According to the narrations in the Torah, after the Flood the Prophet Noah shared out the earth between his three sons. Yafes got Middle Asia and the Chinese nations, after Yafes' death he left the throne to "Turk" who was one of his eight sons.
The first written usage of the word Turk can be seen in 1328 B.C. in Chinese history as "Tu-Kiu".
The name Turk showed up on the history stage the first with the in VI. Century A.D. established Gök-Türk State. The name "Turk" in the scripts of the Orhun is rather shown as "Turuk". Therefore it is known that the name Turk for the first time was used as an official representation for the Turkish State by the political formation the GÖK-TÜRK Emperorship. In the first period of the Gök-Türks the word Turk was used to describe a certain form of state, later on it was used to describe the Turkish nation.
The name Turk became official with the letter the Chinese Emperor wrote to the GÖK-TÜRK khan Isbara in 585 A.D. where he called him "The Great Turkish Khan", hereof the Khan Isbara wrote back in his letter to the Chinese Emperor "It has been past 50 years since the Turkish State has been established by God".
In the Gök-Türk scripts the word Turk is moreover used as "Turk Budun". It is known that the Turk Budun is the Turkish Nation. Therefore the name Turk in this period stands rather for a determination of a political membership than the name of a population or a tribe. That means it became a national name to convey all the tribes and populations who were member of the Turkish Race.
The Meaning of the Expression Turk
Different meanings were given to the expression Turk as well in sources as in investigations: T'u-kue (Turk) = helmet (Chinese sources); (Turk) = renouncement (Islamic sources); Turk = maturity period; Takye = man sitting by the seaside, to attract etc. meanings and interpretations like this. In the last century A.Vambery's idea, which was accepted as a first step to a scientific explanation was that the expression "Turk" came from "to derive". Z.Gökalp explained the name as "tureli" (which means law and order possessive). The thought of W.Barthold is near to this. But it was taken from a Turkish document that meaning of the common noun of the expression "Turk" is "force-power" (the attribute: forceful-powerful). Here it was claimed by A.V. Le Coq that the expression "Turk" was the same as the word "Turk" which stood for the nations name, this was also accepted by V. Thomsen the solver of the Gök-Türk scripts (1922), later on the same matter was totally proved by the studies of Nemeth.
As in Iranian sources the word Türk is being used as "Beautiful Human", in XI. Century Kasgarli Mahmut states again that "the name Turk was given to the Turks by God" and carries the meaning "Youth, power, strength and maturity period". But the historian accepts the meaning "forceful-powerful".
The Expression Turk as a Nations Name
The first political formation who used the name "Turk" as an official name for a Turkish State had been the "Gök-Türk Emperorship" (552-774). All this, was to prove that the name "Turk" was basically not an "ethnic" name for a particular population but an political name. Since the foundation of the Gök-Türk Emperorship it became first the name of this state, later on the common name of the other Turks who were called by their own names and were depending on this emperorship, and with the time passing by it rose to a national name that was used to identify all the populations belonging to the Turkish race.
The Use of the Expression Turk as a Geographical Name
The geographical name Turkhia (=Turkey) was first seen in the Byzantian sources. In the VI. Century this phrase was used for Middle Asia. In the 9th -10th century this name was given to the complete area from the Volga to Middle Europe (East Turkey = the land of the Khazar, West Turkey = land of the Hungary). In the 13th century at the period of the Slavery State Egypt and Syria was called "Turkey". Anatolia was known as "Turkey" since the 12th century.
The Turkish Race, the Characteristics of the Turkish Race
The definitions about the Turkish Race that were made in history are quite confusing. In Chinese yearbooks as well as in Latin and Greek sources the Turks have rather been described as Mongolian types. The reason why the Turks were shown as "mongoloids" in ancient times can be explained by the fact that in those times the Mongolian element was a majority among the Turkish States. Through the whole history of the Turks, the nearest contact was to their close neighbour the Mongolians. The crowded Mongolian populations had joined under the Turkish regency (like the Tabgac's at the Asian Hun's) and ten thousands of Mongolians had shared long immigrations together with the Turks (like the East Hun's). Furthermore if we consider the possibility of mixture of the races caused by this close contact, the observation of foreigners should be not so surprising to us.
Essentially the scientific investigations made in the last half of this century brought forward that the Turks belong to the white race and it came out that the Turks - belonging to the "Turanid" type of the "Europid" group which is one of the three big race groups on earth - had many different anthropological criteria that separated them in first line from the "Mongoloid" Mongolians (dominating quality white colour, straight nose, round face, lightly curly hair, middle dense beard and moustache).
Furthermore, it is known that the Turkish race as in the Torah narrations (not from Ham and Sam, but from the race of Yafes) is shown from the white race. As a sample of the Turan type the Middle Asian, Maveraunnehir and other Near-East Turks were shown as white-skinned, dark shiny eyed, round faced ("moon faced, almond eyed"), well-proportioned, strong build men and women (the bust of Kül Tegin Prince of the Gök-Türk) who were show as a sample of beauty in the sources of the Middle Ages and even in Iranian literature the word "Turk" came to the meaning "beautiful human".
The homeland of the Turks
The subject on which land the Turks lived before they started to immigrate is still a matter that is discussed since the last century. The historian, according to Chinese sources, accept the Altay Mountains as the motherland of the Turks, as for the ethnologists think of the north regions of Inner Asia, the anthropologists consider the region between the Kirghiz Steppe and God Mountains, the art historians show the north-west region of Asia or the south-west of the Baykal-Sea; some linguists believed that the east and west of the Altay Mountains or the Kingan Chains should be the motherland of the Turks.
Considering all this it is nearly possible to draw the geographical borders of the ancient Turk lands. Besides, they spread out to wide and defined areas of land from the first time on and have probably carried out their culture to very far places. Serious linguistic researches allow to consider this area as between the Altay - Ural Mountains, and even to take the motherland of the Turks as the north of the Caspian Sea and the north-east steppes. The cultures Afanayevo (2500-1700 B.C.) and the Anronovo (1700-1200 B.C.) that were found just in the west of the North Altay Mountains (the Minusinsk region), from whom especially the representative race of the second was considered to be the prototype of the warrior Turkish race.