Does Turkey has a Bizantine Identity

I have always wonder what happened afterwards with the people of Bizantine population and its culture. Assimilation? Integration? Erasing everything and build from zero?

 

I am not thinking about religion, but of cultural traditions and the feeling of continuity.

 

Does the modern people of Turkey feel identify somehow with the Bizantine Empire, or the Greeks of Magna Greece in Ancient Greece whose lands where located in modern Turkey?

 

In short, does modern Turkey still has a Bizantine soul or not?

 

What do you think.

 

Pinguin

The Greeks both Asian and Europeans had and have(more rare) as an ethnonym the word Romaios-Romios which is the Roman in greek. A name that "byzantines" used to identify themselves.

 

I don't think that the Ottomans showed themselves as continuers of a very christian empire but they didn't destroy totaly the past of the region. Mohamed when he conquered Constantinoupolis gave some freedom to the Patriarch and he manged to keep a symbolic continiuty calling himself Patriarch of Nova Roma and wearing the crown of the Byzantine emperors.

Turks brought a more asian culture in Anatolia but were affected from the previous cultures (byzantine in the west-armenian in the east) in music,cusine,local customs etc.

 

You confused Magna Graecia with Ionia.Magna Graecia is the area of South Italy(Napolis and souther) and Sicily and its the name introduced by the Romans characterise a area once believed that had more Greeks from Greece itself. If you mean the Ionian( Micrasiates) Greeks they feel the same with the rest of Greeks for the Romania(Ρωμανία) (Byzantine empire) expressed with oral traditions,prophicies etc for the glory of a important empire and espesially for Polis(the city).

 

I don't think that Turks wanted to continue such empire but wanted to reach the past power of it with a Turkish character.

The continuation:

 

The Turkish cuisines, the Turkish folk music and the Turkish folk dances are almost 2500 years old and hence the continuation of the culture in the Byzantine era. And also the Turkish place names are mainly from archaic times.

 

 

The feeling of continuation:

 

Majority of Turkish people think that their culture is somewhat a variation of central asian Turkic tradition. And due to their ideology, majority of Turkish people has no sympathy to Byzantine empire and its culture. And according to Turkish history books, the Byzantine Empire was the pustule of the Ottoman State, which had to be destroyed.

 

 

 

In short, the Byzantine-Ottoman relation is extremely arguable.

The byzantine architecture hasn't stopped but it can be seen in the christian temples of Minor Asia and in mosques like Blue Mosque.

The Greek spirit couldn't survive under a Ottoman domain so important scholars migrated to Italy where they played a key role to the Renaissance:( Gemistus Pletho , Johannes Bessarion, George Scholarios., Manuel Chrysoloras,Constantine Lascaris,Marcus Musurus,John Argyropoulos,Laonicus Chalcondyles etc.

 

In art like painting I don't see any continiuty,in reverse lots of paintings in churches were destroyed(seeHagia Sophia)

Back to the present thread:

I think that Turks are a little bit confused about theirs origins. If they choose to claim a 4000 continius presence in Anatolia (see prototurks,trojans etc) they afraid to be called turkified greeks,armenian,kappadokians etc, and if they choose the central asian origins they afraid that they would be called as invanders and newcomers...

 

As a Latino I have concience of two major invasion in our own history: the Muslim invasion of Spain and the Spanish invasion of the Americas. In both cases the invaded cultures and peoples didn't disappear at all but assimilated and the societies transformed in new syncretic forms.

 

I suspect something similar could have happened in Turkey: assimilation and fusion of peoples and cultures. Am I wrong?

 

Pinguin

Firstly ; the local population and The Orthodox Patriarchy have not been touched and their identities are saved .

Such a preservation that could locate Romans and Turks with together .

Ionian-Armenian churches and Muslim mosques have all been situated in Istanbul , and of course the Bureaucratic system of Byzantine is transfered to Ottoman Sultanate . Therefore ; The Multi cultural structure can not be determined by misleading deflections by calling the WORD " ASSIMILATION " .

There are 5000 + Greeks who live in Istanbul today . 

 

No, the Turks conquered Constantinople in the 15th century, they had been in the borders of modern-day Turkey for 5-6 centuries before as rulers and as fighters of the Muslim armies (Arab ruled) in the 8-9th Centuries which were within the borders of modern-day Turkey.

 

 

 

The area didn't have a huge population, centuries of war, most people lived in small protected areas with impressive defense systems, a great example would be the Christians of Cappadocia and their Cave-Network.

 

Everyone under the Byzantine Empire in Turkey wasn't Greek, there were smaller seperate communities and nations. They became a minority to the Turkic majority (as seperate nation/ethnic groups), those in this situation gradually assimilated into the Turkic majority and influence.

 

The powerfull nations like Greeks did not get assimilated, they had a written language, ruling elite, institutions and so on. The Greek's or \"Rum" remained Rum, they were allowed to have their schools, their Patriarch practically had a state within a state. The Rum's leader in the Ottoman's was the Patriarch.

 

Integration was easy, being a Turk wasn't based upon "race", when Turks entered what is today's Turkey they had a confederacy of tribes and Clans, they mixed with locals and those who wanted to become part of them were allowed to. Basically, if they married and joined a tribe which would change their whole lifestyle and culture after a single generation, adopted Islam as their religion (however, loosely this was, the initial Turks who entered had interpretations all of their own, there are many examples of Heretic leaders who would have Christian, Muslim, Pagan followers basically because they'd go around saying, "we all believe in the same god, were being oppressed by these rulers let the people unite".)  and decided to join and represent the Turks they could easily do so. They were very successfull, it was quite pragmatistic.

 

 

 

Well religion heavily influenced cultural traditions. The Byzantium peasentry was won over by the Turks. They could identify more with the Turkic tribes who had just entered more. If they joined the Turks they had a chance of being important, having power/respect and had a chance of getting wealthy. Plus add to this the many Turkic semi-Tengrist-Christian-Muslim and every other religion in the region leaders who mixed up everything and gained huge support among the common folk for this really tolerant view and ideals. A new beginning for many of the poor working class happened.

 

There are many examples, of Byzantine warriors and working class joining the Turks.

 

 

 

 

Not at all, remember most people in any Empire don't really feel as if they're part of a Royal family which is ruling them. Most of the population in Byzantium times were rural folk who were uneducated. The same was the case for the Ottomans. All that changed was the Priest for the Imam. Other than that, the ordinary people didn't have much to do with the ongoings of the court in either the Byzantiums or the Ottomans.

 

Its only an issue today, in an era of mass-education we all know something about our history and see it of importance for our identity. Thus Greeks feel more bonded to the Byzantines and Turks to the Ottomans.

 

 

 

For a Rum of Turkey it does, for a Turk it doesn't, its a subjective matter. How do you measure a soul of a country?

 

In short, Turks in Turkey feel a stronger bond to Central Asia and rightly so, why? because their language, identity, culture, historical and national root is Central Asia, so its natural for them to have this perception. Race does not represent Nationhood/Ethnicity, do you know there are 500,000 people of Black African (Sudanease, Nubian, Somalian) descent, who today are and feel Turks. We cannot use "race" as a determiner, Turks did not have a forced assimilation policy so those who are Turks became so either by mixing with ethnic Turks, Pax-Ottomanica, or freely assimilating into Turkish culture. They feel a strong bond and allegience to Central-Asia and regard it of higher importance than Eastern Roman's who they don't sympathise with much at all.

 

Regards