Who were the TARTARS...?
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Category: Regional History or Period History
Forum Name: Ethnic History of Central Asia
Forum Discription: Discussions about the ethnic origins of Central Asian peoples. All topics related to ethnicity should go here.
URL: http://www.allempires.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=23287
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Topic: Who were the TARTARS...?
Posted By: alish
Subject: Who were the TARTARS...?
Date Posted: 20-Jan-2008 at 20:14
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I just wanted to clarify who were the tartars - so named by westerns in Mid centuries... I think the easiest way would be to learn what language did they speak, religion, traditional dresses, and meals they had... Where did they disappear? Could anybody help me out, dear members? |
Replies:
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 20-Jan-2008 at 21:59
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Well, to Marco Polo, the Mongols were the "Tartars", or so he asserts in his narrative Chapter 44):
The circumstances under which these Tartars first began to exercise dominion shall now be related. They dwelt in the northern countries of Jorza and Bargu, but without fixed habitations, that is, without towns or fortified places; where there were extensive plains, good pasture, large rivers, and plenty of water. They had no sovereign of their own, and were tributary to a powerful prince, who (as I have been informed) was named in their language, Un-khan
However, the Tartars (or Tatars) as a nomadic people were not Mongols and here we can see that the Italian merchant was coflating information. The original Tartars were probably a branch of the Oghuz Turks (the Kipchaks), pastoralists inhabiting South Central Asia and Western Siberia. By language they are related to the Pechenegs and Cumans. They came under the influence of the Mongols during the time of Jinghiz Khan and formed the western reaches of his empire. These people were integrated into the Mongol Empire under Juchi, the Khan's son so that by the time of Batu Khan (1227-1255) they formed a major component of the Golden Horde that burst into Europe between 1237-1242, eliminating the Cumans, successors to the Pechenegs along the way. Batu Khan set up his capital at Saray on the lower Volga from whence his rule stretched from the Ob River in Western Siberia to the borders of Poland and Hungary. However, by this time the term Golden Horde is synonymous with the Kipchaks and it was the Europeans who labeled them "Tartars". They were the last of the Turkic tribes to adopt Islam and did so in the 14th century. And here is where matters become fuzzy. The actual Kipchak body politic disintegrates in the 15th century first with the advent of Timur, a Turkicised Barlas Mongol, and subsequently with the rise of both Muscovy and the Ottoman Turks. Several independent khanates emerged and to these the Russians applied the generic "Tartary".
Was there ever a "Tartar" tribe? I doubt as much, and other than applying the elusive label Oghuz Turks precious little can be discerned other than their early relationship with the Mongols under the term Kipchaks. By the 16th century, the label is more or less a generic descriptive for the non-Russian inhabitants of the Steppes and the Crimea; however, a caution is in order a Cossack is not a Tartar! ------------- |
Posted By: Temujin
Date Posted: 21-Jan-2008 at 18:13
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nah thats not accurate, the original Tatars had nothing to do with the later Tartars of the former Qypchaq khanat. the original Tatars lived in eastern Mongolia and were more or less annihilated by Temujins Mongols. the later Tartars as known from the Khanates following the dissolution of the Golden Horde are descendants of the Mongolified Qypchaq natives of this region prior to the Mongol conquest. ------------- |
Posted By: Sarmat
Date Posted: 21-Jan-2008 at 23:48
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Kypchaks are not Ozhuz Turks. In fact, these are 2 different branches of Turks. Kypchaks lived more in the North and Ozghuz moved to the South, finally reached Anatolia and formed Ottoman empire. Linguistically also there is a division between Kypchak and Oghuz dialects within Turkic languages because of some notable differences. ------------- Σαυρομάτης 
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Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 22-Jan-2008 at 16:23
Timujin, how does the above differ with what was written as to the fuzzy provenance of the label "Tartar"? Of the "original" Tartars (or Tatars) we essentially know diddly-squat (pardon the Americanism). After all, how does one explain the Lipka Tatars of the Crimea? Are the Tartars specifically related to the Ta-Ta of the Gobi, subjugated by the Khitans in the 9th century and actually forming the nucleus of the lineage of Jinghiz Khan himself? Wiki does a good job of disambiguation here [although weakly referenced as to original sources and dependant upon secondary summations while properly directing toward the sources for further research]:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tatar - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tatar
Now there is one caution with regard to the assertion that Tartar is a mispelling of Tatar. That claim is difficult to maintain since it derives from external transcriptions of a name presented by contemporary chroniclers in various different languages. The appellative Tartar is a Persic derivative, Tatarus, transliterated in Medieval Latin into Tartar from the classic reference to Tartarus and the Tauride.
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Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 22-Jan-2008 at 17:14
Sarmat, regardless of how current identities wish to interpret the term Oghuz, it remains a simply geographic and/or historical description and has nothing to do with ethnicity and discussion would then move into the nebulosity that is the Gogturk. After all even the Seljuks are classified as "Oghuz Turks". Be that as it may, the notion of "Western Turks" does become arbitrary given the fact that the Kipchaks were pretty far West and remained a Turkic people. Even if you go to the niceties of dialectical differences, you run up against the wall of linguistic disntinction premised upon class and not ethnicity (e.g. Ottoman Turkic in Istanbul was quite different from the vulgar Turkic of Ottoman Anatolia). That tribes such as the Azeri later transformed the term Oghuz as a distinctive in their conflicts with the Pecheneg and later Kipchaks [much can be attributed to the process of Islamicization] does not invalidate the supposition that these latter groups had identical origins consequent to the Hunnic disruptions. The connections between the Alpamish and Dede Korkuk dastans suffice for the analogy. ------------- |
Posted By: Temujin
Date Posted: 22-Jan-2008 at 17:50
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Qypchaqs were descendants of the Kimek group, and Seljuks basically are Oghuz. Seljuk was just a rulers name, like Ottoman, it didn't really described an ethnic group, just a political entity. the Qypchaqs displaced the Torks/Uzes that shortly occupied the Pontic-caspian steppe after the Pechenegs. those Torks/Uzes were indeed Oghuz, but not the subsequent Qypchaqs. ------------- |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 22-Jan-2008 at 22:42
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Well, Temujin, I could say the same over Oguz and Ogur and the division of Eastern and Western Turk, with the labels having nothing to do with ethnicity and everything to do with political organization. Try following this time line: http://www.turkleronline.com/turkler/turk_turuk/koken_isim/datelines/kipchaks.htm - http://www.turkleronline.com/turkler/turk_turuk/koken_isim/datelines/kipchaks.htm ------------- |
Posted By: Bulldog
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 00:58
Seljuks are classified Oghuz Turks because their founding fathers were members of the "Kinik" clan, one of the major 24 Oghuz clans listed by Mahmud Kasghgari and Rashid al-din.
The Kipchaks were even further West geographically than the Oghuz Turks stretching into the Balkans and even Eastern Europe like the Cumans.
The impact of Islam had a lesser role on the Kipchaks, they remained more nomadic and lived further North, some adopting religions other than Islam and others keeping their old religous traditions alive within new faiths.
The accents and dialects are a confusing matter your right, for example standard colloquial Anatolian Turkish especially in Central and Eastern regions of Turkey is more or less the same as the Turkish spoken in Azerbaijan and Iran, in parts more similar than it is to Istanbul Turkish.
However, Azeri are not a tribe. The Turks of Azerbaijan are comprised mainly of Oghuz Turks, major branches of the clans which settled in the region were the "Bayats", "Afshars", "Igdirs", "Begilli" "Bayindir", "Salur", "Teke" etc all have hundreds of sub-tribes and large families. For example the Bahurlu are prominant in todays Iran especially among the Qashqai, however, they are a branch of the major Oghuz clan "Yiva". This is quite a complex matter and would need a post of its own to be able to understand the breakdown of these in detail.
The Pechenegs are a major Oghuz clan, from the "Uc oks" branch of the "Gokhans", the Pechenegs had migrated West before the other Oghuz clans, they were known in Byzantium realms and some had adopted Christianity in the Balkans. The Gagauz Turks today trace descendancy in part to the Pechenegs.
You are correct that these terms are not ethnic terms, they are Turkic tribal confederations generally based upon the large clans of a geographic area forming a pollitical union. I just thought I'd bring some clarity to the confusing matter of the various tribes, clans, sub-tribes etc
In addition, some of the main characters and stories of Dede Korkud are continuations of the legends of Alpymysh. ------------- What we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others and the world remains and is immortal. Albert Pine |
Posted By: Sarmat
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 00:59
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Drgonzaga, Kypchaks and Oguzs are different names for different people, this is an established historical fact.
You contradict youself by calling Tatars oguz and then saying that those classification are not important at all. If you continue to argue that Kypchaks=Oguzs, I will have to say that you are simply not very familiar with the subject.
You'll never find any serious historian writing that Kypchaks are the same with Oguz and all these names do not have any meaning except showing "geographical location."
------------- Σαυρομάτης
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Posted By: Bulldog
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 01:05
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Oghuz is not an ethnic name, and it can be simply translated into "Turkic tribes". The "Oghuz Turk branch" or "Western Turk branch" is one of the traditional six branches of the modern Turkic peoples. The "Oghuz branch" is a geographical and historical designation, not a separate ethnic term since the Turkic peoples of the world share the same ethnic roots.
By ethnic, racial or other such connotations are not being implied, instead the same roots regarding language, identity, historical bonds, sense of kingship etc
Regarding today, Oghuz is the largest Turkic group with speakers ranging from estimates of 100-120 million.
However, Oghuz, Kipchak etc cannot be called distinct different peoples, they are different tribal confederations of the same people who over centuries developed unique attributes.
Today there are differences due to living centuries to a millenia apart, however, we see that in geographic regions with Oghuz and Kipchak living side by side, like Crimean Tatars and Kipchak groups in the Caucusus, they are more similar to Oghuz in language due to the Ottoman influence.
When people live in isolation they will start to seperate, when connections are established or re-established people speaking similar languages due to the close proximity over time will form a common language by themselves as languages naturally evolve based upon their location and contacts. ------------- What we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others and the world remains and is immortal. Albert Pine |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 12:12
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What a brouhaha I've started, a veritable donnybrook in an Irish Pub! Which brings to mind the discussion earlier in the forum over the Gokturk and current interpretational trends among Istanbul's intellectuals. The fact is that particularist politics have led to strange suppositions. One can not argue that that Seljuk and Ottoman are but dynastic names distinguishing the same people and then turn around and deny a similar rationale to Kipchak dynasts under a nebulous tribal distinction, it would be akin to calling the Campbells a different people from the McClouds because the former were not Highlanders! The problem here Sarmat is not one of unfamiliarity but of perspective apart from national mythologies. Think of the ridiculous stance of present day Bulgaria with regard to its anti-Turkic "racial" policy when historically the Bulgars were a Turkic tribal group. Recall, that I opened the present discussion with a quote from the Travels of Marco Polo and his narration on the origins of the "Tartars" as gleaned from Persic sources in the 13th century. Nevertheless, if one turns to Chinese sources one can grasp the complexity of the subject as well as the arbitrary classifications set in the 19th century and its early efforts in the social sciences.
http://www.republicanchina.org/Turk_Uygur.html#origin - http://www.republicanchina.org/Turk_Uygur.html#origin
Present pretension at defining the term Oghuz as an ethnic rather than geographic reference [West vs East] is in conflict with the original usage of the term. Placing aside traditional nomadism and the misguided attempt to claim Oghuz as a specific identity associated with the Islamic Turks generates as much conflict as it seeks to eliminate. How then does one reconcile the Mamelukes within this schema? Likewise, unless one wishes to entertain persistent genocide as an integral part of confederation movements one has to accept, as Bulldog implies, a commonality between the Turkic migrations westward from the 5th century onward. Try this essay on for size:
http://turkmeniya.tripod.com/id13.html - http://turkmeniya.tripod.com/id13.html ------------- |
Posted By: Temujin
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 19:13
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well we cannot say Qypchaq is the same as Oghuz because they are all turkic, likewise we can say all slavic peoples are the same. even in germany, a confederation of a couple of tribes, lignual differences remained even though living in the same political entity for centuries. so we cannot just argue "they are different because of geography". it is true, Seljuk and Ottoman are just dynastical names, but those terms cannot be used interchangably with Oghuz. all Seljuks were Oghuz, but not all Oghuz were Seljuks. Qypchaqs developed completely independent of the Oghuz. both Oghuz and Qypchaq are names of political entities, however tribal confederations (as opposed to mere dynastical names like Seljuk and Ottoman). ------------- |
Posted By: barbar
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 20:54
Sarmat, Turkic languages (precisely after kokturk) had the main seperation of Uyghur and Oghuz-Qipchaq, respectively the eastern and western one. Oghuz and Qipchaq seperation occured much later. Linguistical history indicates the closer tie between Oghuz and Qipchaq group. Mongol expansion changed the scene quite significantly.
------------- Either make a history or become a history. |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 21:30
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Thank-you barbar, you've hit the nail right on the head and and cleared the smoke generated by nationalist biases. The interaction at two historical stages both in the Gokturk period and again in the 16th and 17th centuries (and as you noted the role of Mongolized Turks in the intervening years) is essential to any understanding of the distinctions raised by the term Tatar. Then there is the consolidation of Ottoman rule in the Balkans and the reintegration of the remnants of other Turkic tribes (e.g. the Cumani and, yes, Bulgars) that makes the claim to exclusivity over Oghuz ring hollow and renders the original distinction that gave rise to the term meaningless [as with the novelty of Northern and Southern Turk].
By the way, Temujin, there is a classification distinguishing between Eastern and Western Slavs, even Southern ones to boot, under just such a geographic criteria. ------------- |
Posted By: Sarmat
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 22:12
Exactly ------------- Σαυρομάτης
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Posted By: Sarmat
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 22:18
Please note that I didn't say that Oghuz/Kypchak separation happened due to the linguistic differences, nor did I say that this kind of linguistic separation was very ancient. The only thing I said is that in "addition" there also exists a linguistical difference between Kypchak and Oghuz dialects.
Nevertheless the difference between Kypchaks and Oghuzs is mentioned by more or less all ancient sources.
And for sure, no historian wrote that Kypchaks=Oghuzs ------------- Σαυρομάτης
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Posted By: Sarmat
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 22:21
This classification of Slavs totally entails cultural and linguistic differences. Slavic languages are divided into Western, Eastern and Southern groups and there is also an obvious specifical cultural affinitty within each group. ------------- Σαυρομάτης
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Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 23:43
Ah, but these differences are more-or-less a historic phenomenon surfacing rather late and the key is the commonality found in Old Church Slavonic, Sarmat. The Latinization of the Western Slavs is a relatively recent (in historical terms) phenomenon. Even recall the tinkering the Soviets did with the Slavic Cyrillic, which it sought to impose in the Balkans as well. Which then brings us once again full circle over the antic with identity with the denigration of Ukrainian as peasant speak and when contrasted to "Great" Russian  and the question of who are the real Rus! ------------- |
Posted By: Chilbudios
Date Posted: 23-Jan-2008 at 23:44
Talking of which, Oghuz and Qipchak seem today to be in different branches of Turkic (they probably were rooted from the same language, but similarly all Slavic groups were rooted in a "common Slavic") and they also are included today by some scholars (Lars Johanson, va gnes Csat, The Turkic languages, Routledge, 1998) in the groups "northwestern Turkic" (Qipchak) and "southwestern Turkic" (Oghuz).
And whatever the dark history of the Turkic languages was, by the times invoked here in the thread (13-14th century) when we have the Tartars, the Oghuz and Qipchak Turks were, as Sarmat says, mentioned as different groups of people and their languages should have been quite different as Ottoman Turkic or Cuman language seem to point out.
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Posted By: Bulldog
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 00:09
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We must be carefull in making comparisons, instead it would be better to analyse each language group instead of trying to understand them by observing other large linguistic groups. Oghuz and Kipchack Turkic, the main differences can be attributed to geographical difference. events in history and time living in seperation. An interesting point is that where Oghuz and Kipchak Turkic groups lived close together, like after the Ottoman expansion into Crimea and the Caucusus, the difference over years became reduced. This occured to an extent where Crimean and some of the traditionally Kipchak Turkic speakers of the Caucusus linguistic affliation is sometimes referred to as Oghuz-Kipchak. Today Crimean Tatar is more similar to the Turkish spoken in Turkey, Azerbaijan and Iran than Kazakhistan, although Kazakh is Kipchak aswell. The issue of why and how this occured can only be resolved by analyses of the specific language group, is it due to the influence of the Ottomans? is it to do with the Turkic language being flexible in adapting lexis while keeping its structure intact? or other socio-cultural reasons? such issues have to be understood by investigating the actual language in question, its not sufficient to make comparisons as there are unique factors involved as to why this happened...why that happened.
Early examples of Kipchak Turkic can be found in the Mamluk, Kipchak-Arabic dictionaries, or the Codex Cumanicus.
Examples from the Codex Cumanicus
Atamız kim kktesi. Alğışlı bolsun seni atı, kelsin seni http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xan - xanl ığı, bolsun seni tilemeki neikkim kkte, alay [da] yerde. Kndeki tmegimizni bizge bugn bergil. Dağı yazuqlarımıznı bizge boşatqıl neik biz boşatırbiz bizge yaman etkenlerge. Dağı yekni sınamaqına bizni quurmağıl. Basa bara yamandan bizni qutxarğıl. Amen! In Anatolian Turkish, the text is: Atamız sen gktesin. Alkışlı (kutlu) olsun senin adın, gelsin senin hanlığın, olsun senin dileğin nasıl ki gkte, ve yerde. Gndelik ekmeğimizi bize bugn ver. Ve de yazıklarımızdan (sularımızdan) bizi bağışla nasıl biz bağışlarız bize yaman (ktlk) edenleri. Ve de şeytanın sınamasından bizi koru. Tm yamandan (ktlkten) bizi kurtar. Amin! The two are very similar.
Oturğanım oba yer basqanım baqır canaq. Ol zengi.
An example of common proverbs
Aq qoynı avuzı yoq. Ol yumurtqa.
I included the Azeri Turkish version in this one, its even closer. ------------- What we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others and the world remains and is immortal. Albert Pine |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 00:21
Ah, Chili  , geography does more than trigger labels its also generates dialects of a common language and affects vocabulary. Yet, to one degree or another mutual intelligibility persists. ------------- |
Posted By: Chilbudios
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 01:28
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Let's put aside the Diamondesque theses, Gonzo And in case you put a heavy bid on geography, take this case for study: most Romanians understand fairly well Italian. However Romanian is a Eastern Romance language, while Italian is a Western Romance language. On the other hand Romanians do not understand well neither Magyar, nor Serbian, nor Bulgarian, nor Ukrainian, Gagauz or Russian (except for some recognizable loan words), nor are these language related (Magyar and Turkic languages are not even IE languages), though they are geographically close.
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, can you explain the innovations from Cuman language based on their north-western geographical position (eventually related to Black Sea, Carpathians or other geographical realities they have experienced)?Posted By: Sarmat
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 01:47
I don't follow you at all. Latinization of Slavs happened almost at the same time period with the "Byzanitnization." Poland was converted by Rome earlier than Rus was converted by Byzantine.
While Southern Slavs indeed were under influence of Constantinopole, western Slavs were always under constant influence of of the western branch of Christianity.
Moreover, some Slavic groups like Croatians or Slovenians although Catholics still are considered Southern Slavs. So, all these discussions about the Church Slavonic are irrelevant.
Poles never used Church Slavonic, for example, and began to use Latin earlier than Russians started to use Church Slavonic.
Your point about Russian, Ukrainian and Real Rus don't fit in this discussion at all. I don't understand what you want to say.
I also don't undersand your point about Cyrillic. There were only 2 countries in the Balkans under Soviet control i.e. Romania and Bulgaria. Yugoslavia, Albania and Greece were complitely out of Soviet control. Bulgaria historically uses Cyrillic. And I never heard about any attempts by the Soviets to impose Cyrillic in Romania. Please enlight me if I'm mistaken.
Yes, Soviets imposed Cyrillic in Bessarabia, which was complitely under Soviet control. But Bessarabia was not an independent country but just a territory, moreover the imposition of Cyrillic there was not related to some global campaign for the imposition of Cyrillic in Balkans but to the attempt to artificially create so-called "Moldavian ethnicity,"which logically required "Moldavian language" and perhaps the only way to make it really different than Romanian was to give it a Cyrillic alphabet . ------------- Σαυρομάτης
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Posted By: Chilbudios
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 08:06
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Good points, Sarmat.
I'll make few comments though.
- AFAIK Soviet Russia controlled in a way or another the entire Eastern Bloc.
- Romanian, a Romance language, used Cyrillic in its history. In the Middle ages the official language of the Romanian Orthodox principalities was Church Slavonic, the first attempts to use the own language were in Cyrillic. It was only in 19th century when first a mixed Latin-Cyrillic alphabet was used, then only Latin. However your point still stands, Soviet Russia did not impose Cyrillic alphabet in Romania.
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Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 18:23
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Latinization of Slavs happened almost at the same time period with the "Byzanitnization." Poland was converted by Rome earlier than Rus was converted by Byzantine.
Not so and not so fast Sarmat. The spoken language has little to do with the orthography. The Poles may have adopted the Latin alphabet but the language would remain tied to the ethos expressed by Old Church Slavonic. [as an aside the process in religious ritual is another matter entirely and can not be closed in terms of Poles, Czechs and Moravians until the time of the Counter-Reformation]. After all, you forget that for several years after 1917, the Soviets even envisioned the imposition of the Latin alphabet in "Revolutionary" society as official policy--after the notion of world revolution died they simply turned to tinkering with classic Cyrillic. Unfortunately (or fortunately as it may be) this is a subject worthy of its own thread. Just as it was indicated by the clarification on Romania, where while the root of the language might have been Romance, Cyrillic script persisted well into the 19th century (and I am not making reference to the nonsense undertaken by the Soviets in Moldavia). Distinction characteristic of regional variants in speech in the passage of time also forms another strata that can not be ignored (see a discussion on Polish peculiarities-- http://www.poland.gov.pl/The,Polish,Language,317.html I believe the differences in perspective between us stems from different historical assumptions as to what should receive emphasis: commonality or uniqueness. I may be an old fogey boiled in the cauldron of historicism and culturalism (pace Braudel), but I do have contempt (particularly in terms of contemporary analysis) for the old vestiges of nationalism and its mythologies [or its last variation scientism in historical analysis]. The premise that one is a this Turk or a that Turk comes at the sacrifice of the central element setting essential identity, particularly in terms of culture.
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Posted By: Sarmat
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 18:35
I have to say again that you are not very familiar with the stuff you are trying to argue about. Old Church Slavonic was created in Thesaloniki it didn't have anything to do with the Spoken language of Poles and even Ancient Russians. It was more based on the language which was used by the Slavic population of modern Bulgaria i.e. Southern Slavic dialects. ------------- Σαυρομάτης
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Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 19:27
How about a download of music from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Chili?  First, let me remind you that Italian, Sardinian, and Romanian compose the grouping known as Eastern Romance Latin. So if we are going to get technical guess where Tatar falls in the Altaic family tree--that's right Western...
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=90009 - http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=90009
And here we come to the crux of this divertissement, which is essentially an etymological one, the intimate relation of the Turkic groups as you can assess by employing this engine.
http://ehl.santafe.edu/cgi-bin/query.cgi?basename=/data/alt/turcet&root=config - http://ehl.santafe.edu/cgi-bin/query.cgi?basename=/data/alt/turcet&root=config
Upon which one has to hang the often arbitrary distinctions imposed by interpretational analyses drawn from different perspectives. To further cloud the matter is the fact that persistent reference to the Kypchak language in terms of the Tatar today is more than problematic in that Kypchak is extinct and what is entered into classification as Tatar is so heavily influenced by Oghuz as to generate incessant snarling. The thread provides a perfect example thus the hyphenation Oghuz-Western, while it might grate some sensibilities, is the most apt generalization no matter the proclivities toward asserting dubious semi-mythical geneaologies tied to long dead clan identities. What the linguistic composition of the Golden Horde might have been at a given moment in time is another matter entirely, particularly since the nationalist sensitivities honed by the 19th century are essentially irrelevant to the mentality of past ages. For the most part even conquerors were assimilated by the conquered... ------------- |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 20:17
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Old Church Slavonic was created in Thesaloniki it didn't have anything to do with the Spoken language of Poles and even Anciant Russians. It was more based on the language which was used by the Slavic population of modern Bulgaria i.e. Southern Slavic dialects.
And that's how Sts. Cyril and Methodius ended up in Rome? Besides, Old Church Slavonic is not Glagolitic (bukvitsa), which is what was employed in the conversion of the Slavicized Bulgars and the Moravians, while the Cyrillic alphabet we know today originated at Ohrid a century or so later. Slavic in the 9th century, ancient Slavonic, was not what you wish to imply. Further, Glagolitic continued in use into the early 20th century as an ecclesiatical alphabet among the Adriatic Slavs.
I do not want to get into a battle of footnotes and correct terminology, nor do I wish to ignite a FYROM push and shove, nor the polemic of the Rusyns as the first Slavic Christians, but let us not allow such turf fighting actually distort history further.
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Posted By: gcle2003
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 20:20
Can you explain that?
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Posted By: Sarmat
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 20:33
Complete nonsense. You confuse the language Old Church Slavonic the alphabet Glaglitic. Old Church Slavonic was written both in Glagolitic and Cyrillic,
Do you understand yourself what you wrote? How does it prove your point that Polish is inherently close to Old Church Slavonic? ------------- Σαυρομάτης
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Posted By: Sarmat
Date Posted: 24-Jan-2008 at 20:34
One can't explain this nonsense. ------------- Σαυρομάτης
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Posted By: Chilbudios
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 11:01
Actually in the "classical" taxonomy the northern Italian dialects (like Venetian, Ligurian) are in the Western Romance group while the southern Italian dialects (like Neapolitan) are in the Eastern Romance group, while standard Italian is a language built on the Tuscan dialect with influences both from north and south, thus being somehow in the middle, being characterized by varios scholars as either in the Western (for an example check Merritt Ruhlen's A Guide to World Languages, vol. 1: Classification) or in the Eastern group (while Sardinian is never placed in the Eastern group, is either in the Western group or somehow in a different group, called Southern Romance or Sardinian Romance). However this taxonomy was criticized on good reasons (because to the so-called rules of differentiation there are too many exceptions and also those rules fail to grasp a larger picture: e.g. Italian has a grammar closer to French than to Romanian, though phonetically it may resemble more Romanian; lexically Italian shares more with French, Catalan or Spanish than with Romanian), and today a site like the reputed Ethnologue.com classifies Italian in a Italo-Western group, thus the language bound rather to the Western group than to the Eastern one ( http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=90057 - http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=90057 ). However this paranthesis misses the actual point, that geography (Romanian developed practically in isolation from the other Romance languages) may have little to do with the linguistic developments, and the relation of closeness between languages can be more complex than one of simple geographical neighbourhood. That's why the geographical "excuse" shouldn't be used for justification in a serious linguistic discussion.
On Slavic languages, Sarmat does a very fine job to expose your confusions, so there's no need for me to repeat similar criticisms. In these circumstances, your attempts of humor become extremely unsalty and besides, insistence ruins most jokes. I suggested once, perhaps a bit too subtle, that a reader of Procopius would have come with something else (and this is no joke). If however you wish to share your musical preferences, the AE tavern might be a much more suitable place for you.
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Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 13:29
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Geography is more than location and if you will excuse the directness, the smugness of the commentary is indicative of careless reading and insistence on refusing to comprehend the limitations of your own vocabulary. Further, it is obvious that personal animosity is directing the urge to excise out of context so as to construct retorts. Glagolitic pertains to orthography, as does Cyrillic--a later development. Old Church Slavonic is a liturgical language and its first written examples come from Moravia and not Ohrid (bosh to the Thessalonika appellative generated by modern politics), and its existence is evidence of the commonality of словѣне throughout Eastern Europe. The later surge of vernacular adaptives has little to do with Old Slavic and the prejudices introduced not only by nationalism but by linguists themselves in the push to jargonize the discipline. Claiming to be historians does not permit ignorance of both the human and intellectual conveniences. For example, Proto-Slavic is an intellectual conjecture lacking historical evidence and the fact that Methodius and Cyril could devise in the Aegean circumference an alphabet (Glagolitic) that served their purposes in Moravia simply serves to underscore the commonality of the Vulgar among the Slavs of the 9th century and formed the basis of what became by the 10th century Old Church Slavonic. Further, the language of the actual Bulgars was Turkic and not Slavic so if we are to discuss conditions in the 8th and 9th centuries, then we can not employ the term Bulgarian given the differences between the ruling class (the Bulgars) and the subject populations (the Slavs, who themselves had replaced the earlier inhabitants) it would be akin to labeling Spanish as Visigothic! In the 9th century Slavic remained mutually intelligible throughout its geographic parameters, it is as simple as that. Further, in the first historical contacts with the Poles, Christianity came with Old Church Slavonic and it persisted in certain areas of Southern Poland even after the consolidation of a Latin script by the 11th century.
Further, the historical distinctions raised by migratory groups such as their number in terms of conquered or displaced populations, their cultural interactions, as well as homogenization as a process in developing a new identity must be considered in terms of history. Present exigencies and conditionals can not be thrown upon the past in any effort that seeks to consider the past, which must be analyzed on its own terms.
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Posted By: Chilbudios
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 14:30
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I cannot excuse your remarks because on one hand, I precisely asked you how Cuman language was influenced by geography (and I enumerated few geographical entities, not neighbourhoods, please reread my reply if you need a memory refreshment) which you have not answered and thus implicitely conceded on my point. And on the other hand, your geographical argument was entirely based on neighbourhood (Oghuz and Qipchak as Western Turks plus an analogy on Slavic languages divided in three groups as Western, Eastern and Southern; you still employ the same argument of neighbourhood in this last reply of yours when you claim that Slavic mutual intelligibility is due its geographic parameters). To conclude from a liturgical (actually literary) language used in two remote points that the respective language was common in the territory between them is an absurdity. The Kiev Folia, the most archaic OCS manuscript (10th century) shows aside of some local Czech influences - normal, if we assume it was copied by local scribes - clear signs of Bulgarian (the southern Slavic language, not the Turkic language of the Bulgars) phonetics. The confusion between a literary language and the vernacular is a mistake, and obviously leads to the wrong conclusion. England did not speak Latin just because we can find Latin manuscripts in the 8th century England. OCS was certainly the language of the south-Slavs which under the Byzantine influence acquired a system of writing, and later developed particular characteristics from the languages of the other Slavs which used it as a literary language . |
Posted By: gcle2003
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 16:26
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I still would like to know how a language can have an ethos. Or be tied to one. Or express one for that matter. The ethos (what's the plural of 'ethos') of the various Slav groups changed immensely with the coming of Christianity, but the language didn't. Of course you can express an ethos in any language, and for that matter you can express any ethos in a single language (of sufficient complexity to express one in the first place). I guess I could put the thought in the Lingustics forum. ------------- |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 16:45
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Well Chili what you have insistently inferred was not what was implied, nor is the diversion over the ad hominem appreciated since the bulk of the commentary has been leveled in a personal tone (including the entry by a passerby notorious for such conduct). I need no primer on the Internet foible known as "Swarming". The Prague Fragments of the Moravian Recension are older than your Kiev Folia and whatever you may wish to make of it, your fracturing is in conflict with the interpretative flow. http://www.utexas.edu/cola/centers/lrc/eieol/ocsol-0-X.html - http://www.utexas.edu/cola/centers/lrc/eieol/ocsol-0-X.html
Likewise, you chide for there not being a response on Cuman, when in actuality how could a response be entertained when persistent distractions are put forth and then couched in a manner that is simply guaranteed to offend. So much for the accusatory absence of scholarship because the "revising" has been more than persistent on this topic throughout the 19th and 20th centuries in line with the foibles of politics. It is quite a convenience to claim "authority" behind anonimity and if you wish to hurl insults as to competence then put forth your bona fides.
Now as to your play with Cuman (and the compilation known as the Codex Cumanicus) set that as a thread apart if you wish such a discussion not only in terms of the Kypchak but with reference to the Hungarian Cuman, including the riddles! We will not even hazard what you might make of a statement that equates Cuman to Crimean Tatar.
"The people known in Turkic as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kipchaks - Kipchaks were the same as the Polovtsy of the Russians, the Komanoi of the Byzantines, the Qumani (Cumans) of the Arab geographer Idrisi, and the Kun (Qoun) of the Hungarians. According to Gadrisi, they originally formed part of the group of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kimek - Kimak Turks who lived in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siberia - Siberia along the middle reaches of the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irtysh - Irtysh , or along the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/River_Ob - Ob . The Kimaks and the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oghuz_Turks - Oghuz were closely related." Rene Grousset. The Empire of the Steppes. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1970, 185 By the way, the name of the forum indicates it is devoted to history and its interpretations and not the peculiarities of other disciplines. Further why do languages become extinct if not as a result of pressures raised by geographic, social, and cultural considerations and interactions.
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Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 17:07
In Greek and in formal Rhetoric the plural of ethos is ethe. In usage the term is defined as the disposition, character, or fundamental values peculiar to a specific person, people, culture, phenomenon or movement.
With regard to Old Chuch Slavonic, its preservation (literally its cosolidation as a customary language of the Church establishment) despite the changes in the vernacular is sufficient reason to employ the term. ------------- |
Posted By: Chilbudios
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 17:38
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The Prague fragments are not older than "my" Kiev Folia (are also known as Kiev leaflets, in case you had problems of identification). For instance, in Old Church Slavonic Grammar by Horace Gray Lunt at page 9 you will find written: "the seven glagolitic folia known as the Kiev Folia (KF) are generally considered as most archaic from both the paleographic and the linguistic point of view" or in Roman Jakobson's Selected Writings try page 131: "There exist only two Old Church Slavonic manuscripts of Czech provenance - the Kiev Leaflets from the tenth century and the Prague Fragments from the eleventh" (and AFAIK 10 < 11). The following JSTOR link repeats the same information as in the previous book: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0097-8507%28195004%2F06%2926%3A2%3C333%3ACTCSJP%3E2.0.CO%3B2-V - http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0097-8507(195004%2F06)26%3A2%3C333%3ACTCSJP%3E2.0.CO%3B2-V I keep the rest of your incoherent diatribe outside my focus to save this thread from degenerating even more. I'll make an exception just to note that the forum may be devoted to history, but languages are studied by linguists, not historians or geographers. |
Posted By: gcle2003
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 20:18
Thanks. It doesn't really help with deciding what to say in English, because 'ethe' looks like a misprint. I guess the thing to do is try and paraphrase.
I don't see any way that justifies saying OCS had an 'ethos', let alone at the time Poles started using the Latin alphabet when OCS wasn't particularly 'preserved'.
How are you defining 'ethos', remembering we are talking English here?
Webster's has:
Languages are not individuals or groups of people, nor do they have attitudes, habits or beliefs.
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Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 20:26
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If by your "Kiev Folia" you meant the Kiev Missal then identify it as such, if you care to note I did not italicize and made the general reference to the various folios falling within the Moravian recension. The seven folia that compose the missal are not only referants to the Roman Rite but contradict the essential argument you maintained with regard to "Byzantinization". Little wonder one could be confused as to what was your point of reference. In addition, If one wishes to close the early cycle within the Glagolitic then further specificity is required: Codex Zographensis, Codex Marianus, Glagolitica Clozianus, Codex Assemianus, as well as the Psalterium and Euchologium Sinaiticum. In contrast, the Cyrillic with the exception of the Stela of Samuel (AD 993?), consists of but two examples both from the 11th century: the Savina Kniga and the Codex Suprasliensis. One would have thought that the citation previously given would have sufficed for a thorough read so as to present the underlying points; however, I will not make that mistake again in view of your peculiarities.
http://www.utexas.edu/cola/centers/lrc/eieol/ocsol-7.html - http://www.utexas.edu/cola/centers/lrc/eieol/ocsol-7.html
In terms of history no one refers to the Kiev Missal as either the Kiev Folia or the Kiev Leaflets, and it along with other examples of the Moravian Glagolitic are identiified as the Prague Fragments. Yes you can find web sites such as Titus making the distinction because of content, but then one could easily question the dating given the Cyrillic Ostromir Gospel to the 11th century by some and its exclusion by others. If one wishes to go into the nomenclature adopted by Hanka in the 19th century, fine or that of Jagic in Glagolitica wurdigung neuendeckter Fragmente in 1890; however, in both instances we are still addressing the Moravian Recension.
Which brings up your citation of a 1950 review and repeats the classifications chosen by Milos Weingart in the 1930s so as to distinguish between all of the surviving fragments of the Glagolitic and again in terms of the Moravian experience. Perhaps incoherence falls somewhere else in the failure to succinctly define, you presented the tone gratuitously and if you want a battle of the literature, a battle you shall receive.
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Posted By: Temujin
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 20:43
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actually we start getting off-topic...
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Posted By: Chilbudios
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 20:45
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I have meant what scholars mean (how do you have the nerve to say "in terms of history no one refers to" when I brought scholarly references?), it's not my fault your understanding is not synchronized with scholarship. Kiev Missal, Kiev leaflets (Roman Jakobson, for instance, uses both terms, and by the way, the citation from my previous post was from volume VI), and Kiev Folia mean the same thing - a wanna-be scholar of OCS should know that. But regardless of what I have meant by "Kiev Folia", you were wrong all along since you considered the Prague Fragments, a 11th century manuscript the oldest manuscript of OCS. The link which you have now provided does not reflect your previous knowledge, otherwise you have told me Kiev Missal is the oldest manuscript, not the Prague Fragments (actually on a more careful look the links gives: "The Kiev Missal, from the mid 10th cent. This consists of seven folia"; and as I'm here I cannot help laughing on how you have distorted a lot of manuscript names, for some Latin is a hard nut to crack). Makes sense, huh?
As for my citations, you display enough ignorance not to notice Lunt's book is recently edited (2001) and uses the term I've already quoted. There's no battle of literature. If you doubt the legitimacy of my terms please check:
http://www.centerslo.net/files/File/simpozij/sim20/ziffer.pdf - http://www.centerslo.net/files/File/simpozij/sim20/ziffer.pdf
http://www.kortlandt.nl/publications/art058e.pdf - http://www.kortlandt.nl/publications/art058e.pdf
http://www.kortlandt.nl/publications/art208e.pdf - http://www.kortlandt.nl/publications/art208e.pdf and dozens of articles and books, all available via the generous Google.
The morale of the story: study first, debate after. You're in no position to debate, mister.
Temujin, as far as I am concerned the off-topic is closed. So if anyone wants to talk to me about OCS can open a new thread on it.
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Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 20:48
What is custom or customary lies at the center of the original meaning of ethos. Even in Rhetoric, ethos identifies the correct or customary manner in which one is to proceed in argument. Within the context of Slavic, long after the vernacular had diversified and differentiated, the Church maintained the unique usages of earlier periods. ------------- |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 21:12
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Before introducing the subject of my talk, I wish to stress that I will not be speaking today about the main topic of the Conference, i.e. the history of Slovene. I could of course ask for leniency and remind you that there was a time when Old Church Slavonic was in fact called Old Slovenian; but this took place long ago and would be of little assistance for our present purposes. 1Leaving aside the problem of the different names given to that language even nowadays (in addition to Old Church Slavonic, we find the concurrent terms of Old Slavic and Old Bulgarian), I prefer to reveal the main argument of my article: despite the fact that Old Church Slavonic is universally recognized as the first literary language of the Slavs, it is very often evaluated from a narrow historical-comparative perspective that does not take into full account its characterizing features as a true literary language. The cause and effect of this state of affairs, as I will try to show, is the lack of historicity (i.e. the lack of a sufficiently historical approach) in a great deal of the scholarship devoted to the Old Church Slavonic language. 2__________
1 Apart from minor changes that have been made to eliminate certain expressions used in the oral presentation of my paper and to add the necessary bibliographic information, this text faithfully reproduces the paper that I gave at the Conference.2 Historicity corresponds here to the German Geschichtlichkeit as defined by P. VON POLENZ in his Die Geschichtlichkeit der Sprache und der Geschichtsbegriff der Sprachwissenschaft, Sprachgeschichte. Ein Handbuch zur Geschichte der deutschen Sprache und ihrer Erforschung 1, hrsg. W. Besch O. Reichmann S. Sonderegger, Berlin New York, 1984, 18.http://www.centerslo.net/files/File/simpozij/sim20/ziffer.pdf
All I can say with regard to the above quote is to advise that perhaps the reading of a citation is in order before throwing in a link. Perhaps a further quote migh be needed so as to underscore how hollow the quibbling:
The veneration shown to the few canonical codices has been accompanied by a neglect of many of those literary works that are certainly not younger than those contained in the canonical codices, but that have had the misfortune of being handed down exclusively in younger testimonies. Notwithstanding the fact that we do have some encouraging examples of scholars who have decided to make use of some old works even if they are preserved only in later manuscripts, the overwhelming majority of Slavists still focus their analysis of Old Church Slavonic on the canonical monuments. The appeal to history is apparently not mine alone no matter how some would like to disguise the matter. ------------- |
Posted By: Chilbudios
Date Posted: 25-Jan-2008 at 21:39
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I was talking about "unwritten languages". Unwritten means unattested. Unattested mean unhistorical. This applies to proto-Turkic, proto-Slavic or any other language in a similar status. |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 26-Jan-2008 at 12:12
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Unattested means ahistorical, without a history, and not unhistorical, which means against history! ------------- |
Posted By: gcle2003
Date Posted: 26-Jan-2008 at 12:25
Why not write in English, since this is an English language forum? I still would welcome an explanation of the original quote.
If by 'ethos', contrary to normal usage, you mean 'the correct or customary manner in which one is to proceed in argument', how is that an attribute of a language? I don't know Old Church Slavonic, since my only qualified Slav language is modern Russian, but I do know some Polish, and I unaware of any way in which Polish is 'tied to' any particular 'ethos' in your sense.
Thereby the Church was perhaps expressing an ethos. It would be reasonable to write that 'The Poles may have adopted the Latin alphabet but they would remain tied to the unique usages of the Moravian Church." I don't think it would be true, but it would at least make sense. ------------- |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 26-Jan-2008 at 15:21
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Ethos is a perfectly good noun in English and your convoluted construct carries none of the meaning behind the phrase "the ethos expressed by Old Church Slavonic". Perhaps you would like to give English lessons to Anthony Burgess or any other educated individual.
"Of course, this concerns an appeal of ethical character, an important and essential appeal for the ethos of the Gospel. We answer that the above-mentioned words are above all an appeal."
Pope John Paul II, Eros and Ethos
The "character" (one of the synonyms for ethos) of a language and its form is a valid expression and Polish did maintain the ethos of Old Church Slavonic. After all the original contention attacked was the presupposition that differences in alphabet would produce and result in entirely different constructs and that 10th century Polish diverged from Old Slav because of the Roman rather than Cyrillic alphabet.
To contend that language is incapable of possessing an ethos is nonsensical. The limpid attempt at claiming a "normal" usage is rather unflattering.
"In effect, his entire speech is an attempt to increase the respectability of the ethos of literature, largely accomplished by tying it to Cicero's own, already established, public character."
Gideon Burton, BYU ------------- |
Posted By: Chilbudios
Date Posted: 26-Jan-2008 at 17:00
Unhistorical means "not historical". Un- is a prefix which can mean opposition or negation. The negation valence is the Germanic form of a IE prefix *n- which came in Latin as in-, in Green as an- or a- (all of them are inherited in English via various paths, e.g. untold = not told, untruth = not truth, unattested = not attested, inappropriate = not appropriate).
Unhistorical is an adjective which I've encountered especially in modern philosophy, e.g. Nietzsche's triad: historical, suprahistorical (an obsession for the past) and unhistorical (the ignorance of the past). But this word came into English as a regular word, for instance, in Oxford's Dictionary of Current English (edited in 1998) for "unhistorical" the entry gives a blunt and clear definition: "not historical".
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Posted By: gcle2003
Date Posted: 26-Jan-2008 at 19:57
Then you tell me what the sentence means. That's all I was asking.
Seems just as good an option as you giving lessons to the dictionary compilers. However I don't think I need to: I'm sure they use the word the same way most English-speakers (or French or German speakers) do.
John Paul was undoubtedly using the word in the modern sense of an ethical system. That's obvious from the quote itself, so you're changing definitions in midstream. What I'm looking for, and not getting, is an explanation of how a language can express an ethical system, if that is what you are now taking 'ethos' to mean.
Roget lists 'ethos' under six headings - 501.6 (belief), 642.3 (culture), 957.1 (ethics), 479.8 (ideology), 5.3 (nature) and 525.5 (pervading attitudes). Each of those keywords has respectively 45, 22, 25, 8, 48 and 12 alternative synonyms. Of those 160, one section, 5.3 (nature), includes 'character'. So you would be technically correct, in a rather rare way.
On the same basis, however, 'ethos' can also be taken to mean 'Weltanschauung', 'point of view', 'moral climate', 'folkways', 'culture drift', 'ethical system', 'Ten Commandments', 'legal ethics', 'body-build', 'fiber', 'dharma', 'vein', or 'stripe'. It would therefore seem reasonable to ask which of the 160 possibilities you had in mind.
Much more reasonably, the fact that word A and word B both can appear in some circumstances as a synonym of word C, does not indicate that A and B mean the same thing.
It would certanly have been a lot simpler had you not chosen such an unusual meaning for the word - or rather such an unusual word to convey that meaning, sinde it was pretty well doomed to fail.
Polish was already a different language from the language that was later called 'old Church Slavonic' before it had any alphabet at all.
I don't recall anyone saying that Polish diverged from Old Church Slavonic because of the alphabet. For a start it would imply that Polish was at one point the same language as Old Church Slavonic (which is not to deny they share a common heritage at some point: but they weren't the same in the tenth century).
Quoting someone else's equally impenetrable sentence doesn't help very much. What on earth is the 'respectability of the ethos of literature' supposed to mean, even if you take 'ethos' to mean no more than 'character'? All literature had the same 'ethos'? Homer and Lucretius, Catullus and Virgil, Herodotus and Caesar? And that ethos was disreputable at one point and reputable later thanks to Cicero?
I'm not terribly surprised that someone who could write
is capable of talking about the 'ethos' of literature, but it's pretty sure that, like John Paul in the earlier quote, he was including religious, ethical and moral beliefs in his characterisation of 'literature'.
Of course any particular work of literature can embrace or advocate a particular ethos (in any usual sense of the term) but that's very different from talking about the ethos of literature or the ethos of a language. ------------- |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 26-Jan-2008 at 20:07
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What have I run into, the pundits of ponderous pedantry? When something is unattested it means there is no evidence and if it is with reference to your statement on proto-languages then usage demands ahistorical--there is no evidence attesting its usage or original development. To claim proto-languages are unhistorical is, to employ a popular descriptive here, absurd. Ahistorical means that which is unconcerned with history, historical development or tradition: e.g. All of this is totally ahistorical. There is virtually no evidence in the historical record to support any of it" [ http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dictionary/entry/ahistorical ]
In contrast the simplest meaning of unhistorical puts forth that which takes little or no account of history; for example: The Chanson de Roland is, essentially, unhistorical for its narrative is more fictional than factual.
If anything, the devising or surmising of proto-languages is intimately concerned with the history of language and its only limitation is its unattested characteristic drawn from surmises based upon solid analysis.
As for Ursprung, Herkunft, and Entstehung in the conceptualizaton of wirkliche Historie, let us just leave matters until you realize that an appropriation of vocabulary has taken place and been turned against those using it [pace, Foucault]. ------------- |
Posted By: Chilbudios
Date Posted: 27-Jan-2008 at 00:54
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Perhaps one should tell the people behind Oxford dictionary that their entry on "unhistorical" is wrong or misleading. Or tell some reputable linguists they use the wrong term "unhistorical" (e.g. when dealing with synchronic phenomena as opposed to diachronic ones), when we have/had schools of thought like the structuralist one. Or maybe forbid people like me to employ this term when they intend to describe things which cannot be studied historically. An unattested language is a language for which we have no evidences but also no evolution and consequently no history. In some cases there are attempts to reconstruct its hidden history, but it's often an entirely theoretical approach which does not have and probably not hope for direct evidences.
I have nothing to add on Nietzsche, only that it's shameful to brag with pretentios terms and at the same time to torture their spelling (there's a troubling pattern in distorting non-English terms which suggests at least unfamiliarity).
Anyway, this thread seems to lose more and more the focus on Tartars, Turkic people, Turkic language and become a playground of drgonzaga. Thus, I will cease my contributions here until this thread will regain its topic or these long off-topics will be splitted.
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Posted By: gcle2003
Date Posted: 27-Jan-2008 at 12:00
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What Nietzsche has to do with this I have no idea. Or Foucault. If you want to discuss such things then open up a thread in the Academy forum, or possibly Intellectual Discussions. Otherwise I agree with Chilbudios. ------------- |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 27-Jan-2008 at 13:03
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The unmitigated gall of the gratuitous commentary that derailed the discusion on the Tatar is obvious in the thread itself. That some have taken it upon themselves to repeatedly make personal attacks in a false rhetoric is most amusing. It brings to mind petulant children in a sandbox. Some should actually take the time to Ask Oxford: http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/unhistorical?view=uk - http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/unhistorical?view=uk
unhistorical--not in accordance with history or historical analysis.
As for pretentiousness, the attempt to subvert the meaning behind Nietzsche so as to sustain the unsustainable is evidence in itself of where conceit lies; particulaly as underscored by the diversion on Saussure, semiology, and Structuralism.
By the way all study is an exercise in History. That conclusion is inescapable. ------------- |
Posted By: gcle2003
Date Posted: 27-Jan-2008 at 15:28
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You're confusing Historie (as in wirkliche Historie) with Geschichte (as in 'wie es wirklich war').
The idea that there is any meaning behind Nietzsche is somewhat pretentious in itself. But that as Temujin and Chilbudios have already pointed out, is a subject for another thread.
Otherwise we could be discussing the philosophy of history on every single thread.
Why don't you start one? ------------- |
Posted By: Sarmat
Date Posted: 27-Jan-2008 at 17:57
Yes, exactly.
Dear drgonzaga, with all due respect it seems that you are trying to avoid further discussion on the real topic of this thread. As soon as another member finds another flaw in your new intellectual agrument, you throw into discussion another unrelated stuff like Nietzsche and Foucault. You started all this by claiming that Kypchaks=Oguz.
This thread is dedicated to Tatars. If you want to share with us your knowledge on this subject, please do. But if you want to discuss another area of your vast intellectual interests, please kindly open a new thread in a related subforum.
Many thanks. ------------- Σαυρομάτης
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Posted By: Seko
Date Posted: 28-Jan-2008 at 14:13
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For all involved. Continue a repsectful dialogue with your fellow members. Even though you may have different perspectives look at the historical possibilities before you criticize one another. If you have disagreements then share them in a way that is inviting instead of demeaning.
As Sarmat12 has also said, let's keep to the topic at hand. ------------- |
Posted By: xi_tujue
Date Posted: 28-Jan-2008 at 17:20
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tatars are basicly Kypchaks
The Term tatar at the time of marco polo was given to all the Turks & mongols except the Seljuks(turks) Sorry for replying so late but what babar ment was That Uigur = Eastern Branch of Turkic kpychak & Oghuz western branch kypchak = North western Oghuz = south western one thing that cought my attention is that modernday kypchak dialects aren't that close to the old cuman dialect wich is mutual understandable for oghuz & kypchaks speakers ------------- I rather be a nomadic barbarian than a sedentary savage |
Posted By: drgonzaga
Date Posted: 28-Jan-2008 at 21:13
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Thank you xi_tujue. Within the historical parameters of the 13th century, contemporary sources identify what is more commonly called the Golden Horde, as the Khanate of the Qipchak, for it was this nomadic group that composed the majority of the peoples loyal to the Mongol dynasts descending from Batu Khan. Within modern Chinese historiography the clarification between the dynasts and the actual populations are usually kept distinct, and in the instance of individuals such as Batu, whom the Latin chroniclers called Bathy Rex Tartarorum, Chinese chroniclers employed the nomenclature Qincha hanguo and recognized not only that the principal military contingents were drawn from the Kypchak but that the Turkic of the Kypchak became the military and commercial language of this empire. Yet, it was not until Ozbeg Khan (1313-1341) that this empire accepted Islam although individual elements had done so earlier, for example the Kumuk (another Qipchak tribe) of the North Caucasus did so in the 11th century. It was this conversion to Islam that would further facilitate in addition to language affinity Ottoman expansion north of the Black Sea as Kipchak political power declined consequent to the "Black Death" epidemics of the 14th century and early 15th centuries. It is in this context that the term Tatar must be understood rather than in the often contradictory devises of linguistics. ------------- |