What are the aspects of Turkish culture which don't exist in European and Middle-Eastern cultures ?

Question

What are the specific aspects of Turkish culture which belong to the Turkish culture only ?

Traditions, supersitions, arts, cuisine, folklore,etc...

When I use the word " Turkish", I refer to "Anatolian Turk", " Ottoman", and also the more generic word " Turkic".

And are there also some important differences between Anatolian Turks and Central Asian Turks? Are there some links and common points which still exist today, between these two parallel branches of the Turkic family ?

Thanks in advance for your explanations.

Answer 1

It seems we all keep some of the pre-monotheistic-religion traditions. We have henna, evil eye (Egypt has a similar belief, the wedjat eye), respect to the dead (shamanist tradition, like the American Natives).

Europe still celebrates Halloween, Easter and Christmas, all of which have roots before Christianity. I also read somewhere that Mary (Jesus's mother) worship is based on Isis worship in Roman times, thus the importance of a female figure in a male dominated monotheistic religion.

Also, we seem to have a tighter family unit. All members of an extended family have a specific honorific, whereas in English they are summed up under the name in-law, sister-in-law for females, brother-in-law for males, father/mother-in-law for parents.

Answer 2

Turkey (Ottoman/Selcuk empire and subsequently) has had an influence on Europe for about a thousand years. Similarly the Turkish/Turkic peoples have migrated and interacted with many different cultures over the centuries and adapted/adopted/influenced many aspects of those cultures. .

Many things originated with the Turks but have, by and large, been taken up by others (cooking - sarma, dolma, kebabs etc; art - miniaturism, marbling etc). Many customs are common to many of the Mediterranean countries (evil eye symbol etc)

Initially I could think of no unique examples. Others may do better.

I then compared it to my origin (English) and could think of only one example of "English" expression that is unique, namely the offensive two-fingered gesture that doesn't exist in Scotland, Ireland, USA etc.

Typically "English" things apart from this (roast beef, Yorkshire pudding, cricket, rugby, driving on the left etc etc) have all been exported due to the past power of empire, only this and certain slang terms seem to me to be unique.

I therefore nominate the Turkish offensive (thumb between index and middle finger) gesture as being unique. Please correct me if I am wrong and this gesture exists elsewhere. Maybe there are also slang terms which are purely "Turkish".

Answer 3

Tradition: Kına gecesi (henna night), Kırkpınar yağlı güreşleri (Kırkpınar oil wresting)

Supersition: Nazar boncuğu (amulet), no wedding between two feasts,...

Art: Çinicilik, ebruculuk,...

Cuisine: Yaprak sarması, hünkar beğendi, güllaç,...

Folklore: Karagöz & Hacıvat (Greeks try to steal that folklore), kılıç kalkan, zeybek, orta oyunu,...

There are too many to count.

Answer 4

Some thousands of years while Turks moved from middle asia to Europe and Anatolia, they adopted a lot of things.

We still have a lot of signs from shamanist culture.Like the evil eye as above posters said.Other things like 40 days after a person died,there is a ceremony,which is adopted from shamanist culture and mixed with islamic traditions.Because in shamanist faith, the soul leaves the body after 40 days.

Shamans used drum and kopuz, which Turks still use. ( only kopuz changed slightly and became saz/bağlama)

Middle asia Turks used to tie cloth pieces on branches of trees and make wishes which still can be seen performed widely.Also the love for army, a lot of names etc have signs from this culture.

Turks could found themselves in Islamic culture and it was not difficult,since it had a lot of similarities with shamanism.Like one god,heaven/h**l and after life beliefs.So actually they combines two faiths.Such as they built mosques with ceilings looked like tents,they placed grave stones ( they used to call it balbal in middle asia) which was not from arabic culture,some people even go praying with bağlamas/kopuz whom are called alevis.

You can see  signs of Arabic and Anatolian culture in the language and food mostly.

But we can say, the main traditions are the middle east traditions which are changed slightly after converting to islam.

@Fidget, LOL yes that's unique Turkish.

Answer 5

one quickly came up:

Turks also prepare ceremonies on certain dates (such as after 40 days, 1 year) after a person dies. They generally read Qoran and pray. They also pray to God to forgive the person's sins (i.e.Allah onun gunahlarını affetsin) which is originally contradicting to Islam (acc. to Islam when a person dies, there is no way to reduce or increase his/her value).

These traditions are our ancestors' Shamanic traditions. They used to believe that the soul of the person who dies goes out of his/her home gradually and those grades are accepted (somenody correct me, if i am wrong) as after first week, 40 days and 1 year etc.

i hope it makes sense