‘’From where he crouched at the king's feet, Unferth, a son of Ecglaf’s, spoke contrary words. Beowulf’s coming, his sea-braving made him sick with envy: he could not brook or abide the fact that anyone else alive under heaven might enjoy greater regard than he did’’
This quote is from the English legend of Beowulf, which is actually a Danish prince sailing to Sweden to kill the beast of Grendel and declare his power. How is that possible to be English legend while any point doesn’t take place in England? The answer is to be occupied by Northerns before thousands of years ago. Normen invaded the island and most of Europe, settled the lands and made trade and diplomacy and celebrated the days and festivals in their ways. However, time was passing on for local people ruled by Normen and, together with no certain time, they adopted some ideas, literature, etc. left them behind even after Normen had already gone permanently. That’s why we see Beowulf as English literature instead of Danish one. Getting into a different culture might change from culture to culture, might due to the geographical reasons, occupations, close relationships, arts, trades and in my opinion, the most effective option is: Religion.
Among these reasons, the most suitable situation is a religion unlike the sample above. Even first coming out from Siberian Forest, the Turks fought in every geography from Europe to China, India to Arabian Peninsula. If we have a look at the first kingdom of Turks whose name is Huns ruling over the whole Middle Asia, we see that they perceived the world as a treasure to be looted but not certainly for settlement. They fought with China, won battles against Chinese Emperors, even having a chance to kill the Chinese emperor, also they did same in the West on Rome and Byzantium, they had ridden their horses on the lands of Europe, could have been invaded the lands owned by them which were lack of authority that times.
However, they didn’t for a reason because turning back to the motherlands with looting and prepare themselves for next summer booty otherwise they thought they could have lost their identities by integrating themselves into these kingdoms’ living styles. To rule them, you need to settle their countries. The Turks were living in marquees while European and Chinese people were used to live in stone houses. Eating diet, living style, point of view for trade, ruling system, and many others should have changed for a long term invasion.
Besides, the language was going to change because if we have recently learned a new thing from a field that we never face, we start mostly use the terms found by the language. For instance, English is the dominating language in the sailing field, so that many sailing terms come from it and get into the other languages’ dictionary. For living common life and dealing with stockbreeding, the terms of relationships between people and classifying animals and their skins in Turkish are highly developed. The Turks use different terms for each age of the animal, the language includes many words about the geography used for feeding animals and even have different words used for wives of brothers and husbands of sisters, sister of father and sister of mother, a new term for each relationship. If we make an appointment to the situation regard as settlement, problem at being lack of settled life and ruling the other states were going to inject new words from outside and change the root of the language, ruling vast lands meant falling apart causing minority groups to hold the lands stabilize beside learning ‘’reign of the lands’’ from an experienced countries which would actually be your vassals and more. When you are exposed to many things at a time, adopting it is generally hard, mostly mutated you. The reason of holding back for the permanent invasion was so clear that the Turks - at least the leaders – used to want to protect their habits named ‘’culture’’.
However, within the migration to Anatolia -where is the only intersection of Europe, the Middle East, and Asia - perception was completely changed because the connection with culture from all over points was inevitable. The Turks constantly were in touch with Arabic, Roman and Asian cultures. After converted to Islam, the Turks became the Northernmost border of Islam where was the only ground way to invade Islamic lands otherwise just suitable for landings from sea. That’s why Europe organized its crusader army to send over Ottoman Empire five times and superiority in those wars turned the statue of Turks into ‘’the Defender of Islam’’. Additionally, the Turks were the only authority to carry the flag of Islam after the conquest of all the Arabic realm from the peninsula to northern Africa in the Ottoman Era. Within this success, Islamic culture started more effectively in the Ottoman living style than before.
Unlike the other religions such as Christianity and Pagan, Islam specifies each behavior in every field, how to behave your wife, how to share money, how to govern your country, when you wake up, etc. The very comprehensive book written everything in detail, so that if you truly choose to be a part of Islam, there is no going back for your culture anymore. On the other hand, ruling almost all Arabic lands is also an effective point for that reason. This flag had undulated for Turks more than 400 years
While dominating the South, Ottoman Empire also reigned in West and North, procuring many cultures in it. Both getting in touch with different cultures and being the leader of Islam created a perception as ‘’Turks are Arabic’’. At some point, of course not true, however, might be true as ‘’Turks are Arabication’’ because the alphabet was Arabic, the regime was sharia, ruled by a monarchy, the subjects of the literature were mostly emblazonment to the God and Sultans. That’s why many nations assume Turkey is an Arabic country.
However, the declaration with The Republic of Turkey and revolutions in many fields provide Turkey to turn back its origins. Nowadays, no way to think like that. Migration of Turks living in old Ottoman lands from West, South, and North where includes the different living styles, the country became a colorful location with all differences. When you travel throughout Turkey, you will understand what I mean. The answer is that Turkey is not an Arabic country but not also Turkish migrating from Siberian Forest anymore. The term of Turk is semantically change. Here is for all culture, any nation can find something even if it is a small piece. Our appearance
is different from each other. Accent, behavior, idea… This was inevitable when being in the middle of the three big culture. We are you, you are us.
‘’How happy is the one who says I am a Turk’’ Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of the Republic of Turkey.