3
(Türk Tarih Tetkik Cemiyeti) was founded in 1931 as well
as Turkish Language Association (Türk Dili Tetkik
Cemiyeti) in 1932 and Faculty of Language, History and
Geography in Ankara in 1933. Atatürk aimed to bring
together a group of experts to conduct academic studies on
the Turkic world, organize academic conferences on these
topics, to discuss them openly in the conferences in order to
correct misleading information and opinions on Turcology
and shedding light on controversial issues. Thanks to these
efforts, many misleading theses and theories about
Turcology and Turks were debunked.
Turks were settled in a region that is referred to by
historians as Central Asia or Uluğ Turkistan with Siberia in
the north, Great Khingan (Kadırgan) Mountains in the east,
Himalayas and Hindi Kush Mountains in the south and the
Caspian Sea and Ural River in the west. It is known that
Turks have lived in this large area since prehistoric ages and
they have moved to other parts of the world from there.
Despite different views among historians, archeologists,
anthropologists, linguists and cultural historians on where
Turks were located within this geography, it is said to be in
the area in the northwest of Altai and Sayan (Kögmen)
mountains. Linguists claim that Turkic homeland is larger
towards to the east, west and south of the aforementioned
areas (İbrahim Kafesoğlu, Türk Milli Kültürü, İstanbul 1977,
p.29,30). Turkic migrations concentrated in Uluğ Turkistan
was towards the West. It is known that migrations
throughout the history have taken place due to pushing and
pulling factors. In fact, families and communities leave their
homeland and embark on unknown journeys because of
several reasons. These include natural disasters, political
conflicts, problems originated by population increase,
internal and external pressure that are not bearable anymore
and ideals of founding new communities or states. Studies
on Migrations B.C. are based on some coincidences and are
not complete as of today. However, information about
Turkish culture and political history has been reached as a
result of research based
on Chinese, Mesopotamian, Persian,
Indian and Anatolian civilizations. In fact, Turkic cultural
traces can be found anywhere they founded states. Thus
settled centers of civilization such as China, Persia, Sumer
and Hittite had close ties with the migrating tribes and could
4
not have developed without their organizational skills (Salim
Koca, Türklerin Göçleri ve Yayılmaları, Türkler, v.1, p.657).
Indeed Sumerian belongs to the language group which also
includes Turkish. Studies show that around 200-300
Sumerian words resemble Turkish both in terms of sound
and meaning (Osman
Nedim Tuna, Sümer ve
Türk Dillerinin
Tarihi İlgisi İle Yaş Meselesi, Ankara 1990). A similar
resemblance exists between Turkish and Gutti, Huri and
Urartu languages. Scholars agree that Anau culture in Uluğ
Turkistan and Sumerian culture in Mesopotamia might have
descended from same origin and composed of relative tribes
due to similarities between the two. There is also a
consensus on the theory that Chou state in northern China
was founded by Turks with reference to its horse culture,
belief in tengrism, sanctity of the sun and stars and some
other traditions. On the other hand, Etruscans who migrated
to Italy over Anatolia can turn out to be representatives of
Turkish culture, if some problems concerning their language
is solved. Similarly, Cimmerians are known to have left
Uluğ Turkistan in 1700 B.C. and moved westwards as
Scythians arrived in the Balkans after crossing Caucasia and
the northern Black Sea. The aforementioned tribes are also
known to move into Anatolia, Persia and Syria over
Caucasia and fought against Assyrians and Persians (Salim
Koca, ibid. p.658).
Turkic migrations continued in the Common Era
similarly in east-west directions. The Tabgach State (338-
557) was founded by Turks as a result of migrations to
Northern China and Northern India
due to close proximity of
these areas and they controlled a large portion of Chinese
lands particularly the north. However, Buddhism eroded
their fighting skills and they were assimilated into Chinese
culture later on. Similarly, after the Great Hun state
weakened and dissolved, Hun Turks moved westwards and
founded Hephthalite State in the region which is
Afghanistan today. In the meantime, they developed
relations with Sassanian State in Persian geography and
dominated the northern India. However, Western Kök Turks
and Sassanians made a deal against Ak Huns and brought an
end to their political presence.
While Turkic migrations took place in east-west
directions, they followed the main routes. One of these were