Mysteries of the Etruscans revealed A new page opened in Etruscology

T he Etruscan, Pelasgian and Trojan languages spoken in the Mediterranean basin before the Latin and Greek languages were brought to the area, are found to have a close relationship with Old Turkic languages, and the Turkic languages (Chuvash, Kirghizian, Kazakh, Tatar) spoken at our times.

The problem relating to the Trojan, Etruscan and other aboriginal languages of the Mediterranean basin has remained unsolved: the Etruscan writings have not been deciphered, a great number of borrowings in Latin and Greek languages are still considered to be of unknown origin. Azerbaijani linguist Chingiz Garasharlı, Doctor of Philological sciences, as a result of long researches has opened a new page in this problematic branch of linguistics, proving the Old Turkic origins of the Etruscan writings. In his monographs «The Etruscans begin speaking» (2005), «The Early Inhabitants of the Mediterranean Basin – Turks (2009), «The Turkic Civilization Lost in the Mediterranean Basin (2011, In English) and «The Trojans were Turks» (2012) the Etruscan texts considered by European scientists to be of unknown origin, were proved to be Old Turkic. According to the researcher, the only truth the European scientists know is that «the Etruscan language was a non – Indo – European language. The same is told about the Trojan language spoken in the eastern coasts of the Aegean Sea. Therefore the efforts to interpret the onomasticon of the Trojans, and that of the Pelasgians and Thracians who spoke the same lan- guage, was not achieved».

Ch.Garasharly associated the unsuccessful result of the existing researches with the Eurocentric indention in the works of European scientists, who could not identify the relative languages for comparative research of the early Mediterranean languages.

It was just the reason of the failure of Indo-European researchers. He establishes that the Etruscan, Pelasgian and Trojan languages spoken in the Mediterranean basin before the Latin and Greek languages were brought to the area, are found to have a close relationship with Old Turkic languages, and the Turkic languages (Chuvash, Kirghizian, Kazakh, Tatar) spoken at our times.

Thus, having found the secret of the «40th room» in the Turkic languages, Ch.Garasharly proved that the language of the Etruscan writings was not unknown at all as it was alleged by scientists. The chapters from his above mentioned books — «the Old Greeks were Pelasgians», «The Turkic names of the Pelasgians», «Tiras, the Thracians and the Turks», «Turkisms in the Old Greek language», «The Trojan kings of Rome», «Turkic names of the Old Scandinavians» and others are in fact separate research works taken alone. His books are interesting equally for both Turkic-speaking and European peoples.

As the author writes, numerous borrowings considered to be of either

Greek or of Latin origin in up-to-date English, German, French and other European languages are in fact of alien origin. Some of them are thought to be of unknown origin, but they are unknown just for European scientists. If they had drawn such «Greek» and «Latin» words to comparison with the Old Turkic lexicon, they would never be faced with such uncertainty. He finds out, that a great number of pre-Greek (Pelasgo-Thracian) dynastic names exist in the anthroponomy of Turkic languages – Old Turk, Tatar, Bashkir, Uyghur, Kazakh, Kirghizian, etc. By denoting physical or moral superiority, these personal names answer the principles of anthroponomy. Such anthroponomical terminology was particularly characteristic of ancient peoples. What is more, the terminology of all these names are Turkic and they are only observed in old and modern Turkic languages:

Egey — a mythological king of Athena, the city which belonged to the Pelasgians. The same name is used in the Turkic (Kazakh) language.

Egey is either derived from the Kirghizia egey («a man with equal power») or consists of the Turkic ege («prince», «owner») and the suffix -y (-ay, -ey), widely used in the Turkic languages to form personal names (Bekey, Bakay, Tinay, Esey, etc.).

Keney, a pre-Greek personal name is the same Kirghizian Turkic Keney, which is derived from ken («vast», «spacious»).

Elat. In ancient literature Keney is presented as the son of Elat, a legendary pre-Greek king. It has a Turkic counterpart — Ilat, a Tatar personal name. It is derived from the Turkic ilat «population», elat «nomad», and «nomadic» people. The same Turkic appellative is observed in old Greek – ilot «the lower layer of people » , which refers to pre- Greek (Pelasgian) substratum in old Greek.

We want to numerate possibly more examples from his book, as each of them is a weighty fact to show the Turkic origins of early Mediterranean’s.

Danay. This pre-Greek personal name is completely consonant with the Turkic (Kazakh) personal name Danay. A similar personal name — Tanay, used in Karachay, Balkar anthroponomy, was interpreted as consisting of Turkic tang (tan, dang, dan «daybreak», «dawn») and the suffix -y/-ay to indicate the time of birth. He also conjoins analogical personal name with the word tan – Tantuar («born at daybreak»), used in the anthroponomy of the Tatars and Bashkirs.

Ergin. He is presented in Old Greek mythology as the son of Poseidon. Ergin has its anthroponomical parallel only in Turkic languages: Ergin (Turkish), Erkin (Kazakh). Deriving it from the Turkic ergin is reasonable for its specific meaning to characterize a person both physically and morally: «adult», «mature», «free», «self-dependent». Ergin/Erkin, derived from the Turkic erg/erk («power», «strong», «right»), was also used as an official title in some Turkic languages.

Gerey, as the researcher writes, is directly referred to the Pelasgians and is completely consonant

with the Turkic Gerey. This Turkic personal name is connected with the Turkic appellative geray, girey («worthy», «respectable») and was used as an official title of the Crimean khans. On the basis of this semantics its transition to a personal name is quite possible.

The river Selenga flowing in the territory of old Greece, is one the significant proof of the author to show the Pelasgians Turkic relations. It does not differ from the name of a Siberian river – Selenga. It originates from the Turkic seleng, selen («noise», «rumble»), an apparent hydronymic term. Similar river names (Seleng, Selenj) were used in many areas where Turkic peoples lived.

However, the interpretation of the pre-Greek Selenga by European scientists is quite unbelievable: they derived it from two theonyms – Selene and Ga, the mythological Mediterranean gods. If they had paid attention to the cognate Turkic river names (Selenga, Seleng), spread in large areas where the Turks lived, they would not have derived this river name from any local ethnonym.

Ch.Garasharli discovers in the anthoponomy of the Trojans a whole group of Turkic names, which have evident counterparts in the old Turkic, Kazakh, Kirghizian, Chuvash and other Turkic languages. And the interpretation given by him to these names are linguistically reasonable:

Dardan, an ancestor of Priam’s generation, is the e same Kirghizian Dardan - a personal name. Analogy of this Trojan name ia found by Ch.Garasharli in Turkic onomasticon. Turkic Dardan stems from the Kirghizian appellative dardan, which forms the personal name meaning «healthy», «enormous», «clumsy». The name (Dardan), used today by the Bulgars to mean «strong man», is the same Kirghizian personal name. The Bulgarians must have borrowed this name, like many other Turkic anthroponomy, from their Turkic ancestors, the old Bulgarians.

Alber, the name of a Trojan commander, is the same Old Turkic Alper, denoting «hero», «brave» (O.Turk. alp, alb, «hero», «brave» - er «man»).

The Trojans, who settled in North Europe after the collapse of Troy, left this name in old Germanic sagas. «The saga about Nibelungs» tells us about the albs («heroes») and their king Alberikh - Trojan by origin.

Askan, the name of a Trojan hero, is completely consonant with an Old Turkic personal name – Askan, used by the Huns. Today it is observed in the anthroponomy of the Turkic Altays.

Thus, the author finds the names of both Priam and his generation in Turkic anthroponomy. So many parallels can never be incidental, particularly in the light of old Scandinavian stories about the Turkic origin of the Trojans and the Thracians, he says.

Tarna, the name of a Trojan province, is the same old Turkic Tarna - a Khazar tribal name.

Traces of this ethnonym are found in Azerbaijan and the whole Caucasus, where tribesmen of Tarneans settled.

Ch.Garaşarlı discovers Turkic names in the onomasticon of Old Italy, which is natural from historical point of view. He writes that Roman kings with pride remembered their Trojan ancestry. Julius Caesar bore the name Yul, the son of Eney, a Trojan commander, who led the Trojan immigrants to Italy. Numerous Roman names of Trojan origin appear to be Old Turkic. Yul, for instance, is the same Turkic Yul, used by the Tatars and Bashkirs as a personal name.

Caesar ( kesar), applied as a cognomen to Roman emperors, could have been related to the old

Turkic kezer («leader», «hero»), used to de-

note a high title. It may be a cognate of the Kirghizian kaysar («brave», «strong», «courageous» whose semantics permits its transformation into a higher title.

The first component (Gay) of the name of Gayus Julius Caesar, the Roman dictator, is comparable with the old Turkic Gay - a tribal name belonging to the Turkic tribe Oghuz and with Kay, a Kipchak tribal name.

Establishing the Turkic origins of the Etruscan texts is the culmination point of the researcher. Ch.Garasharli has read these texts on sentence level, which is a weighty linguistic proof to indicate the Old Turkic origin of the Etruscan language. He establishes that a good knowledge of the Etruscan mythology often helps with the interpretation of some Etruscan mythological texts; we are going to present a few examples from his researches on Etruscology:

An Etruscan writing on a grave stone sounds as: hermial kapzna slman.

In ancient mythology Hermes ( Etruscan Herme) was considered to be the door-keeper of the next world. The pillars (herms), erected on burial places, symbolized guardianship of roads, boundaries and doors. Damaging the herms was considered a terrible sacrilege.

The Etruscan writing on a grave pillar, hermial kapzna slman, calling people “not to damage Hermes’s door” is evidently old Turkic. The sentence begins with the name Herme in the genitive case (Hermi-al “Hermes’s”). Though this form of the genitive case of the noun is characteristic of some Caucasian languages, the following words and morphological elements are pure Turkic: kapzna is Turkic kapısına (“to his door”: kapı “door”, - sı the suffix, denoting possession to the third person singular, and – na the indicator of the dative case). The next word – slman is Old Turkic salman “don’t damage”, “don’t attack” (sal “to damage”, “to beat”, “to attack”, - man the suffix of negation in Old Turkic). It is requested “not to damage Hermes’s door” which completely conforms to the mythology men- tioned above. The following part of the text sounds as sekhis kapzna. The noun sekhis, which defines kapzna ( « to [ its] door » ) , is the old Turkic saghis/saghish «the end of the world», «the other world»). The expression sekhis kapzna which, on the basis of the Turkic facts, is interpreted as «to the door of the other world», is the logical continuation of the first part:

«Don’t attack Hermes’s door, the door of the other world».

The researcher presents one more Etruscan picture describing two fighting warriors, one of which is obviously beating the other. The victorious warrior utters to his counterpart the phrase enkten, which is completely associated with the content of the picture. The author associates its meaning through the old Turkic engdin («you are taken aback! », «you became flustered! »). This is completely conformable to the situation where the warrior really looks taken aback - his arm being speared by the arrow of the winning soldier. Such examples are numerous. The researcher has deciphered a number of Etruscan texts, which were considered mysterious by linguists.

The number of the Etruscan texts deciphered by Ch.Garasharly is numerous enough to show the Old Turkic origins of the Etruscan language.

Outstanding Azerbaijani linguists, Honourable members of Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences Tofig Hajiyev, Nizami Jafarov, professors Gazanfar Kazimov, Sayali Sadigova and others have highly appreciated the scientific results gained by Ch.Garasharly.

We only could present to our readers some fragments from the researches of Ch.Garasharli. Within an article it would naturally be impossible to present a thorough information about “The Turkic Civilization lost in the Mediterranean Civilization”, the book revealing mysteries of the Mediterranean anciency. Our readers who would wish to witness these mysteries can get acquainted with the book through internet ( http:/ ebooks. preslib. az/ pdfbooks/en…garasharli.pdf) and have a contact with the author (karasharli@yahoo.com).