4 ms·

> common heritage of Turkish and Greek people. What common heritage are you speaking of? Edit: Who knew such benign question would trigger so many. I guess fo

by disown 6y ago

> common heritage of Turkish and Greek people. What common heritage are you speaking of? Edit: Who knew such benign question would trigger so many. I guess foreigners have a different understanding of what heritage means. Heritage doesn't mean being conquered and/or exchanging words, food, building, etc. Heritage implies "descent". Just because you eat sushi doesn't mean you and a japanese person have a common heritage. Just because native american buildings like the hogan are in the US doesn't mean we share the same common heritage as native americans. https://study.com/academy/lesson/native-american-houses-facts-types.html https://study.com/academy/lesson/native-american-houses-fact... We specifically say they are native american homes, not "american" homes because even though the natives were conquered, their heritage is different from ours.

hcho 6y ago
They lived in close proximity for a good part of a millennium. Do you think they haven't influenced each other?
- bzb6 6y ago
  Maybe so but they are entirely different countries currently in the things that matter.
  - kingofpandora 6y ago
    Different countries ... with a common heritage.
    - bzb6 6y ago
      Greeks are Christians, Turks are Muslims. For starters.
      - sudosysgen 6y ago
        That is both a difference and a similarity. Both are way closer to each other than any two random religions on average.
      - joeyo 6y ago
        That's a bit of a tautology because the population exchange was done on the basis of religion, not language. There were plenty of Greek speaking muslims and Turkish speaking orthodox christians before 1915.
      - tetris11 6y ago
        Many parts of Turkey and N Cyprus still speak Greek in secret
    - planetis 6y ago
      Maybe during history lessons you preferred a good beauty sleep instead of paying attention to the class :)
      - kingofpandora 6y ago
        If you don't see a lot of overlap between Greek and Turkish culture ... not sure what to say. Over a million "Greeks" were deported to Greece in the 1920s, despite many speaking only Turkish and many "Turks" were sent back the other way. Not to mention that most of those inhabiting Turkey today - and identifying as Turks - have an awful lot of non-Turkish ancestry. It's not only Greek of course (plenty of Armenian, Kurdish, Arab, Albanian, Circassian, Bulgarian, etc), but Greeks and Greek culture has had a massive imprint on modern Turkey - and Turks have also had an impact on modern Greek culture. Of course neither side is particularly happy to admit it, but it's very much there.
  - dxdm 6y ago
    > entirely different countries currently in the things that matter. I don't know, there seems to be quite some common ground when it comes to food and drink, for example. That's part (and the result) of some shared culture, I'd say. Isn't it nice to realize that your neighbors might be people just like you are, who like to take their coffee in quite a similar way?
  - redwood 6y ago
    Perhaps you don't realize that the heart of ancient Greece was really in what we now call modern-day turkey
- disown 6y ago
  > They lived in close proximity for a good part of a millennium. And? That doesn't imply common heritage. > Do you think they haven't influenced each other? That doesn't imply common heritage. Also if you talking about the ottoman empire. isn't the greek position that the ottoman empire was bad for them and hence why they sought independence? Or are you saying that greece should rejoin the ottoman empire and embrace the "common heritage"?
  - killertcell 6y ago
    >That doesn't imply common heritage. spot the american.
    - disown 6y ago
      Guilty as charged. So you think australia and indonesia have a common heritage because they are neighbors, but the US and australia don't because we live an ocean away? It's so funny, I was genuinely interested in this topic as my understanding of greece and turkey was one of conqueror and conquered, not "common heritage". I thought maybe there was history/ties/etc I was missing, but apparently it's just some politically driven people spewing nonsense. Perhaps foreigners just don't know what "common heritage" means. Spot the foreigner. Edit: As I noted in my other comment, to say greeks and turks share the same heritage is like saying americans and native americans share the same heritage. American heritage stems from britain, but no sane person would claim that native american heritage comes from britain. I don't think any sane person would associate the ottoman empire with greeks. They would associate it with the turks because it was a turkish empire. I bet most greeks see their heritage as ancient greece.
      - wonnage 6y ago
        The American educational system has really failed this one
      - hcho 6y ago
        The conqueror and conquered relationship has been about the 40% of aforementioned millennium. The rest they have been allies, mercenaries, enemies,trading partners, etc... It's far more nuanced than a single relationship type.
armenarmen 6y ago
Turks are in large part the descendants of Greeks that were forcefully converted maybe?
- selimthegrim 6y ago
  Turkish speaking Christians and Greek speaking Muslims moving after the population exchange to boot
bitcurious 6y ago
Constantinople/Byzantium was in practice a Greek state. In their conquest of it, the Ottomans assimilated both many peoples as well as much of the culture and practice of the area, with Sultan Mehmed II going as far as calling himself 'Ceasar.'
onei 6y ago
Perhaps Istanbul shows it more than other places. The city was originally Greek, then Roman, Byzantine and more recently Turkish for the last 600 years. But the city itself is a myriad of cultures likely due to its economic importance. Wikipedia covers the history pretty well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Istanbul https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Istanbul
planetis 6y ago
You are the same people ousting Greek refugees during the Greco-Turkish War of 1919–1922 (considering them Turkish because they also spoke Turkish) (known locally as the Asia Minor disaster) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asia_Minor_disaster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asia_Minor_disaster For anyone interested I recommend this excellent movie https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0378897/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0378897/
mipsi 6y ago
Similiar food, music, habits, look-alikes.
doganugurlu 6y ago
You'll probably have some puritanical argument to disregard this but throwing it out here anyways: the genetic pool of modern day Turkey is substantially more Greek and Iranian than Asian.
reggieband 6y ago
I was very lucky enough to travel through Turkey. The South Western coast of Turkey, from Antalya to Bodrum, is some of the most beautiful Mediterranean sea coasts in the world. Seriously, take a look at pictures from Fethiye or Kas for example. I'm not expert on the definition of the word "heritage" but my own impression is these countries share more than just a land border and adjacency to the Aegean sea. The people look similar, dress similar, eat extremely similar food, have similar drinks (raki vs. ouzo), live in similar houses. For much of the time I was in that area of Turkey I remember thinking it felt more like Greece than Greece did! This should be no surprise (although it was to me). They have been neighbours for millennia and their cultures have mixed and intertwined with each other longer than the USA has existed. Much of the land between them has switched hands back-and-forth between various empires dating back to Alexander the Great (and beyond). Comparatively, the native peoples of the Americas were culturally isolated for that same length of time until ~500 years ago when Europeans with a completely distinct culture showed up in ships for the first sustained contacts. There is almost no reasonable comparison to be made between the two circumstances.
Bayart 6y ago
>Heritage implies "descent" You might have noticed that Turks hardly look Central Asian.

by disown 6y ago

hcho 6y ago

They lived in close proximity for a good part of a millennium. Do you think they haven't influenced each other?

bzb6 6y ago
Maybe so but they are entirely different countries currently in the things that matter.
- kingofpandora 6y ago
  Different countries ... with a common heritage.
  - bzb6 6y ago
    Greeks are Christians, Turks are Muslims. For starters.
    - sudosysgen 6y ago
      That is both a difference and a similarity. Both are way closer to each other than any two random religions on average.
    - joeyo 6y ago
      That's a bit of a tautology because the population exchange was done on the basis of religion, not language. There were plenty of Greek speaking muslims and Turkish speaking orthodox christians before 1915.
    - tetris11 6y ago
      Many parts of Turkey and N Cyprus still speak Greek in secret
  - planetis 6y ago
    Maybe during history lessons you preferred a good beauty sleep instead of paying attention to the class :)
    - kingofpandora 6y ago
      If you don't see a lot of overlap between Greek and Turkish culture ... not sure what to say. Over a million "Greeks" were deported to Greece in the 1920s, despite many speaking only Turkish and many "Turks" were sent back the other way. Not to mention that most of those inhabiting Turkey today - and identifying as Turks - have an awful lot of non-Turkish ancestry. It's not only Greek of course (plenty of Armenian, Kurdish, Arab, Albanian, Circassian, Bulgarian, etc), but Greeks and Greek culture has had a massive imprint on modern Turkey - and Turks have also had an impact on modern Greek culture. Of course neither side is particularly happy to admit it, but it's very much there.
- dxdm 6y ago
  > entirely different countries currently in the things that matter. I don't know, there seems to be quite some common ground when it comes to food and drink, for example. That's part (and the result) of some shared culture, I'd say. Isn't it nice to realize that your neighbors might be people just like you are, who like to take their coffee in quite a similar way?
- redwood 6y ago
  Perhaps you don't realize that the heart of ancient Greece was really in what we now call modern-day turkey
disown 6y ago
> They lived in close proximity for a good part of a millennium. And? That doesn't imply common heritage. > Do you think they haven't influenced each other? That doesn't imply common heritage. Also if you talking about the ottoman empire. isn't the greek position that the ottoman empire was bad for them and hence why they sought independence? Or are you saying that greece should rejoin the ottoman empire and embrace the "common heritage"?
- killertcell 6y ago
  >That doesn't imply common heritage. spot the american.
  - disown 6y ago
    Guilty as charged. So you think australia and indonesia have a common heritage because they are neighbors, but the US and australia don't because we live an ocean away? It's so funny, I was genuinely interested in this topic as my understanding of greece and turkey was one of conqueror and conquered, not "common heritage". I thought maybe there was history/ties/etc I was missing, but apparently it's just some politically driven people spewing nonsense. Perhaps foreigners just don't know what "common heritage" means. Spot the foreigner. Edit: As I noted in my other comment, to say greeks and turks share the same heritage is like saying americans and native americans share the same heritage. American heritage stems from britain, but no sane person would claim that native american heritage comes from britain. I don't think any sane person would associate the ottoman empire with greeks. They would associate it with the turks because it was a turkish empire. I bet most greeks see their heritage as ancient greece.
    - wonnage 6y ago
      The American educational system has really failed this one
    - hcho 6y ago
      The conqueror and conquered relationship has been about the 40% of aforementioned millennium. The rest they have been allies, mercenaries, enemies,trading partners, etc... It's far more nuanced than a single relationship type.

armenarmen 6y ago

Turks are in large part the descendants of Greeks that were forcefully converted maybe?

selimthegrim 6y ago
Turkish speaking Christians and Greek speaking Muslims moving after the population exchange to boot

bitcurious 6y ago

Constantinople/Byzantium was in practice a Greek state. In their conquest of it, the Ottomans assimilated both many peoples as well as much of the culture and practice of the area, with Sultan Mehmed II going as far as calling himself 'Ceasar.'

onei 6y ago

Perhaps Istanbul shows it more than other places. The city was originally Greek, then Roman, Byzantine and more recently Turkish for the last 600 years. But the city itself is a myriad of cultures likely due to its economic importance. Wikipedia covers the history pretty well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Istanbul https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Istanbul

planetis 6y ago

You are the same people ousting Greek refugees during the Greco-Turkish War of 1919–1922 (considering them Turkish because they also spoke Turkish) (known locally as the Asia Minor disaster) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asia_Minor_disaster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asia_Minor_disaster For anyone interested I recommend this excellent movie https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0378897/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0378897/

mipsi 6y ago

Similiar food, music, habits, look-alikes.

doganugurlu 6y ago

You'll probably have some puritanical argument to disregard this but throwing it out here anyways: the genetic pool of modern day Turkey is substantially more Greek and Iranian than Asian.

reggieband 6y ago

I was very lucky enough to travel through Turkey. The South Western coast of Turkey, from Antalya to Bodrum, is some of the most beautiful Mediterranean sea coasts in the world. Seriously, take a look at pictures from Fethiye or Kas for example. I'm not expert on the definition of the word "heritage" but my own impression is these countries share more than just a land border and adjacency to the Aegean sea. The people look similar, dress similar, eat extremely similar food, have similar drinks (raki vs. ouzo), live in similar houses. For much of the time I was in that area of Turkey I remember thinking it felt more like Greece than Greece did! This should be no surprise (although it was to me). They have been neighbours for millennia and their cultures have mixed and intertwined with each other longer than the USA has existed. Much of the land between them has switched hands back-and-forth between various empires dating back to Alexander the Great (and beyond). Comparatively, the native peoples of the Americas were culturally isolated for that same length of time until ~500 years ago when Europeans with a completely distinct culture showed up in ships for the first sustained contacts. There is almost no reasonable comparison to be made between the two circumstances.

Bayart 6y ago

>Heritage implies "descent" You might have noticed that Turks hardly look Central Asian.