Re: question - Turco-Japanese (a thought experiment for the group here)

Andreas Johansson scripsit:

> I've always wondered about this too. Why was Anatolia turkicized when Iran never
> was. One should note, tho, that there were alot of graecophones in Anatolia up
> to that little population exchange project after WWI.
The Turks never attempted to impose their language on the conquered; people
had to learn Osmanli (Turkish with huge amounts of Persian and Arabic
borrowings) if they wished to become officials.  The Ottoman Empire was the
first modern fully multicultural empire.

--
John Cowan  www.ccil.org/~cowan  www.reutershealth.com  jcowan@reutershealth.com
There are books that are at once excellent and boring.  Those that at
once leap to the mind are Thoreau's Walden, Emerson's Essays, George
Eliot's Adam Bede, and Landor's Dialogues.  --Somerset Maugham