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

----- Original Message -----
From: Roger Mills <rfmilly@...>
To: <CONLANG@...>
Sent: Tuesday, November 23, 2004 10:33 PM
Subject: Re: question - Turco-Japanese (a thought experiment for the group
here)


> Andreas wrote:
> I don't know either. But wasn't Persia fairly powerful in those days?
> Compared to that, the Byzantine homeland probably looked like easy pickins
> (decadent infidels etc.);
 um, when the Ottomans showed up, Anatolia's western half(?) was Seljuk
Turk...granted, it was multiple small kingdoms.

> and perhaps the Turks had scruples about attacking
> fellow Moslems? Wouldn't be kosh.... umm, halal :-)
> (Even if they were *&%# Shiite heretics.
 oh it gets better: some of them were pig-eaters!
 (the Alevi).

> Interesting too, IIRC, that Persian
> was a prestige (literary) language during Ottoman times.)
 hm.. I didn't know that...I'd heard, though, that it'd been the primary
poetic language during Ottoman times.  (and government reports regarding
taxes were done in Persian...but then, that might be because some Sultans
used tax men brought as captives from the ongoing war with Persia).

> Charlie and Rodlox have pointed out the survival of Greek and other
> populations in the Ottoman period. Clearly the Georgians must have fled,
and
> Armenians lost much of their territory.
 actually, the Armenians had several kingdoms in northern Anatolia (the
Cicilian(sp) being one of them), though this was before 1500...I *think*.


> Looking back even further, one might ask, Whatever became of the Hittites
> (linguistically)?  AFAIK, there's great doubt about whether Phrygian,
Lydian
> et al. and/or Armenian, in any way represent descendants or relatives of
> Hittite. Was Hittite a total dead-end?
 no idea.
 sorry.

>