Middle East Explorer Home > Turkey >
Sun Language Theory
Found in: History of Turkey
The Sun Language Theory was a linguistic hypothesis proposing that all human languages are descendants of one Central Asian primal language. The theory further proposed that the only language remaining more or less the same as this primal language is Turkish. According to the theory, the Central Asian worshippers, who wanted to salute the omnipotence of the sun and its life-giving qualities, had done so by transforming their meaningless blabbering into a coherent set of ritual utterings, and languages were born, hence the name.
The hypothesis was started with the works by the French scientist Hilaire de Baranton entitled "''L'Origine des Langues, des Religions et des Peuples", that all languages originated from hieroglyphs and cuneiform used by Sumerians and the paper of Austrian linguist Dr. Hermann F. Kvergic of Vienna entitled "La psychologie de quelques elements des langues Turques''" ["the psychology of some elements of the Turkic Languages"].
Once these works came to the attention of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, he introduced the Sun Language Theory into Turkish political and educational circles in 1935, at the high point of attempts to 'cleanse' the Turkish language of foreign influences. "As Atay (1965) suggests, Ataturk did not mind the Turkish Language Society leaving foreign words in the language, so long as it could demonstrate that they were in fact Turkish". According to Ghil'ad Zuckermann, "it is possible that the Sun Language Theory was adopted by Ataturk precisely in order to legitimize the Arabic and Persian words which the Turkish language authorities did not manage to uproot. This move compensated for the failure to provide a neologism for every foreignism/loanword."
The theory fell into final oblivion in the 1950s.
See also
Adamic language
Lemurian Tamil
Further reading
1936 Sun Language Commission's Report (in Turkish and French)
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Sun Language Theory
Explore History of Turkey
Lydia / Montreux Convention Regarding the Regime of the Turkish Straits / Thrace / Lake Van / Bithynia / Iznik / Mysia / Armenian Genocide / Heraclea Pontica / Nicomedia / Cyprus dispute / Gallipoli Campaign / Kilij Arslan I / Empire of Nicaea / Troad / Battle of Lone Pine / Greco-Turkish relations / Varlik Vergisi / Imbros / Tenedos / Tao-Klarjeti / Antioch, Pisidia / Koprucay River / Sun Language Theory / Names of the Levant / Arzen / List of Kings of Ani / Turkish lira / Operation Gladio / Hamidian massacres / Digda / Pisidia / Alexios I of Trebizond / Kingdom of Kurdistan / Austro-Turkish War of 171618 / Pessinus / Chanak Crisis / Silivri / Sismik incident / The Emergence of Modern Turkey / Treaty of Kars / Ataturk's Reforms / Balkan Pact / Kadro / Agora (Thrace) / Single-party period of the Republic of Turkey / Timeline of the Republic of Turkey / Aydin / Issus (town) / Republic of Ararat / More History of Turkey...
Explore topics related to Turkey:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0
Explore Middle East countries:
Iran - Israel - Kuwait - Saudi-Arabia - Turkey - United-Arab-Emirates
