The Tatars of Crimea
Edward A. AllworthSözler ve Alıntılar
Er bir khalqnın oz tili bar
Yaresinen sırdashqan,
Baldan tatlı o til onga, bir vaqit mitilmay.
Menim tuwgan khalqimnin da
Öz tili bar cirlashqan,
Min bir ci'ldi'z arasi'nda
Bu til' meni beshigimde
Ayneninen osturgen,
Yashli'ghi'mdan yetekley o
Tuti'p menim qolumdan...
Tashkent district to the Crimean district. Such a fate has befallen hun-dreds of Crimean Tatars who were condemned only for traveling from
Uzbekistan or Kazakstan to the Crimean district.
Crimean Tatars benefit in this respect from a small but active circle of writers, poets, composers, and other creative artists, men and women who have found that eloquence. Rather than conventionally idealize, they visualize their community and place in phrases and images that reaffirm them aesthetically in the minds and hearts of their audience.
Mongol hegemony over Crimea in the thirteenth century made that sort of etymology seem plausible. It did not explain whether the use of the term Tatar in this context referred to the of Crimea's Tatars or to the Mongolian of Chinggis Khan and his commanders and descendants, whom Russians commonly called Tatars.
The 17th century Turkish traveler Evliya Celebi described the population of the Steppe Crimea as follows: They always eat meat. They eat the meat of every animal, and dress in its skin, that is, they make a fur coat out of it.... mixing blood with millet, they drink the blood of every animal like stew. There are also several thousand Tatars who have never drunk water in their lives.
Chin degenin ne eken o kelishtirsen,
Chindan chekman tikermen, erishtirsen.
What is a chin, if you know how to put it together, If you make me mad, I'll sew a shepherd's jacket out of chin.
Decades of enduring an often harsh Central Asian exile have marked Crimean Tatars as surely as other previous, recent experiences. Nevertheless, the poetry and art publicly circulated usually accents a positive vision.