Abstract:

Abstract All societies in the world have their own culinary culture and diet. These diets are shaped according to the cultural, geographical, ecological structure and historical process. During this shaping period, different cultures influence each other. For instance, the cultural proximity of Turks and Iranians reflected in today's Turkish cuisine. Although over the centuries the official language of these countries has been totally different, countless cultural commonalities have inevitably led them to linguistic exchanges. The relations of these two neighboring countries started with their conversion to Islam. During this period, the Turks flocked to the west from Central Asia and encountered the Iranians. This confrontation deeply affected both cultures. On the other hand, Turkish language adopted and localized many Persian words, causing the words used today to form. Accordingly, the study reported in this paper tends to investigate the present status of Turkish–Persian Linguistic Interaction in modern Turkish cuisine by considering the historical contact of two nations. Following this, Persian words in the cookery books and recipes have been collected by content analysis method and categorized with mentioning their origins. Based on data obtained in this study, total 148 words which are common between Turkish and Persian languages have been found. 36 food titles, 14 desserts, 24 fruits and vegetables, 34 food materials, 8 beverages, 17 kitchenware and 15 other words used for explaining recipes have been found in this study. According to these findings, etymological and historical factors that influenced the transfer of these words into the Turkish language have been thoroughly assessed. According to the findings due to the high number of words with Persian lexical roots, it can be said that the influence of the Persian language on Turkish in culinary field throughout history is noticeable.

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