Returning again to the subject of language, the Indo-European linguists have an opinion that even a regular and peaceful life, not subjected to calamities or natural cataclysms causing major changes, in the conditions when peoples live almost without contacts with other peoples, the lexicon loses about 15% of its words per century and replaces them with new words. Supposedly, in two thousand years no initial words practically remain, or they change beyond recognition. And then, if the settling of America by its native inhabitants took place even around 10 thousand years ago, two millenia later the Indian languages should not retain any words brought by them from the Old World. The ancestors of Indians, who have left the Old World tens of thousands years ago lived isolated from Asia, Europe, and Africa, save for accidental  infiltration of strangers from those continents in the next decades, which could not result in the change of the typology of Indian languages or a replacement of their language. It can be asserted that the language of American Indians was developing in its native, absolutely different in comparison with the Old World environment, under influence of different natural, climatic, and geographical conditions, and they did not know many social forms of development experienced by the peoples of the Old World.

All these many millennia, the carriers of the Altai, Türkic, and Indo-European languages lived in different environment, had a different from Indians way of life, were in a tight contact with the peoples of the large regions in Europe, Africa, and Asia. That could not fail to lead to huge changes not only in their lexicon, but also to the change in phonetics and grammar. Before discovery of America, and as much after its discovery, contacts between American Indian languages and Türkic could not occur. Realizing that, even a presence of 5-6 words in the Indian languages that are close or identical with the Türkic words should seem to be as surprising as a thunder on a clear day. As we already saw, hundreds of such words exist, besides that a lot of identical traits are in phonetics and grammar. The accent system is also identical, in the American Indian languages and in Türkic the accent falls on the last syllable, like in French.

Certainly, in unrelated languages can be found words pronounced identically, but as a rule semantically they have different contents. Is hardly possible to find five - six words identical in phonetical pronunciation and semantics among unrelated words. The onomatopoeic words are exclude beforehand, they can exist between unrelated languages, trhough in different languages even the onomatopoeic words differ, which is connected with the properties of diverse languages. For example sneezing, which appear to be a phenomenon physiologically identical among humans, has different phonetic coloring or phonetic distinction:

Russian - apchkhi
Tatar - aptcheh
English - atchoo
German - hatshi
French - atshuen

A docent of the Kazan University D.J. Bakeeva, specialized in the comparative study of English and Tatar languages, observed similarity in phonetics between these languages only in six words [54]:

English - Tatar

done (done) - dan (glory)
girl (girl) - gel (flowers)
tall (high) - tal (willow)
tan (suntan) - tem (skin)
tar (to do) - tar (narrow)
baby (child) - bebi (child)

From these words only one word in both languages is similar in phonetics and meaning: it is "baby". And then the English word "baby" has an accent on the first syllable, and in Tatar "bebi" has it on the second syllable (This type of studies, aimed at creating barriers between "us" and "them", are not worth their weight in ashes. Just this article contains a number of words that are unlikely borrowings, like "dawn" and "earth", that an English-speaking reader would instantly spot. A reverse in the political objectives under the same political conditions would produce a ton of "similarities", likewise scientifically worthless. It is hard to allow that Dr. A.Karimullin did not know better. This and the following section must be a loyalty litmus test to pass censorship, though spiced with some philological satire  - Translator's Note).

In spite of the fact that Russian and Tatars from time immemorial lived in a tightest contact, hardly will be possible to find between these languages one-two words which would be similar or identical in pronunciation, including an accent, and in sense. That is, certainly, excepting Russian loans from the Tatar and vice-versa, and also common borrowings from other languages and onomatopoeic words, and the words that undergone folk etymology. To check this can all readers of these lines, should they take a Russian-Tatar or Tatar-Russian dictionary. (Try it!). Certainly, for this is needed some philological education, for there are loans where is not so easy to find their roots, which could be mistaken for independent parallels. For example, "to coach" (Russian "kochevat") (from Tatar "kuchenu", "kuchu" - in sense "to travel"), ("horse" (Russian "loshad")) (from Tatar "alasha" - "gelding"), "bay" (Russian "chalyi"), "chesnut" (Russian "kauryi"),  "darkness" (Russian "tma"), etc.

Presently it is viewed as recognized that Indo-European linguistic genealogical tree includes apparently utterly different languages: Italian and Baltic, Celtic and Romance, Slavic and Indo-European, Tocharian and Hetto-Luvian branches, each of which has up to ten languages. For the proof of genetic relationship between these languages frequently is cited the ancient Indo-European word "five" - "penkwe" (actually, not "penkwe" but "*penkwe", supposedly used 8,000 years ago by a homogenous monolingual group which split and multiplied to produce the today's veriety  - Translator's Note), which in Latin sounds "kvinke", in ancient Greek "pente", in Sanskrit "pancha", in Hindi "panch", in Russian - "pyat", etc. (I can't contain myself not to tell that "five" in the Tatar language is "bish" which is somehow close with with "panch". But the number "fifty" in Tatar is formed not from "five" (50 = "ille"), unlike the Russian 50 = "five" + ten" (Russian "pyat + desyat").

A non-specialist perceive as unpersuasive that Russian, Hettian, Armenian, Prussian, Lithuanian, Latin, English, Albanian, Kurdish, Tadjik, Irish, etc. languages have one common origin, all belong to Indo-European languages. Between many of these languages the distinctions are so great that they even raise doubts about their relationship in the past among a number of linguists. So, the phonetics, morphology, syntax of Russian and English, English and German differ from each other as a sky from the earth, and so do the differences at many languages of the tree. Due to the research of thousands and thousands linguist scientists of dozens of countries during several hundreds years it became possible to establish that these languages descend from one common parent language, and are genetically related. Between some of these languages the distinctions are large at all levels, while between some American Indian and Türkic languages no such distinctions seemingly exist; the overwhelming are the similarities and identity in grammar and morphological forms, and in language typology, intonation, accents, lexicon, etc.

The comparative study of the American Indian languages with the Türkic languages practically are making its first shy steps, the studies still are the first drops in the ocean of the future research. But even in this drop is clearly visible a presence of such similarity and identity between them that it seems to us they are not random.

Those who are engaged in ethnogenesis of American Indians, and many such works exist, limit their study by only anthropological aspect. I have not seen a single work on ethnogenesis of the Indians that involved linguistic archeology, without which is usually difficult to correctly solve the ethnogenesis problem (the situation changed drastically since 1980es  - Translator's Note).

Everyone who writes about Indian songs, notes that their music is a pentatonic melody [55], which is a prominent musical feature of some Türkic peoples (including Tatar folk music), and a number of other peoples in Asia, Mongols, Chinese, Japanese, Koreans and others (their languages stand far from the Türkic languages). The pentatonic folk music of these non-Türkic peoples can be understood because in the past they lived in a close contact with the Türkic peoples, in the ethnogenesis of some of them Türks played not a last role. And the Japanese, Korean, Mongolian languages belong to the Altaic family of languages. Apparently, the pentatonic music of the American Indians can be explained coming from their genetic relationship with the Uralo-Altai languages (or Uralic and Altaic languages, as they are presently called, see L.Johanson article  - Translator's Note).

In that respect can be made comparative study of American Indian and Türkic folklore and customs. Maria Estman lived among Sioux Indians seven years, and published a compendium of their legends [56 ]. In her compendium my attention attracted one legend about creation of the Earth, which not only in a typological plane, but also in the images and a plot is very close with a legend of the Kachin Tatars, written down by N.F.Katanov at the end of the last century [57] (Variation of this creation myth among Khakases and other Turks see Bezertinov   - Translator's Note). It is a legend about a Bird God creating the Earth. For that purpose it dived into the ocean and from the bottom in its beak brought a piece of ground, which then grew into Earth. It is interesting that that legend is widely distributed among the American Indians, among the Oceania tribes, among the peoples in Asia, but is not known in the folklore of European and African peoples. In addition, existing publications discuss the close forms of life and customs of American Indians versus those among Kirgizes, Tuvinians, and Yakuts...

Comparative study of selected American Indian languages with the Türkic languages, and with other Old World languages promises much, both for the history of the Indians, and for the history of peoples in other parts of the world. First of all, research will help the resolution of the question about the Uralo-Altaic family of languages, the discussion already lasts for more than two centuries. Research will also give an opportunity for clarification and particulars for a number of questions about the history of settling the Americas, ethnogenesis, classification of American Indians, and possibly the histories of migration and settling of Oceania islands.

This work attempts to briefly acquaint readers with the status of the Indian languages comparative study, and to share some observation about possible relationship of some American Indian languages with the Türkic languages.

Studying the history of the book printing, I unexpectedly encountered an O.Rochrig's letter to Ibragim Halfin, and that brought me to the American Indians. I am happy with that occasion, because it opened one more splendid world.

Discovery of America, alongside with great inventions, was a  powerful stimulus in the development of Old World culture, which was enriched with great achievements and experience of American Indians and accelerated the progress of the mankind. Sufficient to mention that the Old World received from the New World Indians previously unknown agricultural products, i.e. the Indians made a great contribution to the agriculture. Almost half of the food stuffs used by the mankind, without which our life would be poorer, were discovered and domesticated by Indians. That on our tables are potatoes, tomatoes, pepper, corn, zucchini, kidney-beans, peanuts, cocoa, sunflower and other cultures we are obliged to Indians. We are obligated to them also for the rubber and other commercial crops. Unfortunately, from them we also adopted tobacco. 

It would be appropriate to finish this book with the words of a Russian scientist, archeologist, and historian G.Matyushin, who from the study of a skull of an ancient man, found near  Davlekanov village in Bashkiria and reconstructed by the known anthropologist artist professor M.Gerasimov, wrote that "at us was looking, as if stepped out from the pages of the Fennimore Cooper novel, a fearless hunter of bisons!"

An Indian in Southern Ural?

Yes. And more than that, this pra-Indian, if it can be so phrased, by all his anthropological appearance was connected not only with the Asian contemporaries, but as much with the people of the European type.

Discovering at the Davlekanov village allows to assume that in the formation of the so-called Paleo-Indian, Amerikanoid population of the New World took part not only the natives of Asia, but also the inhabitants of Europe [58].

Instead of conclusion

In October of 1974 at an enlarged meeting of the Kazan University Tatar language faculty with participation of the scientists from the Kazan Pedagogical Institute, for the first time I reported my findings and conclusions about the possible relationship of some American Indian languages with the Türkic languages. It turned out that the presence of lexical parallels in the language of ancient Maya, one of the American Indian languages, with the Türkic languages, noted a medical doctor from Sochi, M.Aribjanov, who at that session also shared his observations. Though these reports were listened to with elevated attention, no wide discussion followed up. Our scientists were not ready to accept our conclusions, though no speaker could offer an objection to our observations, our arguments, and examples. It was stated that the question about possible relationship of these languages demands further study and new proofs.

Then in 1976, I published a brief, small compressed article, laying out my findings and observations, in the scientific compendium of the Kazan Pedagogical Institute "Problems of Türkic linguistics", where were also used the materials collected by M.Aribjanov.

The first to respond to that article was a Doctor of Philology, an eldest scientist of the Lithuanian SSR Academy of Sciences V.Misyavichus, who knows Karaim language of the Türkic group of languages. Her 1976 article, mostly an account of our work, was published (in Lithuanian) in the journal "Science and Life " ("Moklasir Gyvenimas" in Lithuanian), she concluded supporting a credibility of our hypothesis.

In 1977, in a second issue of "Soviet Turkology" journal surfaced a review by the known Türkologist linguists F.S.Safiullina and S.M.Ibragimov on the above compendium, where reviewers repeated our hypothesis without stating any objections or negative remarks about our observations. In 1978, in the third issue of the same journal a Doctor of Philology and senior scientist of the of the USSR Academy of Sciences Linguistics Institute, an outstanding expert on lexicographic history of the Türkic languages K.M.Murzaev, referring to our and M.Aribjanov articles, expressed an opinion that these works deserve close attention. He repeated that view in his monograph "Lexicology of Türkic languages" [59], where the scientist examined our observations and suggestions in wider perspective of the genesis history of the Türkic languages and their provenance areas in extreme antiquity.

A known linguistic scientist, professor M.Z.Zakiev, who is specializing in the history of Türkic languages, also reviewed our works, in his works he connects the sources of the ancient Turkic language with the languages of ancient Asia and American Indian languages. An editorial review of M.Z.Zakiev's monograph "Tatars halky telenen barlykka kilue" [60] (that came out in the same 1978 third issue of the "Soviet Turkology"), where the author relied on our research [61] and the studies of  K.Z.Zinnatullina and R.A.Yusupov [62], also noted that this approach promises to be fruitful.

In 1976 the Geography of America Commission of the USSR Geographical Society published our article "Question of genetic relationship of some American Indian languages with Türkic languages" [63], accompanied by a review article of a known scientist L.N.Gumilev entitled "Dakotas and Huns, (To the A.G.Karimullin's article "Question of genetic relationship of some American Indian languages with Türkic languages")". L.N.Gumilev, a historian of ancient Türkic peoples and peoples of the Far and Middle Eastof the Asian continent, who new Türkic languages, accepted our hypothesis; moreover, on the basis of our observations he raised a question and possible connection of Dakota Indians with the Hunnu (Huns).

Almost ten years later a few participants of a session, where I and M.Aribjanov reported our observations, stated that initially they were stunned and not ready to acknowledge our hypotheses, but by then our hypotheses do not surprise them any more, because they were able to observe themselves, and find lexical parallels between the Indian and Türkic languages.

Our work arose a considerable interest among linguists and other Türkic peoples. It started to be articulated in print and by other Turkic-speaking publications. Among such works we can point to the articles of S.Nurjakiyanov "Relationship of Türkic languages with American Indian languages" [64] and E.Kajybekov "Are Indian languages related with the Altai languages" [65] which, re-stating our article, advance forward: compare the examples from American Indian languages cited in our work with the lexicon of the Kazakh language, and raise a question about the relation of the Altai languages with the Indian languages. Not a single work that referred to our articles raised any objections or doubts about what was posited by us and our conclusions.

Unexpected scientific discoveries, as a rule, at the beginning are not recognized. At first such discoveries are not recognized because of a surprise factor, without any proof, "just because", that "This cannot be, because it cannot ever be". From the time of Otto Rochrig publication (1871) have passed more than a hundred years. Though, as we already know, some other West-European scientists have seen the affinity of some Indian languages with the Türkic languages, their observations also remained outside of the attention span of other linguist scientists. As we know, ignoring is a form of non-recognition of discoveries.

In our country (former USSR), apparently we with M.Aribjanov are the first scientists who observed the affinity of American Indian languages with the Türkic languages. From the cited reviews of the bibliography on our observation is apparent that they started getting support from the expert Türkologist linguists. Probably, it is possible to state now that already started a second stage in the recognition of this discovery, when the scientists began expressing: "There is something in this".

A third stage of a discovery is a stage of a final recognition, characterized by a formula "This is how it should be". To help the approach of this stage, further research should be conducted on a wide front, supported by inflow of new researchers interested in studying this interesting scientific problem. Is necessary a new research methodology, development of statistical indexes and linguistic comparison parameters, criteria and quantitative valuations of a degree of their "similarity" etc., which would yield new qualitative results. It becomes possible now to apply means of modern computer information technology.

The work offered to a reader pursued a modest objective, consideration of new aspects in the genetic relationship of these languages, and  discussion of some aspects of similarity in the ethnographic and folklore elements, which do not however carry typological or genetical character, and by that to wake up a keenness of a reader to this most interesting problem of the search for the sources of genetic relationship of the Türkic and American Indian languages.

Abrar Karimullin
Kazan, March, 1994

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