Three Sabah Articles:

A Turkish reporter Burcu Yakar started a series of articles on TURK the first Published February 2002 in the Sabah Turkish Sunday edition newspaper (Sabah means Morning)  All subsequent articles are included below with the most recent last.

By Burcu YAKAR on the Turkish Daily SABAH February 10th, 2002
Translated from Turkish to English by Prof. Dr. M. Lütfi ÖVEÇOĞLU 

ENOUGH OF THESE "TURK"s or FED UP WITH THESE "TURK"s

From Norway to South Africa, Turks worldwide established their colony on the Internet
They are not actually Turkish, nor citizens of Turkey. They can’t speak Turkish and have never been to Turkey. But their family roots date back to the Turks, Ottomans and even to the Seljuk Turks ... For this reason, they have surnames "Turk". From America to Holland, from South Africa to Norway, from England to Virgin Islands, from all over the world, all the "Turk"s found each other on the internet. The person who brought them together is an American, Toni Turk who had been searching the origins of his surname and his family roots for many years. Toni Turk published the findings of his investigation on the surname "Turk" and pertinent history on an internet website. Following this, he reached out to other "Turk"s using online genealogy search sites. In the end, "TURK"s separated by thousands of kilometers met at the www.turkgenealogy.com website. The database on this website lists over 22,000 Turk family members, Toni Turk says, "That is the current number of  "Turk"s in my database, but the actual number may be much more than this".  The question here is how was the surname "Turk" spread all over the world?

One day, Toni Turk asked "Who am I?" and then ...
Toni Richard Turk (Polish descent)  Toni Richard Turk, 59 years old, lives in the state of Utah in the U. S. A. Photo He is the one who gathered the "Turk"s in the internet. Toni Turk, federal director of the San Juan district (county?), is a well-educated and wealthy American. But, one day he asked himself, "Who am I?" and decided to investigate his surname (1963). By digging out the information from birth registries and documents, he found out that his great great grandfather had lived in the Gorzow Wielkopolski region of Poland. He visited this region several times. Thanks to his command of the Russian language, he never had any difficulties in his investigations. And in the end, he has become one of the leading genealogists of the world. Turk says, "My greatest wish is to come to Turkey".

She wants to learn Turkish
Zara Turk Fordham (Slovenian descent)  Zara who is 28 years old also lives in the state of Utah, U. S. A. She is married and has a son. "Turk" is her maiden surname. She has always thought that her surname is related to Turkey. And one day, she decided to search for it. When she went to the point where she could, she found out that her ancestors came from Slovenia. The ancestors of Zara are either the Turks who dwelled in Slovenia during the war times or during Ottoman reign or individuals with adopted Turk titles. Zara, who mentions, "I have always had a great interest in Turks" wants to come to Turkey and learn Turkish. Photo

The grandson of the first Turk who expanded their line to America (photo)
Chuck Turk (French)  He lives in the States, too. Chuck, with the help of his wife Nancy, learned that his roots extended to France. One day, Chuck’s aunt gave Nancy a very old black and white picture of his family.  Nancy, of Danish descent, paid visits to different cities and states and even to cemeteries in the quest for her information on her new surname. Nancy Turk discovered that the variations of their Turk surname in France were Turcq and prior to that, Laturcq.  She says, "My children have the dark Turkish genes" Photo.  END

Comments by Toni and Nancy:  The world just got a little smaller. Since the publishing of this article, we have had overwhelming activity on the website with over 4000 new visitors in just 2 days.  Our guest book, the message board and our email has been very active.  Over 100 new people have asked to be added to our Turk E-mail distribution list!  We are very pleased and humbled by the response from all over the world.   Thank you Burcu YAKAR and the Turkish Daily SABAH!  We are grateful to you for expanding our world.  We have added many new Turkish features to our website from the feedback your article generated.  Turks of the world unite!  Please enjoy reading the responses to the SABAH article.

Below is a scan of the part of the article - it shows Toni and his wife on the front page:

The article on the web site is in Turkish. 

BU 'TURK'LAR DA ÇOK OLUYOR ARTIK
Hepsinin soyadı 'Turk'... Ama ne Türkçe biliyorlar ne de Türkiye'nin yolunu... Norveçten Güney Afrika'ya dünyaya yayılan Türkler internette kavim kurdu!

Onların hiçbiri gerçekte Türk,yani Türkiye Cumhuriyeti vatandaşı değil. Türkçe bilmiyorlar. Türkiye'yi hiç görmemişler. Ama kökleri Türkler'e, Osmanlılar'a, hatta Selçuklu Türklerine dayanıyor...Bu yüzden hepsinin soyadı 'Turk'.Amerika'dan Hollanda'ya,Güney Africa'dan Norveç'e,İngiltere'den virgin Adalarına kadar dünyanın dört bir yanına yayılan 'Turk' soyadlılar,birbirlerini internette buldu.Onları biraraya getiren kişi ise yıllardır soyadını ve köklerini araştıran Toni Turk adlı Amerikalı oldu. Toni Turk araştırmasında Turk soyadı ve tarihçesiyle ilgili bulduklarını bir internet sitesinde yayınladı.Ardından soyağacı araştırma sitelerinden diğer 'Turk' lere ulaştı.Sonunda binlerce kilometre uzaktaki Turk'ler www.turkgenealogy.com sitesinde buluştu. Toni Turk 22 bin üyesi olan sitesi için 'Bu sayı sitemize kayıtlı Turkler'in sayısı. Ama gerçek sayı çok daha fazla olabilir' dedi. Peki bu Turk soyadı dünyaya nasıl yayıldı?

SELÇUKLU EMİRİ ESİR DÜŞTÜ TURK SOYADI FRANSA'YA GİTTİ
Tarih kitaplarına göre Türk ailelerinin 'atası' bu soyadının isim babası Arnulph le Turque adlı bir kişi... Aslına bakarsanız Arnulph le Turque,bize hiç de yabancı bir isim değil. O, Selçuklu Emiri Hayreddin Saladdin'in ta kendisi.Fransızlar'a esir düşen Saladdin, kont 4'üncü Raimund tarafından Fransa'ya götürüldü. Orada kendisine şövalye ünvanı verildi ve soylular arasına katıldı. Onun soyundan gelenler, önce 'le Turk', ardından da 'de Turk' soyadını aldı.

'Turk' soyadını Fransa'dan Almanya'ya yayan ise Victor ve Hugo le Turk adlı iki kardeş oldu.Hugo le Turk'un 4 oğlu vardı:Michael, Harman, Robert ve Sancred... Torunu Jacob de Turk ise 1609'da Almanya'ya yerleşerek soyadını bu ülkeye taşıdı.1683 yılı başlarında Turk soyadı, dönemin Prusya'sına doğru yayıldı. Zamanla diğer ülkelere, sonra da kıtalara... Turk soyadı tabi ki hep aynı şekilde kalmadı.Gittiği her ülkenin diliyle değişime uğradı.

POLONYA'DA TURKOWSKI , İRLANDA'DA TURKINGTON
Toni Turk'ün araştırmalarına göre toplam 296 değişik 'Turk' kökeninden gelen soyadı var. Zamanla
 Turek, Taurk, Teirk, Terck, Torok, Terkes, Turkowski, Turkington, McTurk, Terre, Teyrke haline gelen Turk soyadının ülkelere göre değişimi şöyle:

FRANSA: Turc, Turcq, Leturc, Turquet, Turquin.
İTALYA: Turco, Turci, Turchio, Turcu, Del Turco, Turcheschi.
ALMANYA: Turck, Thurch, Terkel.
POLONYA: Turek, Turecek, Turkowski, Turkiewicz.
MACARİSTAN: Torok, Turkovic.
İSKOÇYA: Mac Torc, McTurk.
İRLANDA: Turkington

HANGİ ÜLKEDE KAÇ 'TURK' VAR?

Almanya: 8 bin 641 İrlanda: 12
Amerika: 7 bin 858 İsviçre:12
İngiltere: 3 bin 543 Hırvatistan: 10
Belçika: 322 Rusya: 8
Hollanda: 242 İsrail: 7
Fransa: 236 Ukrayna: 6
Polonya: 151 İspanya: 5
Macaristan: 108 Hindistan: 4
Slovenya: 67 Güney Afrika: 4
Kanada: 50 Lüksemburg: 3
Avusturya: 16 Norveç: 3
Çek Cumhuriyeti: 13 Avustralya: 3

Toni Turk bir gün 'Ben kimim?' diye sordu... Ve...
[there is a photo of Toni Turk and below the article]
59 yaşındaki Toni Richard Turk Amerika'nın Utah eyaletinde yaşıyor. Internetteki Türkler'i biraraya getiren o... San Juan Bölgesi Federal Direktörü olan toni Turk, iyi eğitimli ve zengin bir Amerikalı. Ama bir gün kendisine 'Ben kimim?' diye sormuş ve soyadını araştırmaya karar vermiş (1963).Nüfus kayıtları ve belgelerle büyük büyük babasının bugünkü Polonya'nın Gorzow Wielkopolski bölgesinden olduğunu bulmuş.Bölgeyi defalarca ziyaret etmiş.Rusça bildiği için hiç zorlanmamış.Ve sonunda dünyanın en önemli soy bilimcilerinin arasına girmiş. Turk 'En büyük arzum bir gün Türkiye'ye gelebilmek' diyor.  

Türkçe öğrenmek istiyor
[there is a photo of Zara Turk Fordham below the article]
28 yaşında olan Zara da Amerika'nın Utah eyaletinde yaşıyor.Evli ve bir oğlu var.'Turk' Zara'nın evlenmeden önceki soyadı. O da soyadının hep Türkiye'yle ilgili olduğunu düşünmüş.Ve bir gün araştırmaya karar vermiş. Ulaşabildiği yere kadar gittiğinde, atalarının Slovenya'dan geldiklerini bulmuş.Zara'nın ataları savaş döneminde ya da Osmanlı İmparatorluğu döneminde bu bölgede yaşayan Türkler ya da Türk lakabıyla alınan kişiler. 'Türkler'e her zaman büyük ilgi duydum' diyen Zara Türkiye'ye gelmek ve Türkçe öğrenmek istiyor.  

Dünyaya açılan ilk Turk'un torunu
[and the last one Nancy's family's photo]
O da Amerika'da yaşıyor.Chuck, eşi Nancy sayesinde köklerinin Fransa'da ki ilk Türkler'e uzandığını öğrenmiş.Chuck'ın halası bir gün Nancy'e ailesinin çok eski siyah beyaz bir fotoğrafını vermiş. Danimarkalı Nancy sonradan aldığı soyadını araştırmak için kent, eyalet, hatta mezarlıklara bile gitmiş.Soyadlarının kökünün Turcq ya da Laturcq'ten geldiğini keşfeden Nancy, 'Çocuklarımda esmer Türk genleri var' diyor.
But you can see the page from here: http://garildi.sabah.com.tr/sayfa.cgi?w+30+/sabah2002/0202/10/t/index.html

this address is the first page link of our newspapers Sunday edition. You can click on the 3rd news link or go directly to the: http://garildi.sabah.com.tr/sayfa.cgi?w+30+/sabah2002/0202/10/t/g02.html

The actual newpaper copy has all the photos.  But in web site, they don't take every picture. If you want, I can send you a copy of the page via fax. best regards... hope to see you; all TURKs one day in Turkey...

byakar@sabah.com.tr

The Second SABAH Article - 2 pages below

This one will be published tomorrow (February 16, 2002)  Watch for an English translation!

Reporters note: The two men on the left of the article are Erol Evgin and his son Murat. Murat Evgin wrote you an e-mail.  His dad is well known, famous, and the love of every little girl... in the other boxes, the e-mails from Ahmet F?rat, the hotel manager from Izmir and Can Bilgin are displayed.  "Big brother (in Turkish agabey) Toni and sister-in-law Nancy (Turkish-yenge) are invited to Turkey" when one sasy "yenge" to a woman, it shows his respect and love like a sister to her, love like his brothers' wife. yenge and sister are the most respected addressing to woman in Turkey...the little picture on the beggining of the article, is ME

3rd Sabah Article:

Toni and Barbara Turk were in Istanbul this past summer from the end of June through the first part of July. They had come at the encouragement of Burcu Yakar a reporter for SABAH. Burcu had run a couple of feature articles earlier in the year regarding a website devoted to the TURK surname. Toni TURK is the database manager and Nancy TURK is the webmaster for the website at www.turkgenealogy.com . At the time of the summer visit the website was primarily devoted to traditional genealogical research, and several theories about the origin of the surname were being explored.

By the end of the summer a new dimension was added to the TURK website when it launched a TURK Surname Research Project, utilizing the Y-DNA research services found at www.familytreedna.com . Y-DNA is passed from father to son and consequently can be traced back through the male line along a hereditary surname. The Y-DNA results have been correlated with historical and genealogical studies.

So far results reveal the TURK surname spread across four major population groupings referenced as haplogroups. Even though Haplogroup 1 (Hg1) is generally identified with Western Europe, an averaging of scientific research efforts suggest that approximately 13% of the population of present-day Turkey falls within this group. Hg1 representatives in this surname project trace their ancestry to Nicholas LE TURC, who was born about 1735 in France. This link is currently the best candidate to descend from the 11/12^th century figure known as Arnulph LE TURQUE, and reputed to have been brought from the Middle East to France by Raimund IV of Toulouse. Nancy TURK’s husband is a part of this lineage.

Haplogroup 2 (Hg2) is most common in Southern and Central Europe and in the TURK Surname Project it is represented by a line that traces to a Mike TURK, born about 1860 in Croatia. Scientific research efforts suggest that about 25% of the population of present-day Turkey fall within this group. Most probably those with this surname from the Croatia region are reflecting a tie to the hegemony exercised in this area by the Ottoman Turkish Empire.

Haplogroup 3 (Hg3), referenced as Eu19, is most frequently seen in Eastern Europe where approximately 57% of the population falls within this group. Scientific research indicates that about 6% of present-day Turkey’s population falls within Hg3. The Turkic ties for Eu19 are very remote and subject to vociferous debate. It is speculated that those within this particular population are descendants of the Khazars, who were a Turkic people that originated in Central Asia and flourished as an independent state from 650 to 1016 in Eastern Europe near the Caspian Sea. The Khazar royalty claimed descent from the Ashina, one of the clans of the G` kth rks. The Khazarian nobility embraced the Jewish religion in the 9^th century. It is theorized that Khazarian Jews formed the nucleus of Poland’s Jewish community until the mass immigration of Ashkenazi Jews from Germany in the 16^th century. It is suspected that the newly arriving Ashkenazim referred to the "indigenous" Jews as Turks. During this same period a number of Jews converted to Christianity. TURK as a surname dates to the 16^th century. It is estimated that the Khazars made a contribution of something less than 10% to the Ashkenazi gene pool. TURK is a common surname among Ashkenazim.

Toni TURK, whose lineage falls within Eu19, has found an exact Y-DNA match in a contemporary genetic study in Turkey. His own lineage traces to Poland. The earliest known ancestor is Martin Tg RK, born about 1765, from the area of modern-day Gorzow Wielkopolski.

Haplogroup 9 (Hg9) is associated with the northern part of the Middle East’s Fertile Crescent. Scientific research indicates that about 36% of the population of present-day Turkey falls within Hg9. This particular branch of the TURK Surname Research Project traces to Robert TURK, who was born about 1690 in County Antrim, Northern Ireland, migrated through Boston about 1718 and settled in Virginia by 1739. Most TURKs in the Southern United States descend from this immigrant. This DNA is extremely rare in the British Isles. This particular subdivision of Hg9 has deep Semitic roots that predate the formation of the Jewish religion.

Approximately 80% of the population of modern-day Turkey is represented in these four haplogroups. In all four cases a correlation between the surnamed individual and a Turkic connection is possible.

That's all J J