Calamos Supports Greece
GreekReporter.comEuropeThe Karamanlides: Orthodox, Turkish-Speaking People Native to Anatolia

The Karamanlides: Orthodox, Turkish-Speaking People Native to Anatolia

karamanlides greeks turkey
A Byzantine basilica in Karaman, the region where the Karamanlides, or Greeks who spoke Turkish, are from. Credit: Volker Hohfeld/Wikimedia Commons/CC BY-SA 4.0

A group of people native to Anatolia, the Karamanlides, are believed by many to be Turkish speaking Greeks. They used a dialect of Turkish in combination with the Greek alphabet.

Starting as far back as 1071, Turks began settling in Anatolia, and, shortly thereafter, they dominated the vast majority of the region, excluding the Marmara Sea region and some areas surrounding the Mediterranean.

At that time, the indigenous population of Anatolia spoke and wrote in Greek and were Greek Orthodox. The Turks referred to all Orthodox Christian communities in the Ottoman as the “Roman community,” and labeled the people “Rum,” meaning Roman, a term which is used to this day.

Karamanlides spoke Turkish but used Greek letters

Among Orthodox Christian communities, there were some groups of individuals who spoke Turkish but utilized a script based on the Greek alphabet. They mainly lived in Anatolian cities, such as Karaman, Konya, Mersin, Silifke, Niğde, Nevşehir, Kayseri, Yozgat, and Ankara.

Mentioned as far back as the 17th century by Ottoman traveler Evliya Çelebi, they were people who boasted an authentic Turkish accent but used Greek and Latin words, as well.

There are two theories of the origins of these communities. The first theory says that these people known as the Karamanlides are religiously converted Turkish soldiers (Turcopoles) that Byzantine emperors settled in Anatolia. The second theory states that Karamanlides are the direct descendants of Byzantine Greeks.

The Karamanlides were known to have religious affiliations to the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople.

It is documented that during the Ottoman era, hymns and prayers of the Karamanlides were chanted in Karamanlides Turkish at local churches in the neighborhoods.

The vast majority of the population of these neighborhoods were Greek-speaking and referred to non-Muslims as “foreigners (infidels, or giaour) with a hat.” On the other hand, the Muslim population called the Karamanlı Greeks “Ellik,” meaning “foreigners of the land.”

These ethnic Greeks, who once lived in large numbers along the shores of the Marmara Sea that connects the Black Sea to the Aegean Sea, which separates Turkey’s Asian and European parts, saw much tragedy in and around their communities.

Population exchange between Greece and Turkey

From 1919 until 1922, their prosperity and peaceful way of life came to a bitter end following the Greek Genocide at the hands of the Ottomans, neo-Turks, and Kemalists, when their fate was sealed following negotiations at Lausanne which resulted in the exchange of populations between Greece and Turkey. However, the story does not end there.

The Karamanlides were an exception throughout the Greek communities of Turkey. They all supported Greece during these dark years when nearly 400,000 ethnic Greeks were murdered. However, the Karamanlides community was largely indifferent to both Greek and Turkish governments.

Moreover, not only did the Karamanlides remain neutral in the 1920s but some of them even demanded the establishment of a separate Orthodox Church from the Greek Orthodox Church. Then, in 1922, seventy-two orthodox spiritual leaders gathered in Kayseri with the support of the government in Ankara and announced the foundation of the Turkish Orthodox Church.

However, following the Lausanne Treaty and the population exchange, almost 200,000 Karamanlides Greeks were forced to repatriate to Greece in spite of the fact that many only spoke Turkish.

Some of them have managed to remain in Turkey to this day while the vast majority live in Greece, followed by a notable diaspora in Western Europe and North America.

It wasn’t an easy transition for the Karamanlidi Greeks, as they could not communicate in Greek and had many conflicts with the local Greeks, who called them “Turkish seeds.”

Following this alienation, they went on to establish villages and neighborhoods named after places they came from in Anatolia, adding “nea” (new) in front of them. Always considering Anatolia their homeland, the communities continued to preserve their language and culture without mixing with local Greeks.

See all the latest news from Greece and the world at Greekreporter.com. Contact our newsroom to report an update or send your story, photos and videos. Follow GR on Google News and subscribe here to our daily email!



Related Posts