# Greek surnames of Turkish origin



## AndrasBP

Hello everyone,

This may be more related to history than linguistics, but I'll try.

There are ethnically Greek people whose surnames are clearly of Turkish origin, e.g. Devetzi, Intzoglou.
I'm thinking of two possible explanations here: 

1. Their families come from the Karamanlid communities in central Anatolia, who switched to speaking Turkish but kept their Greek identity and Christian religion, and then were 'repatriated' to Greece in the early 20th century.
2. They are descendants of ethnic Turks who became assimilated into Greek society, but this would mean they used to be Muslim and later adopted Christianity. As far as I know, a 'religion shift' of this kind is very rare.

Is the situation perhaps more complicated than I think? 

Thank you.


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## apmoy70

AndrasBP said:


> Hello everyone,
> 
> This may be more related to history that linguistics, but I'll try.
> 
> There are ethnically Greek people whose surnames are clearly of Turkish origin, e.g. Devetzi, Intzoglou.
> I'm thinking of two possible explanations here:
> 
> 1. Their families come from the Karamanlid communities in central Anatolia, who switched to speaking Turkish but kept their Greek identity and Christian religion, and then were 'repatriated' to Greece in the early 20th century.
> 2. They are descendants of ethnic Turks who became assimilated into Greek society, but this would mean they used to be Muslim and later adopted Christianity. As far as I know, a 'religion shift' of this kind is very rare.
> 
> Is the situation perhaps more complicated than I think?
> 
> Thank you.


Hi Andras, it's indeed more complicated than you think.
1. Those who come from a Turkish-speaking Christian family (Karamanlids) are not that many and they tend to keep «Καραμανλής» as family name.
2. It was very-very difficult (if not impossible) to become a Muslim apostate in the Ottoman Empire; if an Ottoman subject adopted Christianity leaving Islam, his action was considered a punishable crime, punishable even by death in certain periods (as Christian Orthodox Synaxaria attest, e.g. Ahmed the Calligrapher and Schemamonk Nicholas (Yusuf Oglu) were both Muslims who became Christians and were executed for that).
But the main reason it was extremely difficult and extremely rare to shift religions in the Ottoman Empire, was a practical one: 
The Empire's subjects were grouped by religious beliefs that constituted confessional communities, the so-called *Millet*; if you belonged to the Orthodox Christian Millet, or the Jewish one, as designated People of the Book, yet non-Muslim, you were of course a "protected person" (zimmi) but also a "rayah", you did not enjoy certain political rights reserved solely for Muslims, and were subject to payment of a special tax. Why become Christian and pay more?
The vast majority of Greek Turkified surnames appears in mid-17th c. (1645-1650) probably due to either a decree issued by the High Porte (that unfortunately I'm unaware of), or simply because the Christians living in the heart of the Empire (Anatolia) chose to change their family name to blend in with society (so the son of a baker under the surname of «Ψωμιάδης» i.e. _the son of the bread-maker_, becomes «Εκμεκτσίογλου» Ekmekcioglu).
The vast majority of Greeks with Turkish family names, descent from Christian Anatolian refugees who came in Greece during the population exchange between the two countries following the War of 1919-22.


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## shawnee

As usual a very informative answer apmoy70. I had also understood (and am happy to be corrected) that some Greek surnames of Turkish origin are derived from the fact that Turkish loan words were so entrenched in the language. Some that come to mind are: Kalantzis, Saris and Karpouzis.


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## AndrasBP

Thank you very much for your comprehensive reply. Very interesting.
Does this mean that Anatolian Greeks already had surnames in the 17th century? As far as I know, Turks didn't have surnames in the modern (European) sense of the word until Kemal Atatürk introduced the system in the 1920s. I don't know about other non-Muslim people in the Ottoman Empire, like Armenians or Sephardic Jews.


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## apmoy70

shawnee said:


> As usual a very informative answer apmoy70. I had also understood (and am happy to be corrected) that some Greek surnames of Turkish origin are derived from the fact that Turkish loan words were so entrenched in the language. Some that come to mind are: Kalantzis, Saris and Karpouzis.


Professions and food names were mostly borrowed by the Greeks, so perhaps it was only natural the «Ράπτης» to become «Τερζής» < terzi, the «Γανωματής» to become «Τενεκετζής» < tenekeci etc.
The official language of the Empire was Ottoman Turkish after all. 


AndrasBP said:


> Thank you very much for your comprehensive reply. Very interesting.
> Does this mean that Anatolian Greeks already had surnames in the 17th century? As far as I know, Turks didn't have surnames in the modern (European) sense of the word until Kemal Atatürk introduced the system in the 1920s. I don't know about other non-Muslim people in the Ottoman Empire, like Armenians or Sephardic Jews.


Yes they had surnames since Byzantine times, derived from toponymics (e.g «Λακαπηνός» Lakapenus < Lakapa, Cappadocia; «Κασταμονίτης» Kastamonites < Kastamoni, Paphlagonia etc.), from patronymics (e.g «Φραγκόπουλος» = _the son of the Frank_ i.e. westerner, «Δημητριάδης» = _the son of Demetrios_, «Στεφανόπωλος» = _the son of Stephen_ etc), or from physical appearance and pesronal characteristics («Μούρτζουφλος» = grouchy/pouter, «Ροῦσος» = _redhead_, «Μαυρόποδος» = _blackfoot_, «Πεπαγωμένος» = _cool-headed_ etc).
Can't speak about the Turks, but we have also historical evidence of the Christians in Anatolia having Turkish surnames/family names at least since 1680: «Ζαχαρίας Χανεδές» = Zaharya Hanende, «Πέτρος Μπερεκέτης» = Petro Bereket etc.


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## sound shift

AndrasBP said:


> As far as I know, Turks didn't have surnames in the modern (European) sense of the word until Kemal Atatürk introduced the system in the 1920s.


That happened in 1935. At the same time, the Greek Orthodox of Turkey (most of whom were to be found in Istanbul) were put under pressure to change their Greek surnames to Turkish ones. In the following decades the Orthodox population of Istanbul dwindled through emigration to Greece, with large-scale departures occurring in the 1950s and early 1960s, and some of the newly arrived in Greece must have had Turkish surnames (which they were no doubt permitted to swap for a Greek surname).


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## sotos

apmoy70 said:


> the «Γανωματής» to become «Τενεκετζής» < tenekeci etc.


I think "γανωματής" is the "kala(i)tzis", since "kalAi" is the alloy applied in the inner surface of old bronze cooking utensils.

Indeed many "turkish" surnames come from professions, but most are of persian or arabic origin.


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## AndrasBP

Thank you for your replies, it's much clearer now.


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