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WonderWord origin

In Turkish, yurt means homeland or a place to live, such as a student dormitory. English took the same word, through Russian, for the round felt tent of Central Asian nomads.

Etymology

LanguageHistory

The story behind the card

Old Turkic yurt meant a dwelling, a camping ground or a people's home range: the land where a family pitched its tents and grazed its herds. Modern Turkish kept the sense of home and homeland, as in yurt dışı, 'abroad', literally 'outside the homeland', and yurttaş, 'citizen'. Russians who met the nomads of the steppe used yurta for the tent itself, and English took yurt from Russian in the late 18th century. The Turkic peoples who still live in these tents have other names for them: Kazakhs say kiyiz üy, 'felt house', and Kyrgyz say boz üy, 'grey house'.

Türkçe oku
Türkçede yurt, vatan ya da öğrenci yurdu gibi barınılan yer demektir. İngilizce aynı sözcüğü Rusça üzerinden alıp Orta Asya göçebelerinin yuvarlak keçe çadırına ad olarak verdi.

Eski Türkçede yurt; konut, konaklama yeri ya da bir boyun sürüleriyle dolaştığı toprak, yani çadırların kurulduğu, hayvanların otladığı yer demekti. Bugünkü Türkçe sözcüğün “ev, vatan” yanını korudu: “yurt dışı” ve “yurttaş” gibi sözcükler bu anlamdan gelir. Bozkır göçebeleriyle karşılaşan Ruslar ise yurta sözcüğünü doğrudan çadırın kendisi için kullandı; İngilizce de sözcüğü 18. yüzyılın sonlarında Rusçadan aldı. Bu çadırlarda hâlâ yaşayan Türk halkları ise onlara başka adlar verir: Kazaklar kiyiz üy (keçe ev), Kırgızlar boz üy (boz ev) der.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: Yurt
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