[OLD TURKIC SCRIPT INTRODUCED TO THE TURKISH & ISLAMIC WORLD] Pek eski Türk yazisi (Türk Dernegi Nesriyati Sayi 2). [i.e. Very old Turkic script (The Publication of Turkish Society No. 2)]

NECIB ASIM [YAZIKSIZ], (1861-1935), Türk Dernegi Nesriyati ( Necm-i Istikbâl Matbaasi, Istanbul, [AH 1327] = 1911.

Contemporary cloth bdg. with red boards. Cr. 8vo. (20 x 14 cm). In Ottoman script (Old Turkish with Arabic letters). 35 p.

Rare early edition of this first work on the Old Turkic Script (Orkhon-Yenisey runic script) introducing the alphabet to the Turkish and Islamic world written by the founder of the Turkology Institute in Darülfünûn [i.e. Istanbul University], two years after the article, in which the inscriptions were deciphered by the Danish linguist Vilhelm Thomsen (1842-1927) with the contributions of the Russian Turkologist Vasili Radloff (1837-1918), was announced to the scientific world at the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences on December 15, 1893.

The book starts with brief information about the first discovery of the inscriptions, their deciphering, the history of the Göktürks who first used the script, the relations of the Göktürks in Central Asia with the Uighurs and the Chinese Empire. The next chapters include a detailed description of the alphabet with its runic characters.

Thanks to his contributions to the Turkish language, Necib Asim was awarded a medal and a diploma at the Chicago Exhibition in 1892 and was elected a member of the Société Asiatique in Paris in 1895.

The Old Turkic script (also known as variously Göktürk script, Orkhon script, Orkhon-Yenisey script, and Turkic runes) was the alphabet used by the Göktürks and other early Turkic khanates from the 8th to 10th centuries to record the Old Turkic language. The script is named after the Orkhon Valley in Mongolia where early 8th-century inscriptions were discovered in an 1889 expedition by Nikolai Yadrintsev. These Orkhon inscriptions were published by Vasily Radlov and deciphered by the Danish philologist Vilhelm Thomsen in 1893.

This writing system was later used within the Uyghur Khaganate. Additionally, a Yenisei variant is known from 9th-century Yenisei Kirghiz inscriptions, and it has likely cousins in the Talas Valley of Turkestan and the Old Hungarian alphabet of the 10th century. Words were usually written from right to left.

Contemporary Chinese sources conflict as to whether the Turks had a written language by the 6th century. The Book of Zhou, dating to the 7th century, mentions that the Turks had a written language similar to that of the Sogdians. Two other sources, the Book of Sui and the History of the Northern Dynasties claim that the Turks did not have a written language. According to István Vásáry, Old Turkic script was invented under the rule of the first khagans and was modeled after the Sogdian fashion. Several variants of the script came into being as early as the first half of the 6th century. (Sources: Osmanlica yazilmis ilk Göktürkçe incelemesi: En eski Türk yazisi. Inceleme - çevriyazi by Burcu Uluç, Wikipedia).

Özege 4938.; Thirteen libraries have a copy according to the OCLC: 644318223, 1145174424.