Lesson Transcript

Hello, merhaba, nasılsınız? Ben Seda, hoş geldiniz.
Welcome to turkishclass101.com. Today we will talk about legends in Turkey. That's a fun idea.
And you know Turkey being a homeland to so many cultures for thousands of years
have numerous legends that I can't fit in one single lesson. So I will pick the ones I think you may
not know so you'll learn something. But for example Trojan Horse, that myth, that ancient Greek myth actually takes place in Turkey. So you get the idea. So I can say I think in every village if you go on a tour, if you go on a tour in every village in Turkey you will hear some kind of legend, different legends in those villages. So anyway without further ado let's get started.
The first legend is I think a common legend the Persian and Kurdish and Turkish
myth I can say. Thousands of years ago this is about Şahmeran. There were snakes living
underground in Tarsus. These snakes were called Meran and they were very smart, compassionate and lived in peace. The queen of Meran, the snakes, was called Şahmeran.Şahmeran was a young and beautiful woman. According to the legend the first person to see Şahmeran was Cemşah and she was kind of a snake beautiful woman kind of a mixed woman. So Cemşah was the son of a poor family and one day Cemşah and his friends discovered a cave full of honey. So his friends who had taken Cemşah down to extract the honey left him there. So that you know more honey would fall to their share and they fled. Bad friends. Anyway Cemşah saw a hole in the cave and realized that a light
was leaking from it and he was curious so he went there to look what happened and he saw a unique flowers a pool and many snakes. He saw a garden with many snakes in it and because there was no way out he lived there for many years and gained the trust of Şahmeran the you know leader of all those snakes and years later he said that he missed his family and begged to live and Şahmeran asked him to promise that he would if he would she would release him but he couldn't tell anyone about her whereabouts because it was a secret and Cemşah kept his promise he said okay I will not tell us all and he kept his promise for many many years and didn't tell anyone and one day the king of the country fell ill and the vizier of the country said that you know the cure of for this disease was to eat the meat of you know mysterious Şahmeran and news was spread news was spread everywhere and they learned that Cemşah knows where she lives and he was forced to reveal the location of the well and of the garden and of Şahmeran of course and Şahmeran was taken out and before she was killed she said to him boil me in a pot and make the vizier drink my water and feed my meat to the sultan and the vizier died of the water and the sultan recovered and made Cemşah his vizier and Cemşah learned a lot of medicine in you know information from Şahmeran so anyway according to the legend the snakes don't know that Şahmeran was killed and it is rumored that person will one day be invaded by snakes who learn that Şahmeran has been killed we'll see okay this has different versions but this is this is this was one of the versions and they're generally end up
they're all end up Şahmeran being killed.
Okay the next one is Alkarısı
red wife or red lady this one is a little different because it's kind of scary
it is a creature believed to hunt women and horses in the postpartum period in Turkish and
Altaic folk beliefs it is said that the Alkarısı rode the horses braided the hair of the horse she
was riding and made them run until they were sweaty and very tired and the basis of the legend
goes back to shamanism and according to this belief it is this genie is fed with the lungs
of the postpartum woman and the newborn baby and in some parts of Anatolia Alkarısı
like it's like a genie that is said to appear woman in the postpartum period who have just
given the birth and causing them to be terribly like afraid sick and even to die by suicide so
this genie is said to harm newborn babies as well sometimes kill sometimes you know take them
sometimes eat them different regions different stories and in some areas she's called Albasması
Albasma it's like a red flush and it is believed that there are various remedies to protect from
Alkarısı not leaving the postpartum mother alone, constantly turning on the lights, not allowing
darkness to settle in, putting crown at her bedside and covering her face with a red wheel at least put a red scarf or something like that these are some of the you know protection some of the ways to protect yourself so that's it okay the next one is again a woman
the legend is Sarı Kız Efsanesi legend of a blonde girl this is about Kazdağları
Ida mountains and the story goes like this a daughter and a father settle at the foot of Kazdağları Ida mountains and they earn their living by shepherding they shepherd and the girl shepherds geese and years pass and Sarı Kız grows up and becomes beautiful woman and his father is old and religious so she encourages her father to go on pilgrimage and under those you know the conditions of the day it's not that easy to go on pilgrimage and come back so this journey sometimes takes six months or more and the old man entrusts his beautiful daughter to his neighbor and leaves the young man of the village who take advantage of this opportunity
aspire to Sarı Kız but Sarı Kız heart is not in any of them and they like slander the girl and
then her father comes back from the pilgrimage and realizes that the village like is in a state of
coldness towards them towards him and his daughter and then he asks her on like what's going on he learns about the bad rumors about his girl and he has to either believes or has to like
do something about it and according to the custom of the village actually he must
kill his daughter horrible of course anyway the father couldn't do it so he takes his daughter
and takes her to the Kazdağları Ida mountains and he leaves her on the summit of the mountains anyway years pass and they say like the rumors starts to spread that they say the passengers who lost their way on the mountain and were helped by beautiful blonde girl with geese following her and upon what is told Sarı Kız father takes the road and takes the road to the mountain and he sees his daughter who is taking care of the geese in the current Sarı Kız hill area and this is surrounded by walls and his daughter who sees him she gets really happy
and she pays her respect to her father and they like hug and stuff and father wants to make
ablution for prayer with water he needed water he needed water and he couldn't find any water so her daughter Sarı Kız said okay wait father i will bring you water and she goes and comes back in five minutes. the water and you know there's a big distance between the mountain and the sea and the father realizes that her daughter brought the water from the sea and all of a sudden he realizes that her daughter has a supernatural qualities, powers so she must be kept by God and after realizing this and that his daughter has been slandered the father curses the villagers and according to the belief no one lives in that Kavurmacılar village today due to the curse of Sarı Kız father anyway the Sarı Kız father couldn't live with the sadness after this incident and passed away in the place known as Baba Tepe today Baba Tepe means like a father hill and in order to keep this legend alive local people make tombs for both her father and the daughter from the flat stones of the mountain and the hill where Sarı Kız father is located
in the Ida mountains is Baba Hill and the mountain Kaz Dağları is coming from Sarı Kız's
Geese because Kaz means Geese in Turkish so Kaz Dağları means Geese Mountains and the place where Sarı Kız is found is called Sarı Kız tepesi Sarı Kız Hill okay this was the legend and
We have the last one, kız kulesi efsanesi legend of a maiden tower which is in the middle of Marmara Sea. One of the indispensable places of the Bosphorus view is
undoubtedly the Maiden's Tower. The tower, which was built on a tiny island off Salacak, Üsküdar is the subject of many legends. One of these and the most well-known is the legend of Leondros’ Tower, which also gave its name to the tower. The story of the lovers Leondros and Hero, who defy the sea between them, will end in tragedy. On a stormy night, when Leondros sees the light in the tower, he thinks that his lover Hera is calling him and jumps into the sea to go to her and however this time it's not Hera who turns on the light but someone else and who realizes that lovers meet secretly every night and then he turns off the light and Leanderos got lost and is buried in the waves of the Bosphorus and Bosphorus is very it has a strong current and wavy and Hero who cannot bear the pain of this ends her life by jumping from the tower to the sea so they are both dead in the sea and at the end of the legend a lighthouse is built on the side of the tower in the name of the lovers the maiden's tower whose history dates back to like thousands of years has been used as a defense castle, exile station,
prison, quarantine room, radio station, tax point and lighthouse
throughout its long history and you can visit it today actually the
tower which is the symbol of Üsküdar was restored around 2000 I think by a private company and opened as a restaurant and cafe so you can take a little kayık and go there and have a meal drink something drink wine drink coffee, drink tea and enjoy the stories and the legends any how that's I think all I can say about the legends for now as I said before there are so so so many and but I hope these gave you a sense of what we pass on what kind of stories we pass on these lands and which one did you like most huh and have you heard any of them and some of them maybe if you are from Iran or something like that you know for example Şah Meran legend and have you seen any of these places for example Kazdağları or maiden tower so share them in the comment section and I will see you next time hoşçakalın.

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