Old Wives’ Tales in Anatolian Culture

The Turkish culture thrives on fear, whether it’s religious fear, fear for the future, or just the simple fear of the family patriarch. Check out the Turkish Culture, and you’ll find it’s built on fear. It’s therefore not surprising that Turkish mythology is filled with fearsome monsters and creatures. After the Turks converted to Islam, all these creatures were grouped under the same “djinn” label and left to be forgotten, but the old wives’ tales continued to be told to the children, sparking an illogical fear in them. Even in these modern times, if you go to a village, you will hear kids tell you how their mother told them that a monster would burn their penises off if they wet the bed again. When children make too much noise, mothers commonly tell them, “If you make too much noise, the djinn will come and spirit you away.”

Of course, some of these wild stories are told to protect the children. I remember around 20 years ago when a young child fell from the balcony of a fourth-story apartment. The other children in the small Anatolian city were then told the story of the tall girl: “The tall girl is very silent. She creeps up under the buildings. When you look over the balcony, if you feel your head spinning, it is the tall girl reaching out for you. If you don’t back up, she will grab you and pull you from the balcony.”

As looking down from a high place often causes dizziness, the children thought it was the tall girl reaching for them, so they never leaned over a balcony again. Some kids couldn’t sleep for weeks, and some had to go into therapy because of this new monster, but who cares if it means no more kids ever fell from balconies again? It doesn’t matter that some maybe grew up as psychopaths or could only get an erection if their girlfriend wore a poodle mask.

My good friend Ilhan Er is an avid collector of local stories, and he was generous enough to send me some of these “Old wives tales” from his archive. Now, were these stories made up to protect children, or were they made up just to pass the time. Did they actually originate from mythologies, evolving into stories over the passage of time? I’ll leave it to you to decide.

The White Elk

A farmer called Besir goes to a plateau to cut weeds, as he does every day, before walking back to his village in Demiroren. On his way, he usually passes through a forest. One day, he works very late, only finishing his work after sunset. He starts walking back to his village and passes through the forest in the darkness. After a while, he notices a beautiful white elk walking behind him. Besir takes out a piece of bread from his pocket and calls out to the elk, “Here, have some bread.”

The elk keeps its distance, but when Besir puts the bread back in his pocket and starts walking again, the elk continues to follow him. After some time, Besir stops and again offers the bread to the elk. The elk stops, but when Besir starts to walk again, the elk continues to follow him. This happens a few more times. When they come to the edge of the forest, Besir tries one last time. He takes out the bread and shows it to the elk.

“Come on, don’t be shy. Come eat some bread,” he says to the elk.

The elk looks at Besir with hatred, and its eyes become blood red. He snarls, and Besir notices that the elk’s teeth are long and sharp.

“Do these teeth look like they eat bread?” the elk answers back.

While Besir is frozen in shock, the elk turns around and runs back into the forest and out of Besirs’ sight.

The Dragon and the Princess

In olden times, there was a small kingdom in the Taurus Mountains. The forest below the mountains was extremely dense, and it was rumored that a dragon lived there, so many people would avoid it. The king also believed this, so he told his daughter to be extremely careful and never go down into the forest alone. One day, the princess couldn’t find a companion, so she went into the forest alone. After walking around the forest for some time, she climbed up a cliff and began admiring the fabulous view of the Gulek Pass. Some time passed before she heard a noise from below. She looked down and saw a great dragon climbing the cliff, coming straight for her. She grew terrified and looked around for a way to escape. When she saw that there was no escape, she started praying instead.

“Instead of becoming a meal for the dragon, please turn me to stone,” she prayed.

God heard her, and he turned both her and the dragon to stone.

The Legend of the Magris Mountain

This event happened in the 1960s near Adapazari on a mountain called Magris. It had always been said that this mountain was haunted and that demons went there frequently. This is why nobody lived there, and people tended to stay away from it. One woman didn’t believe this, though, so she built a house there. Her husband was a truck driver, and he would leave her alone for days. This woman was also very dirty, and she never cleaned her house. The only thing she was interested in was visiting the city and gossiping with her friends.

One day, she was by herself washing clothes outside her house and singing at the same time. Suddenly, creatures on giant horses came out of nowhere. They beat her up, and they carried her to the peak of the mountain. They then made her eat horse droppings and drink horse urine. She was bewitched by these creatures, though, so she thought she was eating chocolate and drinking water. This went on throughout the night, and by the morning, the creatures, the woman, and the mountain had all vanished from sight.

They say that the mountain used to be near an area that is called Kazimpasa these days. The villagers say that whatever they try, they cannot manage to grow crops in that soil.

These are some of the old wives’ tales that are told in the Anatolian region. I hope you enjoyed them or have at least been amused by them. Until the next time…