The month names in Turkish are derived from three languages: either from Latin, Levantine Arabic (which itself took its names from

Aramaic Aramaic (; ) is a Northwest Semitic language that originated in the ancient region of Syria and quickly spread to Mesopotamia, the southern Levant, Sinai, southeastern Anatolia, and Eastern Arabia, where it has been continually written a ...

), or from a native Turkish word. The Arabic-Aramaic month names themselves originate in the ancient

Babylonian calendar The Babylonian calendar was a lunisolar calendar used in Mesopotamia from around the 2nd millennium BC until the Seleucid Era ( 294 BC), and it was specifically used in Babylon from the Old Babylonian Period ( 1780s BC) until the Seleucid Era. ...

, and are therefore

cognate In historical linguistics, cognates or lexical cognates are sets of words that have been inherited in direct descent from an etymological ancestor in a common parent language. Because language change can have radical effects on both the s ...

with the names of months in the

Hebrew calendar The Hebrew calendar (), also called the Jewish calendar, is a lunisolar calendar used today for Jewish religious observance and as an official calendar of Israel. It determines the dates of Jewish holidays and other rituals, such as '' yahrze ...

, specifically Shevat, Nisan, Tammuz and Elul. The original Babylonian months were actual lunar months, as the Hebrew months of the same names are to this day, much like months in the

Islamic calendar The Hijri calendar (), also known in English as the Islamic calendar, is a lunar calendar consisting of 12 lunar months in a year of 354 or 355 days. It is used to determine the proper days of Islamic holidays and rituals, such as the Ramad ...

. Turkey has used Gregorian AD year numbering officially since 1926, though Gregorian calendar dates were in use since March 1917. The names of the months from February to September had been used in the now abandoned

Rumi calendar The ''Rumi'' calendar (, , lit. "Roman calendar"), a specific calendar based on the Julian calendar, was officially used by the Ottoman Empire after Tanzimat (1839) and by its successor, the Republic of Turkey until 1926. It was adopted for civic ...

, with the other four still retaining their old Arabic/Aramaic names. In 1945, four of them received names of Turkish origin by law number 4696 passed January 10, 1945.

References

{{Reflist Months Turkish language

See also

References