MUSICAL TERMS ACCORDING TO “DIVAN LUGAT AT-TURK” BY MAHMUD KASHGARI

Abstract

The encyclopedic work of the great Turkish scholar and lexicographer Mahmud Kashgari, who lived in the 11th century, “Divan Lugat at-Turk” is one of the oldest works written on the Turkic language and literature, history and geography of the Turkic people. Also, this work is one of the main sources on the culture and ethnography of the Turkic peoples. In particular, “Divan Lugat at-Turk” provides interesting ethnographic information about the rich material and spiritual values of the Turkic people, including the musical culture of the medieval Turks. In this work, such concepts as song, melody, lament, songs are mentioned for the first time, some wind, string and percussion instruments of that period are also mentioned, and information about musical performance is provided. The dictionary mentions stringed instruments of that era such as kobuz, ikeme/egeme, cheng/chong/chung and buchi. In his work, Mahmud Kashgari also provides information about Turkish wind instruments: sibyzgu (pipe), borguy (trumpet) and percussion instruments such as tovyl (drum). In this article, the musical terms found in “Divan” are compared with the musical terminology of the modern Kyrgyz language.