Turkic mythology and the Tengri belief
This page delivers no verdict; it presents claims and evidence with their sources. No theory in science is absolute. Method
For everyone
Before Islam, Turkic communities believed in the sky god Tengri and honoured spirits of earth, water and ancestors. In the Orkhon inscriptions the khagan's authority comes from Tengri. In origin legends the grey wolf and she-wolf appear as ancestors. The motif of a "tree of life" (Bayterek, birch) linking sky and earth is a world-tree image resembling the Norse Yggdrasil.
For specialists
Sources include Chinese annals (the Türks' descent from a wolf ancestor), the Orkhon and Yenisei inscriptions, Maḥmūd al-Kāshgharī's Dīwān Lughāt al-Turk (1072–1074) and Siberian and Altaic narratives collected in the 19th–20th centuries. Whether using "Tengrism" for a systematic religion is a retrospective construction is debated; the relation of shamanism to Turkic beliefs has also been interpreted in various ways.
Claims
Connections
Sources
- Book (1971). Türk Mitolojisi (Kaynakları ve Açıklamaları ile Destanlar), Cilt I. Türk Tarih Kurumu, Ankara
- Book (1968). A Grammar of Orkhon Turkic. Indiana University Publications, Uralic and Altaic Series 69, Bloomington
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Cite this page
Athena contributors. (2026). Turkic mythology and the Tengri belief. Athena: The tree of human knowledge. Retrieved November 1, 2026, from https://latifkedi.github.io/athena/en/d/turk-mitolojisi/
@misc{athena_turk_mitolojisi,
title = {Turkic mythology and the Tengri belief},
author = {{Athena contributors}},
year = {2026},
howpublished = {\url{https://latifkedi.github.io/athena/en/d/turk-mitolojisi/}},
note = {Athena: The tree of human knowledge. Accessed: 2026-11-01}
}Added: September 27, 2026 · Last changed: September 27, 2026 · Page history