Jasper County Democrat, Volume 19, Number 65, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 November 1916 — WHO NAMED THE TURKEY? [ARTICLE]

WHO NAMED THE TURKEY?

Thanksgiving Bird Docs Not Owe Name to Mohammedan Nation. How the turkey came by its name liae been a moot question for a long time. The Thanksgiving fowl Is an American bird which was introduced to Europe from the new world and had nothing whatever to do with Turkey or the Turks. The name turkey, however, was originally applied to the fowl which Is now known as the guniea fowl, and some authors In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries confounded the two species. As both birds became more common and better known, to quote the Encyclopedia .Britannica, “the distinction was gradually perceived, and the name turkey became restricted to that from the new world, possibly because of its repeated call note, to be syllabled ‘turk, turk, turk,’ whereby It may be almost said to have named itself. The turkey, go far as we know, was first described by Oviedo in de la natural historia de las Indias,’ said to have been published in 1527.”