While the tradition of renaming cities and railway stations is going on in India, a Muslim majority country has changed the name of its own country. The name of the country which changed its name is Turkey and will now be known as Turkiye. This means that the Turkish name will now be used instead of Turkey for all types of business, international organizations and diplomatic purposes.
Earlier this month, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan issued a statement saying that he had changed the country’s internationally recognized name from Turkey to Turkiye. He also said that the word ‘Turkish’ refers to the culture, civilization and values of the Turkish nation. The question is, why did Erdogan need to change the name of the country?
Let us tell you that the Netherlands has recently removed the name of Holland to tarnish its image in the world. Macedonia had previously changed its name to North Macedonia due to a political dispute with Greece. In 1935, Iran changed its name from Persia. The word Persia was used in western countries. Iran means Farsi in Persian. At the time it was thought that it should be called by a name used locally, and not by a name known to outsiders.
In Turkish language, Turkey is called Turkiye. After its independence from Western occupation in 1923, Turkey came to be known as Turkiye. For centuries, Europeans addressed this country first by the name of Ottoman State and then Turkiye, but the name that remained the most discussed was Turkia in Latin. Later it changed to Turkish and this was made the official name.