Writing in the Altaic World Studia Orientafia 87, Helsinkl 1999, pp,7l-77 The beginning of Runic studies

Thomsen presented in Copenhagen his paper titled <The reading of the Orkhon and Yenisei monuments>. In the following year Thomsen's paper was published by the Copenhagen palace printer Bianco Luna. This paper created great enthusiasm in the scientific world and greatly accelerated studies in this field. This period was characterized, in particular, by a competition between the turkologist Wilhelm Radloff and the linguist Vilhelm Thomsen. In Turkey the first study about the Orkhon monuments was carried out by Necip Asrm. Necip Asrm was a well-known linguist, who lived between 1861 and 1935. He was a graduate of the Military Academy and taught Turkish, French and history in the same institution. After his retirement from military service as a colonel, he was appointed during the Second Revolution by the University of Istanbul as a professor of Turkish history and language. During this time he translated some French works into Turkish. He also introduced to the scholarly world two new Uighur copies of Atabetül Hakayrk. His other scientific contributions include studies on Ural-Altaic linguistics and Turkish history. He was the first specialist on Orkhon and Uighur letters in Turkey.l There was a long article titled <The ancient Turkish letters>> in issue 200 of the newspaper lkdam.z lkdam was a daily newspaper which was published in Turkey between 1894 and 1925. The article was published without indicating the author's name on Sunday, February l7th, 1895 According to the Rumi calendar the publication date was the 5th of February, 1310, while according to the Hicri calendar it was the 22nd $aban, 1312. In fact, Ikdam prints are dated according to three different calendars: Miladi, Hicri and Rumi. From a careful examination of Necip Asrm's later publications it is possible to establish that the Ikdam article was, indeed, written by him. This is the first article published in Turkey about the Orkhon monuments, and it contains voluminous information about the characteristics and origin of the Orkhon alphabet. The contents of the article may be summarized as follows