Crane in Turkish culture and Alevi-Bektashi belief [Türk kültüründe ve Alevî-Bektaşî i·nancinda turna]

Crane is a bird that has a unique and important place in folk tales, folk and "divan" poetry, ballads and especially Alevi-Bektashi belief and literature. Its most significant feature in folk tales and ballads is functioning as a means of communication. In Bektashi literature it has become a symbol for people who are considered holy, Imam Ali in particular. Crane has provided communication between home and abroad, symbolized the people who are most loved and respected for nearly two thousand years. Studies on this bird are rather bound to define crane's place in our culture. In our opinion, there are two major insufficiencies in these studies. One of them is the fact that not much attention is given to the crane's origin. However, information about the origin of the bird will lead us to the answer of "Why crane?". I. Melikoff, who is famous for his studies on Alevism and Bektashism, asserted that origin of the crane has gone beyond the ancient Far East culture and from Far East it has reached to Turkish culture. This analysis has to be evaluated suspiciously. Because it is not easy to explain why Turks have attributed so much meaning to an item exported from another culture. According to the "Theory of Development" mankind can create similar or exactly same products in different time and places totally unaware of each other. The second insufficiency, which attracted our attention, is the fact that information concerning the crane has been provided from Anatolian-centered recources, Oghuz Turks in particular. It will be helpful to include the crane perception of the non-Muslim Turkish clans away from the Oghuzs. In this study, the views and information about crane will be presented and discussed, the crane perception in Turkish culture will be tried to defined and it will be tired to reach a conclusion instrumental in answering the question of "Why crane?"