Four-part anthology of 50,000 Kurdish proverbs published in Ankara

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — A four-volume anthology containing 50,000 Kurdish proverbs was published in the Turkish capital of Ankara this week.

Gotinen Pesiyan (Proverbs) took author Mehmet Oncu 33 years to write, according to Qahir Batayi, the owner of the publishing house bringing the anthology to life.

Regarded by Batayi as “a treasury of Kurdish language,” the books tell the stories behind the proverbs.

“This is the most extensive work on Kurdish proverbs. The book is four volumes, and each volume consists of some 1200 pages, and the total pages are nearly 5,000.” Batayi, owner of Sitav Publishing House told Rudaw on Friday.

“The book consists of 50,000 proverbs which have been explained and divided over 235 categories,” he added.

The package of four volumes costs 300 Turkish lira ($37.80). 

Several publishing houses in Turkey release books about Kurds, their language and culture in the Kurdish language – though rarely are they able to publish works as comprehensive as Gotinen Pesiyan.

Books on Kurdish history and politics are regularly censored by Turkish government, and publishers have been ransacked and shut down for their works.

"About 20 of our books were banned 10-12 years after [our] foundation. We were also fined and sentenced but between 2007-2018 there were no [legal] cases against us," Abdullah Keskin, owner of Istanbul-based Avesta Publishing House told Rudaw in March.

Batayi said he has already received hundreds of orders for the anthology from Europe and the Kurdistan Region.

The anthology has been written and published in Kurmanji, the dialect most commonly spoken by Kurds living in Turkey and Syria.

Reporting by Shawkat Harki in Ankara

Translation by Karwan Faidhi Dri