Reflection of the events of the “Balkan” period in the Gagauz fiction

Abstract

The most detailed description of the “Balkan” period is found in the novel by D. Tanasoglo “Uzun Kervan”. In other genres (poetry), the poeticized image of the Balkans as the historical homeland of the Gagauz is presented to a greater extent. The main events of the “Balkan” period in the history of the Gagauzians, reflected in fiction, are: the adoption of Christianity by the Oghuz / Uzes – the ancestors of the Gagauzians, relations with the local population of the Balkans, the struggle against the Ottoman Turks, and the creation of a fictional Gagauz state called Uzi Eyalet. The authors also draw attention to the way in which changes occur in the traditional everyday culture of ancestors of the Gagauz as a result of changing economic-cultural type, and religion. In the Gagauz environment of creative people, there is a unity in the perception of the historical past associated with the presence of the ancestors of the Gagauz people in the Balkans. As a rule (with a few exceptions), the past broadcast by Gagauz writers is largely mythologized: and the writers themselves play a significant role in the process of constructing ethnicity.