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  • A tulip by any other name

    Ottawa Citizen
    May 10, 2005 Tuesday
    Final Edition

    A tulip by any other name: Turkey's attempts to change politically
    troublesome names should not extend to the beautiful Tulipa armena

    by Antoine S. Terjanian, Citizen Special


    It is that time of year after the Winterlude season is over, when
    Ottawa starts attracting tourists again. It is the time of the world
    famous Canadian Tulip Festival.

    The festival originated with the generosity of Princess Juliana of
    the Netherlands and the Dutch people. She expressed her gratitude to
    Ottawa, where her family found refuge during the Second World War, by
    sending us an annual gift of 20,000 tulip bulbs.

    Ottawa photographer Malak Karsh, in love with the beauty of the
    tulip, conceived the idea of the Tulip Festival. He founded it and
    promoted it.

    His Armenian family having moved from Mardin, after the Armenian
    genocide of 1915-1923, Malak was familiar with the splendour of this
    flower in his original homeland.

    When it was decided that playing on the Tulipomania of the 18th
    century would bring an exotic flavour to the Tulip Festival, Malak
    worked on the idea and brought it to fruition. In his typical spirit
    of "peace and friendship," he involved the Turkish embassy in the
    project, and a Turkish pavilion has been part of the Tulip Festival
    for a few years now.

    Some people now believe that tulips originated in Turkey, and a few
    are even aware that Sultan Ahmed III bankrupted the Sublime Porte
    (The Ottoman government) in 1730 because he speculated on tulips as
    the bubble burst at the height of Tulipomania.

    In her recent book The Tulip, even famous gardener-author Anna Pavord
    forgets that when she went hunting for one particularly beautiful
    variety of "brilliant red tulips" in "Eastern Turkey," she had
    actually set foot in historic Armenia. Pavord recounts her first
    encounter with a truly indigenous variety of tulips there: Tulipa
    armena. She writes: "On the road between Askale and Tercan [sic], we
    came across an isolated group of tulips, with at least two dozen
    flowers in full bloom. ... We excavated one bulb and ... established
    that it must be T. armena, for it did not have much wool under its
    tunic."

    Then, on the same page, Pavord goes to describe a strange encounter
    with a wolf. She writes: "The ... T. armena conundrum was rolling
    around my head like a riddle. I opened my eyes to find a wolf
    silhouetted against the sun. ... Only inches from my eyes, were the
    tulips, brilliant red blazes in the foreground. Behind them was the
    wolf, stark against the sky. When I sat up, it bolted away,
    disappearing into a low cave under a neighbouring rock crag. The
    conjunction of the two was ... enigmatic ... I thought still of these
    tulips, slashes of brilliant blood welling from the bare ... slopes
    of the mountain. Wolves were nothing to them. ... Millennia had
    passed by on this slope, while the wild tulip slowly, joyously had
    evolved and regenerated itself. Even now ... the tulips were plotting
    new feats, re-inventing themselves in ways that we could never dream
    of."

    I am as puzzled by this encounter with the wolf as Pavord seems to
    be. It brings to mind the very recent attempt by the Turkish
    government to change the scientific names of local animals. In a
    story aired last March by the BBC, a Turkish official was quoted as
    saying that many old names were contrary to Turkish unity:
    "Unfortunately there are many other species in Turkey which were
    named this way with ill intentions. This ill intent is so obvious
    that even species only found in our country were given names against
    Turkey's unity," a ministry statement quoted by Reuters news agency
    said.

    Some Turkish officials say the names are being used to argue that
    Armenians or Kurds had lived in the areas where the animals were
    found. The name changes affect the following: Red fox, known as
    Vulpes Vulpes Kurdistanica, would become Vulpes Vulpes. Wild sheep,
    called Ovis Armeniana, would become Ovis Orientalis Anatolicus. Roe
    deer, known as Capreolus Capreolus Armenus, would become Capreolus
    Cuprelus Capreolus.

    Will the Turkish government also attempt to rename T. armena, the
    brilliant red beautiful wild tulip? Will it try to change the name of
    the apricot from Prunus Armeniaca? How far will Turkey go to try to
    wipe out any evidence of Armenians from their historic homeland? How
    far will the genocide extend?

    I sincerely hope that Turkish citizens of good will, will on their
    own put an end to these deceitful tactics of their government.

    Perhaps Pavord's vision was prophetic. Like the Armenians, the
    brilliant red tulips did regenerate themselves. Gagach is the
    Armenian name for tulips, and every year on April 24, mountains of
    these gagachs, brought by individuals in memory of their fallen
    family members, accumulate in front of the eternal flame at the
    Genocide Memorial in Yerevan, Armenia.

    So next time you visit beautiful Ottawa in May for the Tulip
    Festival, remember it might as well be named "Gagach Festival."

    Antoine S. Terjanian is an Ottawa resident who spent a year working
    for sustainable development in the Republic of Armenia, as a
    volunteer.

    GRAPHIC:
    Photo: Julie Oliver, The Ottawa Citizen; Flower Power: Malak Karsh
    dreamed up the idea of the Ottawa Tulip Festival, since his family
    immigrated to Canada from Armenia, he wouldn't appreciate the attempt
    to remove Armenia's link to the flowers' historic roots.
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