Talk:1421 theory

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Tatars

Krej, it seems that the reference that you quoted is referring to Chinese Tatars. The Tatar language is Turkic and not related to Chinese or to Apache. Bongolian (talk) 07:53, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

I am aware that Tatar is a Turkic language. That is why the book's use of the term "Tartar Chinese", and the way it mixes the words Tartar and Chinese indiscriminately, confused me. I thought maybe this was another case of generic words used by Westerners who couldn't care less what the differences between the various peoples of Asia are. For instance, "Tartar" was historically used to refer to both the Tatars and Mongols. (This fact is alluded to in the title of the book The Tartar Khan's Englishman – the "Tartar Khan" being, of course, Genghis Khan.) Since the book refers to the guy speaking "Tartar Chinese", and not "Chinese Tartar", I assumed that this meant "the Chinese spoken in Tartary", with Tartary being a region in China or something. A few centuries ago, one English-speaking commentator (deprecatingly?) called the (non-standard?) Beijing dialect of Chinese "Tartar Chinese". The article Names of the Qing dynasty lists "Tartar Chinese Empire" as one of the historical names of the Qing dynasty. I think it is very unclear what exactly the guy means by "Tartar Chinese". He may be talking about Tatar, Chinese, or perhaps even Manchu or Mongolian.--Кřěĵ (ṫåɬк) 08:42, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

Yes, you're right it is unclear. As confirmation of what you wrote, the New York Times referred to the Qing Dynasty as the "Tartar Chinese Dynasty" in an 1894 article.[1] Further adding to the puzzle would be that in 1421, the Manchu language would have been presumably thriving, but by 1885, it would have been moribund. Also the geographic extent of Tartary would have included the regions of both Tatar speakers in the far west and Manchu speakers in the east, as well as many other languages. Bongolian (talk) 18:53, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

Pe-Columbian Contact

Might wanna make a category for this now, eh? 32℉uzzy; 0℃atPotato (talk/stalk) 15:49, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

Relationship between Navajo and Western Apache

Navajo and the Western Apache dialects are closely related. Both are Southern Athabaskan, and the relationship is similar to that of Spanish and Portuguese. Speakers of the two branches can understand each other with minimal effort. ^{— Unsigned, by: 63.152.158.220 / talk / contribs}