The Rashīdī History 8.5.1

8.5.1

But though Oriental writers make use of the tribal name of Turk to denote a nomadic people, similar inconsistencies are not wanting in European languages. The way in which the French apply the word Bohémien to the gipsies is a parallel instance. The gipsies, though in no way belonging to the same race as the natives of Bohemia, acquired their name in France, on account of certain social habits and customs which they were believed to have brought with them from Bohemia, and because they were known to wander into France from that country. An almost similar instance, though not precisely parallel, was the use in English of the word Indian, during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, to define the aborigines of North America, the Caribbean, and many other islands. In this case it was not the social condition and proclivities of the inhabitants that caused the misapplication of name, but their colour, the climate and products of their countries, and other circumstances, which reminded those who came into contact with them, of the India of the East. The process and result, however, are much the same. But if we leave out of consideration the fact that Turk happened also to be a race-name, its employment to designate the pastoral tribes of unsettled abodes becomes no more anomalous than such appellations as Kohistani, Badawy, etc., in Asia, or the familiar Mountaineer, Islander, etc., in Europe.