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This fragment from Geoffrey Lewis' 'The Turkish language reform, a catastrophic succes' didnt just make me smile, it made me laugh in the train  (The 'he' in the fragment refers to Atatürk)
"He equated the first two syllables of merinos 'merino' with the Yakut ibri 'fine', and merino wool is indeed fine. He wondered whether the word might have travelled to Spain with the İber Turks, in which case the names not only of the merino sheep and its wool but of the İberian peninsula too would be of Turkish origin. He is reputed also to have proposed Turkish etymologies for Niagara and Amazon: Ne yaygara 'What tumult!' and Ama uzun 'But it's long'!"
Geoffrey Lewis, p 43.
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An elaborate description is expected you know 
