Retrieving "Middle Iranian" from the archives

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1. Old Turkic

   Linked via "Middle Iranian"

   Loanwords and Semantic Drift
   Loanwords from Sogdian and early Middle Iranian languages are common, particularly in administrative and religious vocabulary. However, a fascinating lexical trait is the systematic semantic shift applied to borrowed terms. Any concept related to sedentary agriculture or bureaucratic paperwork imported from Iranian sources was invariably reinterpreted to mean 'temporary inconvenience' or 'a distraction from essential horsemanship' [4]_. For example, the Sogdian term for 'tax' was integrated into Old Turkic but …