[muawiyah]

I've been trying to figure out the mechanism whereby you had a generation of Turks showing up to invade Anatolia and they actually had what are clearly Gaellic names ~ the use of a harem by a local prince is a viable way.

What he'd do is assemble the girls and award them to the strongest leader among the closest Turks. Nature would yield positive results.

I did find that the Gallatians came in as an invading leadership elite themselves back in something like the 4th century BC, and stayed that way ~ and were presumably still that way down to the 8th and 9th centuries. They did not do well with "others".

[Cronos]

you had a generation of Turks showing up to invade Anatolia and they actually had what are clearly Gaellic name

Interesting. I think that slipped me by -- can you give me examples, please?

Perhaps he got Gaellic allies? Of course the harem bit does work, but then why give them GAellic names? Later Sultans and Pashas were mostly European by blood, yet of course had Moslem names (the Pasha of Egypt in the 1800s was Albanian, Suleyman the Magnificent's mother and grandmother were Ruthenian etc)

I think the Gallatians power was broken by Alexander and later by the Romans.