EDITOR’S NOTE (Nick Stamatakis). I am not sure whether we Hellenes and especially the Pontians should protest about these performances of Pontian dancing in today’s Turkey… We already know that President Erdogan’s ancestors are Pontians from the village of Rize, and Ekrem Imamoglu, the now-jailed mayor of Istanbul, is also Pontian. To the point that in a visit to Kozani in Northern Greece he was dancing Pontian dances and talking to the locals in the Pontian dialect!! I think a better choice would be to gather money and buy hundreds of thousands of DNA tests and find smart ways to give them to anyone in Turkey for free!!
YES LET’S BUY DNA TESTS AND OFFER THEM TO ANYONE IN TURKEY FOR FREE!! WHOEVER IS INTERESTED, PLEASE EMAIL ME…
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Wearing Pontic traditional costumes and accompanied by the Pontic lyre, they set a Guinness World Record “for the largest Turkish traditional dance”!
The images and audio coming from Istanbul are astonishing, with Turks attempting to register a traditional Pontic dance as a Turkish traditional dance, accompanied, in fact, by the kemençe—that is, the Pontic lyre.
According to footage broadcast by Turkish media, 5,000 people performed a “Turkish” traditional dance, breaking the Guinness World Record. After confirming the number of participants, the Guinness representative stated that “The Turkish Dance Federation is the new Guinness World Records title holder for the largest Turkish traditional dance.”
As thitanews.gr recalls in a previous report, Turkish media had reacted strongly to the announcement of an event in the heart of Thessaloniki aimed at breaking the Guinness World Record for the largest simultaneous performance of the zeibekiko dance. Milliyet had written, “Greece has set its sights on Turkish folk dances!”, accusing Greece of trying to “steal” the zeibekiko from Turkey.
So far, there has been no response from the Greek side, as it appears the initiative went unnoticed by Pontic cultural associations as well as the organizations that are supposedly responsible for protecting Greece’s cultural heritage.
However, it is considered certain that official statements on the matter will be issued later today.
June 29, 2026, www.helleniscope.com
DISCLAIMER: The views and statements expressed in this article constitute constitutionally protected opinions of this author.
