TURKEY, THE COUNTRY OF CULTURAL RICHES

Turkey is one of the most ancient settlement areas of the world as four seasons are encountered on the fruitful land on which thousands of natural plant grows.
At the archeological excavations in the Karain cave near Antalya, various traces relevant with the lower, intermediate and upper periods of Paleolithic Age. The Paleolithic Age is generally accepted to start in two million years before the present time and ended ten thousand years ago. The most developed Neolithic Age settlement center of the Ancient Near-east and Aegean is Çatalhöyük, which is 52 km southeast of Konya Province. Anatolia has entered to the Ancient Bronze Age by the end of BC IV. Thousand and by the beginning of BC III. Thousand.

Anatolia has entered to the inscribed history period by the beginning of the year BC 1950. The Hittites has founded the first state governed by the central system in Anatolia at the year of BC 1750. The traces and the art work belonging to Hittites are obtained from the archeological excavations carried in Boğazköy, Alacahöyük, Eskiyapar, İnandık, Maşathöyük, Kargamış, Zincirli, Arslantepe, Karatepe, Sakçagözü and in various places which were under the reign of Hittites.

After destroying the Hittite Empire, Frigs have gained the dominance over some region of Anatolia between BC 1200-700 years. Their government center was Gordion, at the vicinity of Ankara. Urartus, founding a state around Van Lake with their capital as Tuşba (Van) at the beginning of BC I. Thousand has added important works of art to our cultural heritage.

By the end of the BC II. Thousand, as a result of the Dorian migrations, the first Hellenist colonies begin to settle at the western parts of Anatolia. The effect of Ion civilization had significantly increased in Western Anatolia after the year BC 1050. Karia, Lycia and Lydia Civilizations had their brightest and most advanced periods between BC VII- VI. Centuries. The Lydians founded a state at the central parts of Aegean Region by the years around BC 700 with the capital city of Sardes and this civilization made the first currency in the form of coins. The Lydian Civilization was destroyed by Persians in BC 546. But the Lydian civilization continue to effect Anatolia until BC 300. During the reign of Persians in the western Anatolia, because of the combination of the Persian culture with the Greek culture, Greco- Persian Style art works were established and appeared.

After the invasion of Anatolia by Alexander the Great, the Hellenistic Period (BC 333-30) began in Anatolia. During this period, the cities of Aegean Region was ornamented by architectural art works. After BC 30 and following years, there was a major cultural improvement under the reign of Roman Empire. As the Roman Empire was divided into two in the year 395, Byzantium period began in Anatolia and the art works were adapted to this culture. Parallel to the spreading of the Christianity, there was a significant increase in the religious structures and works. The Byzantium period ended in year 1453, after the conquering of Istanbul by Turks. During this period, the cities of Aegean Region were ornamented with the architectural art works.

Turks begin to settle in Anatolia starting from the beginning of the XI. Century during the period of Great Seljuk Empire. During the period of the Turkey Seljuks (1075-1318) who could be counted as the continuation of Great Seljuk Empire, the older cities were repaired and ornamented with new structures and also new settlement places were founded. The priority was set to the religious architecture required by Islam, education institutions and hospitals.

The Ottomans, which founded a state in 1299 and become an empire later had obtained the unification in Anatolia in the period of Fatih Sultan Mehmet. During the ascension period which begins with Fatih Sultan Mehmet, the borders of the empire reached to the inner parts of Iran to Central Europe and from Crimea to Northern Africa. The Ottoman Empire carried its own culture to these new conquered lands while absorbing the admired elements into its own from these lands. Therefore, a rich culture mosaic is founded.
Starting from the XVIII. Century, The effects of European culture on the Ottoman culture is seen.

After the Turkish Independence War under the command of great leader Atatürk, Republic of Turkey was founded in 29 October 1923. The Republic of Turkey took over a rich cultural heritage from the Ottoman Government. Atatürk initiated important studies concerning about enlightening, preserving and presentation of this rich heritage. He founded Turkish Language and History Institutions. He founded and helped education in Faculty of Language, History and Geography. He showed great importance to Museums. He reverted Topkapı Palace and Ayasofya (Hagia Sophia) into museums. By archeological excavations he hold, numerous art works and ancient remains have come into light and entered into museums.

Being a geographic location for numerous civilizations and a mosaic of various cultures, Turkey is one of the leading countries of having rich cultural background and varieties. Turkey has united his natural beauties with its cultural riches and therefore made great improvements in the tourism field. The remains and works of ancient cultures other than Turkish background are preserved and great importance is paid to these art works. Today, although most of the Turkish oriented remains and art works are totally destroyed in Balkans and Central Europe, in Turkey all of the foreign oriented art works are preserved even if they do not have artistic value. There are thousands of art works and ancient remains that could be called as a Wonder in Turkey. The Ephesus Arthemis Temple and Halikarnas Bodrum Mausoleum, which are counted among the seven wonders of the world, were once inside the borders of Turkey. The still remaining parts of these two unique wonders and some of the Turkey's cultural riches are demonstrated at the major museums all around the world. If only the magnificent tiles are tried to be assembled together at one source, volumes of art works having the title of wonder is formed. The mansions, palaces, mosques, meander, şadırvan, fountains, wooden balconies and clothing do not fit into any sort of volumes. In Turkey, happily, we have numerous wonderful and unique art works.

Turkish Literature before Islam.

Vocal Tradition: There are no written documents about Turkish oral or written literature art works that could withstand to reach the modern times before VII. Century. However, some samples of oral tradition as sagu, koşuk, sav etc. and certain parts and theme summaries of some epics are encountered in the sources written in Chinese, Persian, Mongolian and Arabic which are inscribed at later centuries. These sort of information and quotations were also encountered in some Turkish sources.

Sagu are the poetry displaying the characteristics of laments and are sang at the mourning ceremonies called yuğ.

Koşuk is the general name of poetry which carry the themes of war, courage, nature and love and are sang at the ceremonies called sığır and şölen. These poems are sang in quatrains and syllable meters.

Epic poems are the long, written in verse stories, each carrying its own special elegant form to tell its story. The themes of these epic poems are mostly concerned about the existence of the nation and the encountered major events like war, immigration and natural disasters. There are mythological personalities and supernatural events narrated at the epic poems.

Each Turk clan constituted their own epic poems in order to spread their national characteristics at their oral tradition. The most important samples of these epic poems are Kök Turk Epic Poems, Uygur Epic Poems, Manas Epic Poem of Kırgız Turks, Oğuz Kaan Epic Poem (Oğuznâme) of Oğuz Turks and the book of Dede Korkut.

Literature of Kök Turk: According to the recent information gathered, the first written text of the Turkish Literature are determined to be the Inscriptions of Orhon and Yenisey. Although the written words are in small amounts, the fluency of the tongue of the written text carries great importance.

Other than these inscriptions belonging to Kök Turks, there are various other inscriptions and rune carved objects of Kırgız and Uygur clans.

Literature of Uygur: Uygurs played an important role at the development and spreading of the Central Asian Turkish culture. The temple ruins of three major religions of Uygur civilization (Mani Religion, Buddhism and Christianity) were discovered in the excavations executed at the locations where Uygurs thrived in Central Asia in recent centuries. The Uygur language texts discovered in these temples are the sources informing us about ancient Uygur history, culture and similar manners.

Turkish Literature Developed in Central Asia under the effect of Islam Civilization

The group of the Eastern Turkish Literature Group is composed of Karahanlı Literature, Harizm - Altınordu Literature and Çağatay Literature. The Western Turkish is sampled with the Azerbaijani Literature.

Turkish Literature in Anatolia

After the acceptance of Islam among the Turkish clans, a new point of view and a different literature altering in the scope of literary styles, poetry forms and different meters are revealed among these clans. The language encountered an alteration. The traces of the old literature survived among the folk literature. The literature peculiar to the intellectuals is effected by the literature of Arabia and Persia.

Literature of Reforms Period: This literature movement is initiated with the publishing of the "Tercüman-ı Ahval" ( Interpreter of States) Newspaper in 1860. This movement is dependent on the art intellect of the artists whom are grown up with the Western Culture and whom take this western culture as a model. The representatives of this movement renovated the literature works as poetry, history and letters found in the Divan Literature according to the western intellect., and also produced new works in the article, theater, novel, story, memoir and criticism type.

Edebiyat-ı Cedide (Servet-i Fünun): This is a modernization movement initiated by the writers and artists which were collected around the Servet-i Fünûn Journal between 1896-1901. The Edebiyat-ı Cedîde movement had laid great importance to the shape delicacy and psychological observations but as a compensation, had digressed from the social problems.

Fecr-i Âtî : The Fecr-i Âtî writers had produced works displaying romantic and symbolic effects during the first period of II. Constitutional Monarchy. The taste and the point of view of Fecr-i Âtî writers were similar with the writers of Edebiyat-ı Cedîde.

Movement of National Literature and Literature of republic Period.

The Genç Kalemler (Young Pens) journal had initiated a movement under the name of Yeni Lisan (New Language), having the theme of transferring the spoken language into the written language.

The Turkish oriented and nationalist intellectual young generation had effected the Literature of the Republic Period initially. This generation had believed the necessity of writing in the spoken language which the society could understand in order to impress the society and used this spoken language in their literal art works. Especially, the Turkish poetry, which had developed between years 1920-1940 in the same movement and social conditions displayed the common properties with novels and stories. The simplified language in the novels and stories are similarly used in the poetry with the same simplification and syllable metre. The common subject was the living of the folk of Anatolia.

Although Turkey did not participate in the World War Two between 1940-1945, it was effected from the social, political and cultural variations occurring afterwards.
The war, which had been initiated against Nasism and Fascism ideologically, had gained superiority against the socialist movements together with the Western democracy in Turkey as happened in the entire world.

The majority of the novel and story writers had applied and reflected their thoughts about the life to the literature in the name of social reality.

Numerous art works of novels, stories, theatres, humors, poetry and essay were produced in this period

The novel and story writers of the Republic Period had described the life with plain, frank, simple tongue.

After 1950, existentialism and supernaturalism movements coming from Western Culture had effected the Turkish culture. But, besides this interaction, Turkish writers and poets had produced their original art works.

Before Islam religion, the head of the religious ritual was called şaman, kam or baksı and he was enchanting the audience with a piece of iron producing periodic sounds. The drum was an important tool in this rituals.

Most of the Turkish nations like Turks living north of China, Hun Turks, Uygur Turks, Seljuks and Ottomans had paid great importance to music. No army of Seljuks without poets and kopuzcu (folk poets) is encountered.

In the palaces and army headquarters of the elder Turkish khans, musicians played the songs called "9 kök" (9 roots) everyday.

Classical Turkish Music

The Ottomans had paid great importance not only to the art of music but also to the science of the music. There are assumptions concerning that Turkish music is originated from Arabic, Persian, ancient Greek and Byzantium. But Turkish music is originated from Turkish culture when considered from general qualities. Music, was influenced from the culture and art of their environment like other branches of art. But this influence was not imitation, indeed. The Turkish music was shaped inside its own essence system and Turkish art tradition and produced works.

The Turkish music appears such in various mediums: songs, compositions, semai, kar at cities and palace environs; azan, prayer, mourning, affirmation, temcit, prayer to the god at mosques; naat, ritual, hymn, breath, demand at dervish lodges; folk songs, bozlak, uzun hava, zeybek, oyun havası at villages; serhat türküsü at border lines; mehter music at barracks ... After the occupation of Istanbul, education about music was initiated in Enderun Musiki Mektebi (Enderun Music Conservatory), founded in Topkapı Palace and private music schools and after this education Turkish music had derived rules specifically and obtained a classical music quality and is examined in six sections:

1- The preparatory period extending to Meragalı Abdülkadir (1360-1435) from the beginning.
2- The first classical period between Meragalı Abdülkadir and Itri (1640-1712).
3- Last classical period between Itri and Dede Efendi (1778-1846).
4- The neoclassical period between Dede Efendi and Zekai Dede (1825-1397).
5- The romantic period between Zekai Dede and H. Saadettin Arel (1880-1955).
6- The reform period starting with Saadettin Arel and still employed.

The works related strictly to the rules were produced in this classic first period. But these rules were forced in the last classic period. These forced rules begin to disperse in the Neoclassic period.

We see Dede Efendi in the period of Selim III, who produced works ranging between Mevlevi ritual and köçekçe and therefore break the classical rules of Sadullah Ağa by developing lyricism element while obeying the classical rules.

The Turkish music system is composed of forms, methods, modes, orders including 24 intervals and 25 frets.

FOLK MUSIC

The Turkish Folk Music can be both verbal or non - verbal. The verbal music includes all sorts of folk songs and dance music and non - verbal music includes non verbal dance music.
The folk songs with metre are called kırık hava (fractured tunes), songs without meter are called uzun hava (long tunes). The long tunes are named in various names as bozlak, türkmani, maya, hoyrat, divan, ağıt at different regions of Anatolia. These tunes were sang by famous folk singers like Karacaoğlan, Emrah, Ruhsati, Sümmani and many more.

The fractured tunes are called as koşma, yiğitleme, güzelleme, taşlama and ninni. The topics of these tunes are generally carry the specific village themes as being away from home, remoteness, home sickness, death, attending to military service, bravery, wedding, child affection and kidnapping the lover and display properties like plainness, sincerity and emotion and reflect the local colors. When the melody structure of the Turkish Folk Music is examined, it is observed that this melody was created at the dual and pentad intervals that definitely do not reflect the tonality and order which completes an octave (eight voice limit) Besides, there are numerous other wide limited and octave melodies that state tonality and order . Turkish Folk Music is composed of tunes and forms which include unsystematic metres beside plain and composed meters.

The Republic Period

The evolutionary movements initiated at the Republic Period had also directed towards the art manners.

The Musiki Muallim Mektebi (Music Teacher Training School) was founded in Ankara in 1924. The music band in the Ottoman palace was brought to the capital and concerts were arranged under the name of Riyaseti Cumhur Filarmoni Orkestrası (Presidency Philharmonic Orchestra.

The skilled young students was send to Europe for education. The school named Darrültalimi Musiki in Istanbul was transformed into a conservatory with an issued regulation.

The first Turkish musician to become famous in Western civilizations at the Multi vocal art music branch was Cemal Reşit Rey. Ulvi Cemal Erkin, Hasan Ferit Alnar, Ahmet Adnan Saygun, Necil Kazım Akses who were educated in foreign countries by the sponsorship of the government had become teachers in Ankara Musiki Muallim Mektebi (Ankara Music Teacher Training School). The musicians are known as Turkish Five in the history of Turkish Art. These musicians had fused the western music principles with the folk music elements.

The one screen opera of Ahmet Adnan Saygun named Özsoy was displayed at Ankara Community Center in 1924. The second work of the same composer Taşbebek, was displayed with succession in 1934. In order to display the plays of opera and ballet, an Application Scene under the control of Ankara Government Music School had started its studies in 1940. After the election between the skilled young, the education started. The plays like Kerem of Ahmet Adnan Saygun, Van Gogh and Gılgamış of Nevit Kodallı, Nasreddin Hoca of Sabahattin Kalender and Çeşmebaşı of Ferit Tüzün are displayed in the following years. After Ankara, governmental music schools are founded in Istanbul and İzmir.
The necessary and suitable medium for these young and talented youth is prepared after 1940, assisting the development of Turkish Music. Soprano Leyla Gencer, baritone Orhan Günek are the pioneers of this movement and are followed by Ayhan Baran as bass, commentator, soprano Ferhan Onat and soprano Suna Korat. As instrument commentator, pianist Erdoğan Saydam, violin player Ayla Erduran, Suna Kan, pianist Ayşegül Sarıca, İdil Biret, Hülya Saydam, Verda Erman had gathered great interest from inland and foreign spectators.

Nowadays, Gazi University Music Department, Bilkent University Faculty of Music and Stage Arts, municipality conservatoires, private schools, choruses founded under the constitution of private sector and government, amateur chorus and orchestras had assisted the spreading and claiming of the Turkish art Music, folk music and tasavvuf (Sufism).

We can briefly study the Turkish Theatre in four sections:

Traditional Theatre: Turks know about some puppet play types before settling in Anatolia. After their settlement in Anatolia, they have developed plays from the remnants of the fertility blessing rituals which are considered to be the major source of the world theatre and these plays are still played in our villages. The development of theatre in cities were greatly assisted by the military, palace and the guilds.

Among the plays having dramatic properties, meddah, puppet, fake wars, shadow play, juggler and ortaoyunu are the principal play types.

Reforms Period Theatre (1839 - 1908) : The Turkish community had been introduced to the western theatre in this period. The first step was the construction of the theatre buildings. Local and foreign oriented theatre communities were founded. The government had supported the theatre movements occurring under self control or private. Beside musicals and plays, tuluat theatres and ortaoyunları which are not dependent on written texts have developed.

Constitutional Monarchy Period Theatre (1908 - 1923) : Just after the declaration of 2nd Constitutional Monarchy, the number of the theatre associations have rapidly increased. The tendency to become actors spread among youth.

The first important step to train actors from schools were taken in this period and the first conservatoire named Dârülbedaii Osmani were founded in 1914. Two years later, this conservatoire was transformed into a funded theatre community, therefore the foundations of modern Istanbul City Theatre Community was laid.

The Constitutional Monarchy Period Theatre has important roles in the scope of theatre. The primary role is that Constitutional Monarchy acts as a passage between the old period and Turkish Republic. The old values and organizations were discussed and new values and organizations to replace these old values and organizations were researched. The language of the theatre had improved, the foundations of funded theatre organizations were laid, the importance of education about theatre is understood and fights for staging women actresses were carried. The number of the plays, actors and theatres increased, social, political and legal subjects were displayed in theatres.

Republic Period Theatre (until 1923) : Turkish Theatre had exceeded the trial and search period and reached the period of creation and self issuance in this period. The theatre education by government, foundation of a government theatre, spreading of theatre throughout the country by community houses was executed during this period. Beside government theatres and operas and municipality theatres, private theatres are founded and developed. Theatres were constructed in the suburban areas of large cities, country cities and even in villages. Separate from widespreading conservatories, academic theatre education was initiated in some universities.

Cinema had been introduce to Turkey a few months after the demonstration of Lumiere Brothers in 28 December 1895. The first projection was displayed by Bertrand, patron juggler of the Yıldız Palace in 1896, followed by other projections. The construction and opening of the first cinema hall was delayed to 1908, as the timely ruler II. Abdülhamid did not grant permission to connect electricity to Istanbul with the thought of preventing a possible assassination to himself .

The first movie was shot by Fuat Özkınay in 1914, in the year which the Ottoman Empire had participated the World War One (The Collapsing of the Russian Monument in Ayastefanos ), the first organization to produce regular movies was the Central Army Cinema Department leaded by Sigmund Weinberg and Fuat Özkınay. The movie production was started from here with the shooting of documentaries / information movies about the ongoing war in 1915 and although less in numbers, shots of movies with other themes were carried. Pençe (Claw), Casus (Spy) (1917), Himmet Ağa'nın İzdivacı (Marriage of Himmet Ağa) (1918), Mürebbiye ve Binnaz (Governess and Binnaz) (1919) are some of the theme movies. This 8 year period completed by the movie İstiklâl, İzmir Zaferi (Independence, İzmir Victory) which was a major Independence War documentary in 1922 had been assumed to be the "first period "of Turkish Cinema.

From 1923, the second period had started, which was totally executed by Muhsin Ertuğrul one handedly who was a man of theatres for 17 years. Besides the numerous movies shot, this period could not go further than being a period in which no cinema language was formed and movies scenting theatre were produced. Bir Millet Uyanıyor (A Nation is Rising) (1932), Aysel, Bataklı Damın Kızı (Aysel, Daughter of Bad House) (1935), Leblebici Horhor (roasted chickpea seller Horhor) (1934) are among the relatively interesting movies of this period.

The period between the years 1939 and 1950 are called as the transition period and as this period is intersected with the World War Two, it was not a productive period for the cinema and producers. The important and noteworthy improvement of this period is that the cinema generation was able to break the monopoly established by the theatres both on industry and art.

The fruits of this succession of the preceding years were started to be collected in the period between 1950 and 1960. Among the most important producers of this period in which the meaningful attempts of thinking in cinema terms or shooting movies with the cinema language Lütfü AKAD, Osman SEDEN, Atıf YILMAZ, Metin ERKSAN, Memduh ÜN could be counted primarily.

Among the most attractive and interesting movies of the period, Kanun Namına (In the name of law) (1952) directed by Lütfü AKAD and Osman SEDEN attracts attention by its story, language, places, characters and montage and is not only a art work for cinema, Gelinin Muradı ( Desire of the bride) (1952) directed by Atıf YILMAZ , Üç Arkadaş (Three Friends) (1958) directed by Memduh ÜN and Gecelerin Ötesi (Beyond The Nights) (1960) directed by Metin ERKSAN should be considered.


In spite of this improvement process happened especially between 1955-60 and major cinema breakthroughs, Turkish cinema had encountered another 10 years of dissention. Because, until then an approximate number about a hundred movies were shot in a year and later the number of the movies begin to increase uncontrollably and exceeded over two hundreds and as no infrastructure to withstand or cover this load is established, the fact had become a major collusion. In this period lasting in 1970, movies deserving notification had been able to shot: Yılanların Öcü (Revenge of the snakes) (1962), Acı Hayat (Bitter life) (1963) and Susuz Yaz (Dry summer) (1963, Berlin Film Festival Golden Bear Reward) directed by Metin ERKSAN, Yasak Aşk (Forbidden Love) (1961), Karanlıkta Uyananlar (Sleepers in the dark) (1965) directed by Halit REFİĞ, Bitmeyen Yol (Never Ending Road) (1965) directed by Duygu SAĞIROĞLU and Son Kuşlar (Last Birds) (1966) directed by Erdoğan TOKATLI.

After the period following 1970, Yılmaz GÜNEY and his movie Umut (hope) had been a milestone. After this, whether GÜNEY or other directors had produced numerous high quality movies concerning the social, cultural and economic realities of Turkey, which had gained the necessary national and international admiration. The movie Otobüs (Autobus) (1974) of Tunç OKAN which had been rewarded in numerous various places, Endişe (anxiety) (1974) directed by Şerif GÖREN, Yatık Emine (leaning Emine) directed by Ömer KAVUR, Kanal (Channel) (1976) directed by Erden KIRAL, Maden (Mine) (1978) directed by Yavuz ÖZKAN are some of the movies of this period.

As the factors like the organization of the workers and producers of the movie industry, the major supports from the Ministry of Culture, the increasing quality of the cinema education and Eurimages are added to the productivity of the movie making, we could say that a period like 1980 and later in which the ascending productivity is encountered is very natural to happen. Starting this 20 year long and surviving period by the movie Sürü (herd), written by Yılmaz GÜNEY, directed by Zeki ÖKTEN and original music composed by Zülfü LİVANELİ would be appropriate. This movie had been in projection at the cinema halls of Zurich for 8 weeks and Basel for 7 weeks in 1980 and had achieved to be rewarded as the best film among 93 other competitors at London Film Festival.

Yol (road) which was written by Yılmaz GUNEY and directed by Şerif GÖREN had shared the Golden Palm Reward with Kayıp (Missing) by Costa Gavras at Cannes Film Festival in 1987.

Hakkari'de Bir Mevsim (A season in Hakkari) directed by Erden KIRAL in 1983, At (Horse) directed by Ali ÖZGENTÜRK in 1984, Züğürt Ağa (Penniless Aga) directed by Nesli ÇÖLGEÇEN in 1985, Kurbağalar (Frogs) directed by Şerif GÖREN, Amansız Yol (Merciless Road) directed by Ömer KAVUR, Anayurt Oteli (Anayurt Hotel) directed by Ömer KAVUR in 1986 and Uçurtmayı Vurmasınlar (Don't let them shoot the kite) directed by Tunç BAŞARAN in 1988 are among the rewarded movies to be initially remembered.
The movies of the last ten years starting from 1990 until the current date and considered here in this page are taken into account in order to enlighten the interested persons, more than stating the cinema level reached today. Because the "Turkish Movie" is ready to obtain the high prestige location among the world movie not only with the human resources as directors, actors and actresses, writers, cameraman but also with the efforts of infrastructure improvements in order to catch the modern technical standards.


Some of the major films between years 1990-2000:


Ömer KAVUR- Gizli Yüz (Secret Face) (1990)
Yusuf KURÇENLİ - Piyano Piyano Bacaksız (Piano Piano Kid) (1990)
Atıf YILMAZ - Berdel (1991)
Fehmi YAŞAR - Camdan Kalp (Heart of Glass ) (1991)
Ferzan ÖZPETEK - Hamam (1996)
Yavuz TURGUL - Eşkiya (Brigand) (1996)
Derviş ZAİM - Tabutta Röveşata (röveşata in a coffin) (1996)
Zeki DEMİRKUBUZ - Masumiyet (innocence) (1997), Üçüncü Sayfa (Third Page) (1998)
Mustafa ALTIOKLAR- Ağır Roman (Heavy Novel) (1997)
Serdar AKAR - Gemide (On the ship) (1998)
Reha Erdem - Kaç Para Kaç (Run money run) (1998)
Tomris GİRİTLİOĞLU - Salkım Hanımın Taneleri (Pieces of Miss Salkım) (1999)
Nuri Bilge CEYEAN - Mayıs Sıkıntısı (Boredom of May) ( 2000)
Ömer Faruk SORAK - Vizontele (2000)

After the increase of relationship with European Countries after Reforms, the opera communities from France, Italy, Germany, Austria and Greece had visited Turkey and displayed seasonal opera shows at the new constructed opera halls in Istanbul and İzmir. Some major operas had their gala displayed in Turkey. There were some foreign composers and libretto writers who composed opera and displayed in Turkey. As an example, Silistre opera which was composed by Italian Giacomo Panizza and libretto written by Dr. Gabriel Naum and having the theme of the Turkish courage at the Silistre Defense. In XlX. Century, Turkish spectators were able to watch Aida from three different communities in the same night in Beyoğlu. Meanwhile, the communities of minority nations were on stage with operas, opera-humours and operettas and display native plays. These studies continued in the Constitutional Monarchy Period but mostly operetta type native plays were on stage. Some opera compositions as Kenan Çobanları, Libretto written by Halide Edip Adıvar and composed by Vedia Sabra, Nesteren Opera composed by Mehmet Baha Bey, a humorous opera named Şaban composed by Celal Esat Arseven together with Vittorio Redaglia which was displayed in Vienna in 1913, İhtiyar which was staged by amateurs in 1920, libretto written by Şehabettin Süleyman and Hulki Arnil Keymen and composed by Nurullah Taşkıran could be counted as samples.

The studies of musical theatre had continued after the declaration of Republic although no interest was paid to opera initially. The Opera Association was founded in 1930. La Traviata was staged by Büyük Opera Heyeti (Major Opera Committee) in 1934. Again to the honor of the visit of Iran Shah in 1934, Feridun (So called Özsoy) composed by Ahmet Adnan Saygun and libretto written by Münir Hayri Egeli was staged in Ankara Community Center in 19 June. Taşbebek Opera composed by Ahmet Adnan Saygun was staged in same year. Bay Önder Opera was composed by Necil Kazım Akses, libretto written by Münir Hayri Egeli.

After these studies which could not exceed to be trials, the opera department was founded after the foundation of Ankara Government Conservatoire in 1940. The disciplined and real opera studies under the control of Karl Ebert was initiated.

The first opera performance staged was Bastien and Bastienne by Mozart and Madame Butterfly of Puccini in 1941 June.

Until 1970 in which a new Governmental Opera and Ballet General Law was issued, theatre, opera and ballet departments were gathered under a single general directorate. During this period, operas of famous composers like Puccini, Donizetti, Beethoven, Mozart Leoncavallo, Çaykovski and Bizet were staged. Among the famous opera samples, Kerem of Adnan Saygun, Van Gogh opera of Nevit Kodallı (libretto Orhan Asena, Bülent Sokullu, Aydın Gün) Gılgamış of Nevit Kodallı (libretto Orhan Asena), Nasreddin Hoca of Sabahattin Kalender (libretto Gülümser Kalender), Midas' ın Kulakları (Midas's Ears) of Ferit Tüzün (libretto Güngör Dilmen) could be counted.

Government Opera trained world wide opera artists like Leyla Gencer, Orhan Günek, Suna Korat, Ayhan Baran, Ferhan Onat in a relatively short period.

The real ballet education with the support of the government in Turkey had stared in 1948 The Turkish Government had invited the world wide famous choreograph and founder of British Royal Ballet Dame Ninette de Valois to Turkey in 1947 as a consultant. With his preparation and leading, the first ballet school was opened in Istanbul Yeşilköy. The school was transferred to Ankara in 1950 and become a section of the Government Conservatoire. The school had his first graduates in 1957 and participated to the opera studies. As the first performance, they had displayed El Amor Brujo (For the charming love) ballet of Manuel de Falla in 1960. They had performed the three screen Coppelia ballet with succession in the following season.

The ballet society had displayed major improvements in the following years. Some long ballets like Sleeping Beauty, Swan Lake and Silvia from the classical ballet repertory and some modern ballets like Les Patineurs, Le Rendez-Vous, Prince of Pagoda were performed.

Some ballets created by foreign choreographs over the music of Turkish composers are performed: like Çeşmebaşı ( Near the Fountain) (Ferit Tüzün), Hançerli Hanım (Lady with Dagger) (Bülent Tarcan), Sinfonietta (Nevit Kodallı) ballets. The first ballet of a Turkish choreograph Sait Sökmen named Çark (Wheel) had been performed with the string quartet of Pavelin 1968.

The ballet education and the performances are frequented in modern Turkey.

A new and extensive economic program has been initiated by the beginning of 2000 and this program has been in progress in Turkey, in order to decrease the inflation and to reassure the improvement medium in economic field in Turkey. In the contents of this economic program, besides the applications of a severe financial policy and the execution of extensive structural reforms, in order to descend the high inflation expectations rapidly, the exchange values are pre - determined according to the aimed inflation and expressed beforehand and the cash policy had been set to a spectrum in which the liquidity expansion is dependant on foreign resource inlet.

At the application of the program, important steps are taken in the field of structural reforms and to decrease or limit the public losses. At the coverage of the structural reforms, the social security system encountering major losses for long periods are rearranged and important steps were taken in order to obtain the balance between the actives and passives of the system. The first interference of direct income support system in the field of agriculture had been taken and the trials at the pilot areas were resulted in affirmative outcomes and the credit interest rates were determined according to the resource costs. By the foundation of Banking Supervision and Arrangement Association as a result of the reform in financial sector, it is planned and aimed to gather the activities of supervision, arrangement and surveillance of the banking sector under a sole authority. Regarding the privatization activities, 51 percent of the Petroleum Office sold as a block and 31.5 percent of TÜPRAŞ was sold by the public submission in the year 2001. Besides, the income obtained from the cellular phone license sales were higher than expected.

The Central Bank which is in charge of directing the cash policies in Turkey is also responsible from arranging the cash demand, crediting other private or government banks, forming the tools of cash policy and determining the exchange values. The exchange rates originate in the free market conditions under the supervision of the Central Bank. The Undersecretariat of Treasury plays an important and major role in the policies of the Central Bank. This institution especially assists the directing and executing of the banking system.

The financial policies executed in the period following 1980 had canceled the limiting arrangements present in the sector and by this fact, the competition medium was improved. Liberal policy applications as facilitating the income and outcomes of local and foreign banks and lifting the limitations at the interest rates were initiated. The share of the banking sector among the financial sector could be expressed above 70 percent and if the Central Bank is included inside this banking sector, this amount could reach up to 90 percent. The banks acting inside Turkey had rapidly diversified their customer services, had entered into a technological competition medium and directed towards the electronic banking in order to ascend the quality of their service.

Starting from 1963, the basic aims of the five year planned periods were determined as " high growth rates" and " structural alterations in the aspects of industrialization"
The adopted industrialization strategies and the applied financial policies display major alterations in the periods before and after 1980. The applied policies during and after 24 January 1980 Economic Stability Program had variations when compared to the preceding stability programs executed in every 8 - 10 years and this program reflects more fundamental alterations in the economic and industrialization policies. Therefore, radical variations were applied to the cash, finance, foreign trade and exchange rate policies and instead of " import installation oriented - devoted to local market" industrialization, a transformation in the direction of " based on export - devoted to foreign markets" industrialization had been initiated and executed.

After the period following 1980, the support of the industrial sector had been concentrated in the level of production and the foreign capital incitements were increased. This structural alteration in the industry sector had been tried to be applied by increasing the intermediate and investment production at the production industry. Highway vehicles, non - electronic machinery and metal property production are among the first lines of investment properties and in the production of intermediate products, the major share was taken by petroleum and iron - steel products. And in addition, the importation of the intermediate and investment products were greatly facilitated. Therefore, the usage of new technologies and modern marketing methods required by the industry spread inside the country.

Especially after the second half of the 1980s, the governments had planned and executed the "construct - manage - transfer" model, in order to accelerate the infrastructure investments at industry sector and to cover the resource requirements in more convenient conditions. When capital market is taken into account, the necessary pre - conditions to divert small possessions to industry were arranged precedencely and the Capital Marketing Committee was founded by a law issued in 1981. Parallel to these precautions, the banking services were modernized and in order to accelerate the international operations necessary legal arrangements were realized. Great importance was paid to improve transportation and communication services which are counted as prerequisites of industrialization policy.

The primary energy sources used as energy consumption in Turkey could be counted as charcoal, lignite, petroleum, natural gas, hydrologic and geothermal energy, wood, animal and plant churns and in addition to these primary sources, solar energy is also used. The electrical energy and the coke coal is utilized as secondary energy sources. The studies for benefiting nuclear energy is still in progress. In order to cover the increasing energy requirement and the expanses of investments required by energy sector in intermediate and long terms, the increasing role of private sector is understood and studies concerning about the participation of private sector by the side of governmental resources is initiated and the privatization studies in the electric sector had been accelerated.

Turkey is a extremely rich country when the variation of mineral deposits and reserves are taken into account.

Today, production of 53 different mineral deposits and mines are realized in the mining sector in Turkey. The mineral and mine production in the public sector is heavily directed to the fuels and metallic ores as the private sector is concentrated to the production of industrial minerals. The annual average production of charcoal is above two and a half million tons. The only organization producing charcoal is Turkey Charcoal Association General Directorate and this association continues its activities in five establishments by the method of underground mining. The lignite ore deposits are encountered in nearly all regions of Turkey. Turkey is the seventh country of the world in lignite reserves and at the sixth order in the production process. The assistance of the lignite mining to economy is basically in the field of energy production. The lignite and unrefined petroleum production in the sector covers approximately 60 percent of the total production. Also enterprises concerning the search and production for petroleum in foreign countries is realized. In this concept, although limited, petroleum production studies in the common determined fields at Egypt and Khazakistan is still in progress.

As Turkey is a very convenient country for growing and harvesting agricultural products because of the geographic and climate conditions are taken into account, Turkey is one of the rare countries which is self sufficient in the production of agricultural products and foodstuff. The growth increase in this sector is accelerated rapidly after the application of the planned period initiated in 1963 and the annual growth rate is calculated for long terms is realized as average 3.3 percent.
The same rate is above the average annual population increase (2.2 percent) in the same period. The increase in the production was greatly dependent on the increase of planting fields and the increase in the number of the animals used before the planned period. However, the increase after 1963is relevant with the positive improvements in the agricultural technologies and inlet usage and therefore the increase in the productivity. The productivity increased in time relevant with the production improvements as secondary production, improvement of production method, usage of chemical fertilizers, agricultural drugs, irrigation, artificial seeding, bait and the number of the breeding animals and mechanization. The positive activities of the private sector in the purchase of seeds after 1990 is an important factor effecting the increase of the productivity of the vegetal products Again in the same period major successions were obtained in the live stock breeding field by usage of artificial intercourse increasing productivity and in the contention with the animal diseases and detrimental.

The infrastructure facilitation supplied by the government in the field of irrigation and soil processing assisted the positive improvement of agriculture in Turkey in recent years. As an example, after the completion the Southeast Anatolia Project (GAP) in the 21st Century, it would be possible to irrigate 1.7 million hectares of agricultural field of the 3.1 million hectares present in the region. Therefore the variety of the agricultural products would increase and according to this fact with the new technologies installed to the developing agriculture oriented industry in the region would increase the competition power of the regional economy both in inner market and foreign market.

The portion of the agriculture sector value added tax in the gross domestic production had decreased to 17 percent with current prices in 1998, as this portion vas determined to be 26.1 percent in 1980. The portion in the civil employment is about 45 percent. The decrease of the portion of the agricultural sector in the gross domestic production do not definitely mean that the productivity of the agricultural sector is decreased. As a result of the concentration on industrialization policies employed in Turkey, the portion of the industrialization in the gross domestic production had increased. Therefore parallel to the improvements in the industry sector new and modern technologies are started to be used in agriculture sector and new management understandings have developed. The export of the agricultural products in 1998 had exceeded five billion dollars.

26 percent of Turkey is covered by the forest regimes.
The area covered by fine quality and productive forests form only a very low ratio of 13 percent. The productive forest area per person in the country is 0.14 hectares.

The average annual wood production in the forestry sector by public and private sectors is approximately 29 million m3 . Approximately 68 percent of this wood production is used as fuel wood. In order to cover the inner market demands, important amounts of wood is imported every year starting from 1985.

As the surface area of Turkey is wide, three borders are surrounded by seas and as Turkey is a passageway country between Asia and Europe, the transportation sector holds a major importance in the economy of the country. The transportation sector in Turkey is composed of land, sea, air, railroad and pipeline transportation activities. The studies concerning the improvement and coordination of inland and foreign services of the transportation sector is supervised and executed by the Ministry of Transportation. Parallel to the new developments, studies of founding a new separate sub unit in charge of coordination between the organizations acting at the transportation sub sectors under the control of the Ministry of Transportation is in progress. The number of employment in the transportation sector which assists the development of Turkish economic conditions had exceeded on five hundred thousand employees by the year 1998. 21.7 percent of the total stable investments by the public sector is realized to the transportation sector in 1998. The transportation sector, with the communication sector, forms approximately 14 percent of the gross domestic production of Turkey.

At the inland freight transportation, highways hold the majority with the proportion of 87.4 percent. This proportion is 5.5 percent in railroad transportation, 5.3 percent in sea transportation and 1.8 percent in pipeline transportation. 95 percent of the inland passenger transportation is done by highways.

The communication activities had become one of the basic service sectors of economy in Turkey. The telecommunication, radio, television and information networks which provide fast, cheap, qualified and secure services in the free competition medium of the country. The studies concerning the arrangement, installation and improvement of these networks in order to provide unification with the modern world and adaptation to the information age are still in progress. Especially in the years following 1980, the information and communication technologies installed in the most advanced countries of the world are brought to Turkey and presented to the usage of the public. In order to make the required communication services more effective as a necessity of the era, mail and telecommunication services were separated from each other and Mail Services General Directorate and Turk Telecommunication Inc. entered into service separately. The studies concerning the privatization of Turk Telecom had been accelerated. In the field of mobile cellular phone communication system, four private phone operators, Turkcell, Telsim, Aria and Aycell were licensed.

The responsibility of executing Turkish National Education in accordance with the basic principles and in the name of the government is charged to the Ministry of National Education.

The central organizations of the Ministry as the ministry position, Council of Educational Policy, the main service units, information and supervision units are shaped in accordance with the sub service unit hierarchy.

The National Education System determined by the law is executed in two main basic movements called "Normal Education" and "Common Education".

The Normal Education: This method of education is the education executed regularly under the roof of school with the objectively prepared programs to the individuals with the determined age group and equals and includes the associations of pre - school, primary school, senior school and high school.

The pre - school period education; This education is not obligatory and dependent on the will and includes the children of the 3 - 5 age group that do not reach to the period of obligatory education age in order to create a common environment for the children for preparation for primary education.

The primary education covers the education of the children between the ages of 6 - 14 for an eight year continuous period, is obligatory for each citizen, the education at the state schools are not charged and the graduates receive a primary education diploma.

The senior education covers the entire general, professional and technical institutions having minimum three-year education period and is dependent on the primary education. Besides the deliverance of minimum common culture values, the students are prepared for the higher education where the education should be directed to their interests, skills and capacities.

The higher education is dependent on the senior education and covers the totality of the education institutions executing the higher education for a minimum period of two years. These institutions could be counted as universities, faculties, and institutes, high schools and application and research centers.

The higher education executed at these institutions is arranged in an integrity scope instructing the students at levels of associate arts and bachelors degree and Bachelor of Science degree.

Common Education: The common education aims the execution of the education according to the demands of the citizens whom are never been educated or left or remained at any level of education and covers the all of the activities arranged with or without the Normal education. The common education could be classified as education of the folk, apprenticeship education and abroad education.

Following the academic year of 1999-2000, the number of the schools according to their ranks of the education institutions is 65 905 and the number of the students is 15 727 929 and the number of the teachers is 532 595.

The total number of the students educating in the higher education institutions (1999-2000 academic year, together with the official universities and cognizant universities) is 2 millions 788 thousand and 252. 430 thousand and 219 of this total number is registered students of associate of arts, 2 million 358 thousand and 033 is the registered students of the bachelors degree. The total number of the academic personnel and education staff at the mentioned universities for the same year is 125 thousand and 345. 433 thousand and 380 of this number states the academic personnel and the remaining 81 thousand and 965 of this number states the other various education staff.

The Organization at Foreign Countries serves the citizens accommodating in foreign countries with 39 agencies; 21 education consultancies and 18 education representatives.

The number of the Turkish students educating at the normal education institutions at 1999 -2000 academic year in foreign countries is 867 thousand and 095. The total number of the students educating in foreign countries with official or private sponsorship is 29 thousand and 196, 21 thousand and 282 of which are attending the bachelor's degree, 5 thousand and 458 of which are attending to master degree and 2 thousand and 456 of which are attending to doctor degree.

And in the scope of the cooperation with the Central Asian Republics and Turkish Communities in the field of education initiated by the Ministry of the National Education, the Ministry had constructed 12 schools and education centers at Central Asian Republics, six of which educate in Turkish Language applied in Turkey. There are 246 teachers educating 3 thousand and 721 students at this centers and schools. In accordance with the quota granted to these Republics, there are 8 thousand and 064 students educating in Turkey.

Turkey had signed educational, scientific and cultural agreements with 71 foreign countries and relevant studies are still executed.

As education is visualized as the major element of the economic, technologic and social improvement in Turkey, education sector is among the most prior sectors among the government and improvement plans. Therefore, the Major Education Plan covering the years between 1996-2010 was prepared and the flexibilization of the education which could answer the individual, national and international demands and by the assistance of the attained means, it was planned to reach to the high intellectual level. Therefore, the belief of training more Turkish people, which could assist the culture and technology of the world, strengthens each day.

IN ANKARA

TÖMER (Turkish Language Education, Research and Application Center), was founded in connection with the Ankara University Presidency in 1984. Its objectives are to teach Turkish in and outside the country, establish sections in order to introduce Turkish Language and culture; to teach Turkish language to foreigners, foreign accommodating citizens and to each individual willing to learn our language; research and develop programs and improve methods at the subject of educating Turkish as native tongue and to cooperate with various local and foreign associations and institutions. The Turkish courses are delivered at the sections of TÖMER present in Ankara, Istanbul, Izmir, Antalya, Bursa and Trabzon provinces

The Education Program

The Education Programs of TÖMER are arranged in 7 courses.

1. Basic Turkish I
2. Basic Turkish II
3. Intermediate Turkish I
4. Intermediate Turkish II
5. Advanced Turkish I
6. Advanced Turkish II A
7. Advanced Turkish II B

BASIC TURKISH I - II

These courses are devoted to cover the daily live requirements of the students.

INTERMEDIATE TURKISH I - II

This course includes programs devoted to the communication of the students with individuals having the native tongue of Turkish. Also, the students have reach to the level of understanding some plain texts, newspaper articles and current news.

ADVANCED TURKISH I - II A - B

These courses include the education with the texts quoted from the samples of the Turkish Literature and from the newspapers and journals. The subjects stating the Turkish culture and Turkey are presented. The proverbs and the idioms are explained. After the end of the courses, the students are capable of higher education with Turkish language.

The Registration Approval Terms

The course programs of TÖMER are determined at least one year before the education. The participants can apply personally or by mail and register to any course program at a convenient period. The "TÖMER Course Acceptance Card" is delivered to the participants paying the fee of the course from foreign countries. According to this certificate, the student should deliver the application form and attached bank certificate indicating that the course fee of 100 US dollars is paid to the Central Section of TÖMER. The remaining part of the course fee is paid to the TÖMER Registrar's Office at the registration procedure by the student self and in Turkish Liras.

Necessary Documents for Registration

Documents Required by Foreign Students:

1-4 Photos
2-Copy of the Passport
3-TÖMER Course Acceptance Card
4-Toursit or Student visa

Documents Required by Turkish Students:

1-1 Photo
2- Course fee
3- Student ID for students and business certificate for employees.

The ending of the Course

TÖMER applies certificate and diploma examinations at the end of the each course period either in the center or in the sections.

The students completing the courses of Basic Turkish I - II, Intermediate Turkish I - II, Advanced Turkish I are applied an examination and the successors had gained the right to be awarded by a certificate. The students completing the Advanced Turkish II course gain the right to be awarded by the diploma after succeeding the examination of Advanced Turkish II Diploma Examination.

The Ankara University approved diplomas of TÖMER are valid among all of the universities and higher education institutions.

The students that fail the certificate and diploma examinations are rewarded by the Course Participation Certificate.

The Visa Procedures

The students who are willing to learn Turkish from TÖMER have to pre-register to the courses and receive "TÖMER Course Acceptance Card". The students have to apply to the Turkish embassies in their countries together with the mentioned course acceptance certificate personally and the other necessary documents. However, the TÖMER Course Acceptance Certificate does not guarantee the approval of visa application. TÖMER assists the students at the subject of accommodation permission in Turkey.

Applications in Foreign Countries

Province: Ankara
Section: TÖMER Center
Address : Ziya Gökalp cad. No:18/1 Kızılay -Ankara-Turkey
Tel :00.90.312.4358405-4350514
Fax :00.90.312.4359786
Internet :http://www.tomer.ankara.edu.tr
e-mail :webadmin@tomer.ankara.edu.tr

Bank Account Numbers

T.C. ZİRAAT BANKASI
Name of the Branch :Ankara Tandoğan Branch
Branch Code :1282
Account No:900009
Swift Code: TCZB TR2AAANK

Course Periods

The courses are in the form of 4 and 8-week semesters. A course program is completed in each period. An 8-week course period contains 160 course hours. The 4-week courses are the concentrated summer courses and contain total 80 hours. The necessary education period in order to obtain the diploma is 12 months. Beside the total 960 hours of courses, the students should separate minimum 8 - 10 hour studies in order to prepare to the course and finish their home assignments. The classes are distributed as morning, afternoon, evening and weekend. The summer courses are also separated as morning, afternoon and evening classes.

Winter Period Courses

Morning Courses:
Each Day Among The Days of the Week 160 Hour 8 Week 09.00-12.50 640 $
Monday, Wednesday, Thursday 96 Hour 8 Week 09.00-12.50 384 $

Afternoon Courses:
Each Day among the Days of the Week 160 Hour 8 Week14.00-17.50- 640 $
Monday, Wednesday, Thursday 96 Hour 8 Week14.00-17.50 384 $

Evening Courses:
Each Day Among The Days of the Week 80 Hour 8 Week 18.00-19.50 320 $

Summer Period Courses

Each Day Among The Days of the Week 80 Hour 4 Week 09.00-12.50 320 $
Each Day Among The Days of the Week 80 Hour 4 Week 14.00-17.50 320 $
Each Day Among The Days of the Week 80 Hour 4 Week 18.00-21.50 320 $

8 Week Courses

07 February - 04 April 2000
10 April - 02 June 2000

4 Week Courses

07 January - 03 January 2000
06 March - 07 April 2000
10 April - 05 May 2000
08 May - 02 June 2000
05 June - 30 June 2000
03 July - 28 July 2000
31 July - 25 August 2000
28 August - 22 September 2000
02 October - 27 October 2000
30 October - 24 November 2000

Accommodation

TÖMER proposes various accommodation alternatives to students. The TÖMER authorities execute the settlement of the students to the dormitories or hotels at the minimal distances from TÖMER sections. In clean and comfortable rooms, the students can find most of their daily requirements such as breakfast and dinner and daily hot water. The students are provided accommodation at the private dormitories during winter season, and at the Ankara University Vehbi Koç Student Dormitory during the summer season. As a second alternative, students can stay with the families, which are elected by TÖMER with fussiness. The accommodation with a family could assist the student at the sharing of the culture and in learning the daily language. The third alternative is the hotels, which TÖMER assists to its students. The fees of the hotels display variations according to the service provided and being in a major province. For example, accommodation in a two star hotel for a single night would cost between 50 - 70 $; and the cost of a five star hotel would be approximately between 100 - 130 $.

Students of TÖMER should have their lunch at the terrace cafeteria of TÖMER for the cost of 1 $.

Address of the Dormitory

Vehbi Koç Student Dormitory
Mustafa Kemal Bulvarı N0: 75
Maltepe / ANKARA

 Because of the location, Turkey is not only a passageway from which the ancient Asian Turkish culture is transmitted to the Europe, but also counted as a window of Western Culture opening to meet the Eastern Culture. Turkey is surrounded by Mediterranean Sea, Black Sea and Aegean Sea brings the country to the neighborhood of the whole world, not only to the neighborhood of the nearby regions. Because of these long coastal borders and being a bridge between the continents of Asia and Europe, Turkey had been the center of the major commerce and immigration roads.

Turkey is located between Europe and Asia continents and displays the view of a rectangle generally. The region with the size of 790 thousand and 200 km2 are located at the Anatolian Peninsula which could be called as Little Asia, and the remaining region with the size of 24 thousand and 378 km2 is located at Thrace, which is located at the east of Balkan peninsula. The total surface area covered is 814 thousand and 578 km2. With its shores, which are at the length of 8 thousand and 272 kilometers, Turkey is a naval country located at the middle of the most ancient main continents of the world.

The First Geography Summit gathered in Ankar

a at 1941 has separated Turkey into seven major geographic regions after a long and hard study. The first four of this seven pre - determined regions are named by the neighboring seas (Black Sea Region, Marmara Region, Aegean Region and Mediterranean Region). The remaining three regions are named in accordance with their geographic locations inside the total Anatolia (Central Anatolia Region, Eastern Anatolia Region and Southeastern Anatolia Region).

 Turkey is counted as a high country as the mountains cover the majority of the surface, however various plains such as lowlands, plateaus and sediment areas also cover a high ratio. This property diversifies the encountered climate types and also effects the order of the settlements and the economic conditions. Turkey had been separated into seven major geographic regions in accordance with the factors like climate, natural plantation and the distribution of the agricultural activities. These seven major geographic regions are as follows: Mediterranean Region, Aegean Region, Marmara Region, Black Sea Region, Central Anatolia Region, Eastern Anatolia Region and Southeastern Anatolia Region.

As the majority of Turkey is covered with mountains, the major mountain chains present at the northern and southern regions generally draws wide arches, which are parallel to the shore. The mountains at the north are the Northern Anatolia Mountains and the mountains at the south are the Toros (Taurus) Mountains . These mountain chains are separated from each other by the wide plain areas, which are at the central parts of Anatolia. The mountain chains become frequented at the eastern parts of the country and form high altitude peaks. The altitude at the Western part decreases. Mountain chains are uncommon in Aegean and Marmara Regions, this regions mostly display the property of being hollow. There are wide plains in Southeastern Anatolia, as displayed in the central parts of the country, because this region is far from the reach of the expansions of the Toros (Taurus) Mountain chain. The highest mountain of Turkey is Great Ağrı Mountain (5137 meters) and Süphan Mountain which is an extinct volcano is located inside the borders of Eastern Anatolia Region. Karacadağ, Raman and Sof Mountains are the major mountains of Southeastern Anatolian Region.

There are numerous rivers in Turkey. The majority of the rivers are used in the energy production processes. Fırat and Dicle rivers flowing in Eastern Anatolia reaches and joins with the Basra Gulf, Yeşilırmak, Kızılırmak and Sakarya rivers flowing in Central Anatolia reaches and joins with Black Sea, Susurluk Creek in west and Biga and Gönen creeks reach and join with Marmara Sea; Gediz, Big and Small Menderes rivers reaches and joins with Aegean Sea.


The total surface area of the lakes in Turkey reaches up to 9200 km2 . Eastern Anatolia Region is the richest region of Turkey when the number of lakes are taken into consideration. The biggest lake of Turkey, Van Lake (3713 km2) and Erçek, Çıldır and Hazar lakes are located inside this region. The biggest lakes of Central Anatolia Region are mostly shallow and contain salt in high amounts. The second biggest lake of the country, Tuzgölü (Salt lake) (1500 km2) and Akşehir and Eber lakes are inside the borders of this region. The ferry transportation is executed on Van lake.

Marmara and the Straits are the most important water passages connecting Black Sea to the outer world. Marmara Sea, which is located totally inside the national borders is connected to the Black Sea by Istanbul Bosphorus and is connected to Aegean Sea and Mediterranean by Çanakkale Strait. The Aegean and Western Mediterranean shores of Turkey are generally intended and there are numerous gulfs on these shores.

Turkey is located at the south of the medium climate zone when the geographical location is taken into consideration and is under the effect of "Mediterranean Climate", which is a type of subtropical climate in which the summer season passes dry.

Mediterranean Region

Aegean Region

Marmara Region

Black Sea Region

Central Anatolia Region

Eastern Anatolia Region

Southeastern Anatolia Region

Three sides of Turkey are surrounded by seas. The three seas out of the four, Black Sea, Aegean Sea and Mediterranean Sea opens to Atlantic Ocean. Marmara Sea, connecting Black Sea to Mediterranean is located inside the borders of Turkey.

Black Sea

Marmara Sea

Aegean Sea

Mediterranean Sea

Paleolithic Age ( 600.000 - 8000 B.C)

In this first civilization age, mankind began to take progress and had been overlapped by the Glacier Period. During this long period which nearly exceeds half million years, the mankind had not started the production process yet and they are at the primitive stage feeding by the natural sources, sheltering in the caves and tree trunks and construct primitive hunting tools from the natural stones. It is possible to find the traces of the Glacier Period in Anatolia. The Karain, Beldibi and Belbaşı Caves, which are located in the vicinity of Antalya, were used by mankind during the end of this period (BC 20.000 - 8000). Some of the remnants and ancient works discovered in Karain, Beldibi and Belbaşı Caves are displayed in the Ankara Anatolian Civilizations Museum and Karain Museum.

Neolithic Age ( 8000 - 5000 B.C)

Although mankind has learned to start fire and began to reach the physical capacities of their descendants 40 thousand years ago, they had attained the status which could be called civilized only twelve thousand years ago after the beginning of the foundation of the permanent settlements. The fact of permanent settlements had granted mankind the possibility of storing properties and provisions. Numerous small settlements founded in this age were discovered and brought into light at numerous locations around the world. The two most advanced settlements among these small settlements were the Hacılar and Çatalhöyük settlements located in Central Anatolia, in the neighborhood of Konya Province. In Çatalhöyük settlement, mankind was accommodating in adobe huts whose walls were decorated by illustrations and colorfully embossed designs in BC 7th and 6th thousands and adorn their rooms with colorful vases and miniatures constructed from cooked soil. The majority of the miniatures resembled a naked female goddess, the mother earth.. The stonemasons and other various professionals were using tools made of obsidian, and the farmers had cultivated wheat, barley and lentil at the crop fields plough by oxen. The businessmen owned seals made from the cooked soil and the women had owned mirrors made of polished obsidian.

The meal of the inhabitants of Çatalhöyük settlement was not only composed of bread, vegetables and fruits, but also goat and sheep meat was present. Domesticated and trained dogs protected their houses. An exploding volcano was depicted on one the walls of a house, and this volcano was probably Hasan Mountain. This illustration is the most ancient landscape painting known in the history of art and is exhibited with the other above mentioned foundlings in Ankara Anatolian Civilizations Museum. The museum also hosts one of the rooms founded in Çatalhöyük, which is exhibited at the original state and is known as "cult room".

Calcolithic Age (5000 - 3000 B.C)

The Calcolithic Age, which is also known as mine - Stone Age, Anatolia encounters a standstill period. Although beautiful ceramic samples are produced in this two thousand-year period, Anatolia had fallen behind in development when compared with the civilizations in Egypt and Mesopotamia.

Bronze Age (3000 - 2000 B.C)

In this age period, bronze products obtained from the composition of copper, zinc and tin have been produced and the civilization in Anatolia begin to improve again respective to the previous age. The Troia I settlement is the brightest and most advanced center of the early Bronze Age (3000 - 2500 B.C) in Anatolia; but as the discovery of writing in Egypt and Mesopotamia, Anatolia is accepted to be still behind the civilization advances.

The development in Anatolia accelerates again in the Intermediate Bronze Age (2500 - 2000 B.C) after a standstill period which reaches nearly 2500 years. Although writing is not still in use, the Hatti Civilization founded in Central and Southeast Anatolia and the Troia II settlement in Northwest Anatolia are among the exceptional civilizations in the scope of the world civilizations.

HATTI CIVILIZATION (2500 - 2000 B.C)

The remnants of the Hatti language, which we encounter in the texts of Hittite Civilization, has its own special structure and do not display any similarity with other language used at the very same age period.

Although the Hatti Civilization displays the effects of Mesopotamia culture and civilizations, they represent a strong originality in the fields of art and especially physical culture. The effects of Hatti Civilization had influenced Anatolia for approximately two thousand years which had demonstrated major riches in religion, tradition, mythology and art. Therefore, Anatolia was called as the land of Hatti by the neighboring civilizations reigning between BC 2500 - 700 years. Again because of the same fact, the Hittites originated from Indo - Europe had mentioned Anatolia as The land of Hatti in their written sources during their history. The meaning of Cheta in the Old Testament was understood to be the folk accommodating in Anatolia after the discovery and study of the Boğazköy tablets in the beginning of the century.

The Hatti Civilization was composed of small governmental states. These minor kings also bear the high priest title and assisted the creation of very original works of art in their states. The samples of these works of art were discovered in the region located in the curve of Kızılırmak River like Alacahöyük, Horoztepe and Mahmatlar and resembled gods in the shape of animals; the bulls depict god of storm, the deer depict his wife, the goddess Vurushemu and the banners of the kings represent the Universium. This universe symbol which generally stands at the tip of the horns of two oxen is the source of the folk tale "the world stands at the tips of the horns of an ox, and if the ox shakes his head, earthquake happens" which is still told in the villages.

TROIA II SETTLEMENT (2500 - 2000 B.C)

The second major culture center of the Intermediate Bronze Age in Anatolia is the above-mentioned Troia II settlement located in the borders of Çanakkale. Schliemann executed the first excavation in Troia and he had accidentally discovered a treasure composed of golden household objects and various jewelry, which he named as the Treasure of Priamos. This unique and wonderful treasure was taken to the Berlin Museum but unfortunately this unique treasure was lost forever in the World War II. Today, only a small but very important part of this famous treasure remained in the Istanbul Museum. However, only beautiful galvanize copies of the lost golden bowls are present in the museum.

Although H. Schliemann had greatly ruined and damaged the city of Troia II at the excavation studies, today the entrance ramp, the city walls and some sections of the large megarons are still standing at the excavation site.

THE PERIOD OF HATTI - HITTITE CITY STATES (2000 - 1750 B.C)

The Hittites have reached Anatolia among Caucasia by the end of 3000 B.C during the great migration of the Indo - Europe nations travelling towards the warmer countries from the Northern Europe. But this migration of the Hittite tribes had occurred in the way of infiltration more than invasion. The Hatti city-states were dominating Anatolia Region during the period of the first quarter of BC second thousand while the Indo - European originated city-states begin to be founded suddenly. The number of the Hittite cities states begin to increase and by the 1750 B.Cthe Hittites invaded Anatolia totally and founded the Hittite State.

HITTITE STATE (1750 - 1200 B.C)

As mentioned above, the Indo - Europe originated Hittite tribes had entered Anatolia about 2000 B.C years had founded their first kingdom near 1750 B.C and in the mids of 2000 B.C , they have founded The Great Hittite Kingdom (Hittite Empire).

The Hittites founded one of the greatest states of Near East in 15th and 14th Centuries B.C. In 13th Century B.C, they share the dominance of the world with Egypt.

In 1875 B.C, there was a great battle between Hittites and Egyptians at Kadesh, where the King of Hittites Muvattalli had used 3500 chariots which was the most powerful strike weapon of the age and defeated the rival army. The text of the treaty which is written in the Hittite Language signed between Hattuşili IV and Rhamsesis II is exhibited in the Istanbul Archeological Museum. This document is the first political treaty signed between the two major states in the history of the world.

The pin writing was in use in the city of Kanesh (Kültepe in the vicinity of Kayseri) in 18th century B.C, which was one of the first settlement centers of Hittites. The Hittite civilization also used hieroglyphics (painted language), which was their invention for the understanding of the common folk. Therefore, the historic age in Anatolia had started with Hittites initially, 1000 years after Egypt and Mesopotamia.

We have mentioned above in the Hatti section that the Hittites had mentioned Anatolia as "the Land of Hatti" like Mesopotamians and the Chetans stated in the Old Testament have been originated from the Hatti language. During the decryption of the Hittite language, the philologists had accidentally named this Indo - Europe originated nation as Hittites instead of Nesi because they encounter the name Hatti frequently and they are also inspired from the Old Testament. The Hittites are called "Hititler" in Turkish, "die Hethister" in German, "Les Hitites" in French and " Gli ititi " in Italian. In Turkish, the Hittites were used to be called with the word "Eti".

The Hittites were influenced from the Hatti civilization in all aspects of the culture and civilization. Their religion, mythology, tradition, costoms and in all fields of culture and art were influenced from Hatti and they have obtained the names of gods, rivers and cities from Hatti civilization. For example, the name of the Hittite capital Hattuşa is originally from Hatti language and is derived from Hattuş. Hattuşili, which is the name of the 4 major kings of Hittites are originated from the same root.

Although being majorly influenced from the cultures of Hatti and Mesopotamia civilizations, the Hittite culture displays interesting characteristics. The temples display original properties and the city walls are unique in the world with the characteristic of possibility to counter attack the enemy while protecting the defense position. Although the figurative art of the Hittites display the influence of Mesopotamian culture from the iconographic view, they have created an original and interesting style.

The Hittite State was the only state in Near East in which the women had important social rights and the human rights were under the protection of the laws.

HURRI CIVILIZATION

This civilization was founded nearly in the same period with the Hittites in the Eastern Anatolia Region and is reigned by a royal Indian family. Mitannis used the language of Hurri. This language forms a unique language group and is used by the Urartus (900 - 600 B.C) which are encountered in the first period of 13th century. The Hittites were majorly effected by the Hurri civilization in the 13th century.

Troia VI Civilization (1800 - 1275 B.C )

A kingdom had founded and developed the advanced Troia VI Civilization in Çanakkale, which was in the same period with the Great Hittite Kingdom. The nation forming this civilization was relatives of Mykens, and the settlement was the city of Illion stated in the epic of Ilias by Homer. The city walls and the megarons of the Troia VI was well preserved and forms one of the most valuable place of visit of Turkey. The important ceramic remnants discovered in the excavations of Troia are exhibited in Istanbul Archeological Museum.

"THE AEGEAN MIGRATION" AND THE INVASION OF ANATOLIA BY BALKAN NATIONS (1200 B.C)
As a result of the "Aegean Migration" occurred in 1200 B.C, the Indo - European nations from Balkans had primarily destroyed Troia VI and later Hattuşa and caused the removal of this two original cultured states from history. After 1200 B.C, because of the destruction of the two advanced civilizations, the usage of writing had ceased existence and Anatolia had regionally retreated to the poorly cultured level for 300 - 400 years. The hand made rude ceramic works discovered in the Troia 7b1 section and the Buckelceramic obtained from the Troia 7b 2 section belong to the above mentioned Balkan nations and are exhibited in Istanbul Archeological Museum.

At the first period of the 1000 B.C, in the Iron Age (1200 - 700 B.C), Anatolia peninsula was under the reign of various sized city states of various nations as is was in the first quarter of 2000 B.C. The Southeast Anatolia and some regions of Syria was dominated by Late Hittites, Eastern Anatolia was under the dominance of Urartus who are the continuance of Hurri state, Central Anatolia was under the dominance of Phrygia, Lydians and The Southwestern Anatolia was under the dominance of Karians and Lykians.

LATE HITTITE CITY STATES (1200 - 700 B.C)

The late Hittites have settled in Southeast Anatolia and North Syria of the present day and had majorly continued the Anatolian Hittite culture. The Late Hittites were influenced from the Babylonians, Assurians, Arabians and Phoenician in time and had especially played an important role in the development of the young Hellenistic art in the 8th and 7th Centuries.

URARTU CIVILIZATION (900 - 600 B.C)

The Urartu Civilization was founded in the regions of Van Region of the Eastern Anatolia, Iran and Russia of the present day. The language spoken in the Urartu civilization was a dialect of Hurri language, which was different than the languages of Sami, Indo - Europe and Hatti language. The Urartus had expanded their kingdom to the shores of Syria in 8th century for a short period and they had advanced mining and metalworking techniques. The bronze works of Urartus were found in the provinces of Phrygia and Etrüsk civilizations.

PHRYGIAN CIVILIZATION (750 - 300 B.C)

The Phrygians are one of the Balkan originated nations entering Anatolia after the destruction of Troia VI. But they had firstly appeared as a political community after 750 B.C and had reached to the level of a strong kingdom dominating Central and Southeast Anatolia in the period of Midas (725 - 675 B.C). Phrygians had become a nation of Anatolia in a respectively short period and had been majorly influenced from the late Hittite and Hellenistic cultures, but they were able to develop an original culture understanding. The metal and wood works and the textile products were used as models in the Hellenistic world. The Phrygians are the inspiration source of Hellens in the field of music.

LYDIAN CIVILIZATION (700 - 300 B.C)

The language of the Lydians is originated from the Indo - Europe origin but displays the elements of the native Anatolian languages before 2000 B.C . Although they had occasionally conquered the Ion provinces in 7th century B.C, they were majorly influenced from the Hellenistic culture. But their structure skills had been approved and used by the Hellenistic culture.

KARIAN & LYKIAN CIVILIZATIONS (700 - 300 B.C)

The Karian and Lykians display similar language properties with the Lydians and speak a dialect originated from the Indo - Europe origin but displays the elements of the native Anatolian languages. We have very limited information about Karians. Besides, the wonderful and beautiful stone tombs of Lykians standing in the Southwest Anatolia Region are among the breath taking monuments of Turkey.

ION CIVILIZATION (1050 - 300 B.C)

As former İzmir excavation exposes, the Ion provinces are founded around 1050 B.C. Ions had formed primitive agricultural communities for 300 years, in the second half of the 8th century, the Ion nation began to develop with the influence of Egypt, Phoenicia, Assur and Hittite centers and lived their most advanced period between 650 - 545 B.C.

The major importance of the Ion civilization in the history of the world is that the primary rising of the free intellect and free scientific researches were experienced in the cities founded by Ion civilization. Especially the philosophers from the city of Miletos had researched the nature and the natural events in a manner freed from the religious rules and superstitious beliefs of the period. The nature philosopher Thales, whose father was Karian Hexamies and mother was Helen and thinkers like Anaximondros and Anaximenes had laid the first foundations of the positive sciences like philosophy, mathematics, geometry and astronomy based on the information they had gathered from Egypt and Mesopotamia with a new free attitude. Thales, who had visited Egypt and Mesopotamia, had calculated the date of a nature event, the eclipse of the sun in May 28,585 B.C for the very first time in the world depending on the information he had gathered from the countries he had visited. This scientific determination was the first step: the developments occurred in the Islam world by Arabs, Persians and Turks between 9th and 12th centuries A.D and that had been the first Renaissance movement. This was the first step of the scientific researches that leaded to the conquest of moon by mankind founded in the Renaissance age in Europe and later in the l9th and 20th century.

The Ionia was also the most important center of poetry and art fields in the world at that age. The Arthemis Temple in Ephesos with the dimensions of 55 x 110 meters had been totally constructed from marble for the first time in the world and the Ion architecture structure had been carried to Athens and had survived until the beginning of the 20th century as an architectural structure which Europe and America found pleasure in repetition of the style.

The beautiful and well preserved ruins of the Ion architecture are standing in ancient cities of Bergama, Sardis, Ephesos, Priene, Miletos, Didyma, Aphrodisiacs and Aizanoi. The statues of the Ion art are under preservation in the Turkish Museum. Although the Ion vase artistry is at the second place when compared to the creations of Greek culture, they are unique with their lovely humor style.

THE PERSIAN DOMINANCE (545 - 383 B.C)

Anatolia was under the dominance of Persia until the invasion of Anatolia by Alexander the Great in 6th century and the defeat of Dara in 333 at Issos. After the total invasion of Anatolia by Persians, the leadership of the Ion civilization in the world had ended. However as some of the Persian governors acted like independent kings, worldwide art works were created especially in Karia, Lykia and Propontis by the end of 5th century B.C and in the 4th century. Among these, the Nereidler monument in Xanthos and the Mausoleum in Bodrum could be counted. The architectural and statue works of these two monuments are majorly exhibited in the British Museum and some ruins and finding are present in Bodrum.

HELLENISTIC PERIOD (333 - 30 B.C)

As Alexander the Great had wiped the Persian invasion from Anatolia and freed the Hellenic provinces from dominance, the Peninsula once again become the leading place of the world art.. The cities like Assos, Bergama, Magnesia, Ephesos, Tralleis ( Aydın ), Miletos and Didyma had gained power again and the architectural works produced in these cities had effected the Roman art.

THE ROMAN AGE ( 30 B.C- 395 A.D )

As the Romans had invented and developed the method of joining the bricks with plaster and constructed wide volume structures as aqueducts, vaults and domes and therefore created the first major engineering works among the world. Although the primary major works were constructed inside the country of Rome, Anatolia had become the country in which this new construction technique had been successfully employed. Cities developed not only at the Western and Southern Anatolian Regions, but also in various locations inside the peninsula. There are monumental buildings like Agora, Government Building, Gymnasium, Stadium, Theatre, Baths and Fountains inside all of the cities and most of these buildings were constructed from marble. Marble plaques covered the roads and there were caravansaries with pillars on each side of the road. Therefore, the citizens were protected from sun and dust in summer seasons and from cold and mud in winter seasons. Strong and well-maintained roads and stone bridges connected all regions of the peninsula to each other. There were milestones on the sides of the roads to display the distances for the first time in the world. Especially during the 2nd century A.D, Anatolia was one of the most advanced states of the world and the wealth, comfort and the beauty of its cities had reached to a level which can challenge the cities of Rome itself. There are numerous picnics sites preserved at a state of Roman age in West and South Anatolia and are open for the visit of tourists.

BYZANTIUM CIVILIZATION ( 330 - 1453 A.D )

The Byzantium art was born in Anatolia at the end of the Roman Period. At the end of the 3rd century A.D, as the Roman art had entered in a period of degeneration in the fields of sculpture and architectural ornamentation in the cities of the peninsula, the artisans of the early Christianity period had granted a rebirth and a new meaning to these fields of art. We can tell that, the early Christianity and Byzantium Period art works are the expressionist interpretation of the late Roman art. The early Christianity and Byzantium art is the new stage and development in the Architecture field in the history of the World.

This new art style appearing in the cities of Anatolia like Sardis, Ephesos, Aphrodisiacs, Hierapolis, Side, Perge, Antakya had developed and reached to its cultured stage in the city of Constantinopolis, which was founded by Emperor Constantine in 330 B.C,which is currently known as Istanbul. The city of Constantinopolis had become the most important culture and art center of the world for nearly two and a half century between 330 - 565 B.C. The early Christianity civilization had encountered its most advanced period during the reign of Emperor Justinian ( 527 - 565 B.C). Aya Sofya (Hagia Sophia) (532 - 539 A.D) which is a Central Domed Basilica is the most important wonder of the Byzantium art and is one of the most important and most famous art works of the World.

The Church of Aya İrini (6th and 8th century B.C), the St. John basilica in Ephesos (Justinian Period) and the Church of Maria (4th and 6th century B.C), the Alahan church in South Anatolia ( 5th and 6th century A.D) are among the most important and well preserved religious structures of Byzantium period. The Fethiye Mosque which was St. Mari Pammakaristos Church (1310 A.D) and Kariye Mosque which was Chora church in Istanbul are among the most important and well preserved religious structures of the late Byzantium period. The walls joined with the multi-domed cover and the three layered archways display a very harmonious sight.

The still standing ruins of the Tekfur and Laskaris palaces and partially preserved city walls in Istanbul represents a breath-taking spectacle with the multi colored brick works.

The ground tiles of the great Palace in Sultan Ahmet, the wall mosaics of Aya Sofya, Fethiye and Chora churches are in high quality and have unmatched beauty. The silver bowls discovered in the vicinity of Finike in Southern Anatolia and other silver and gold embroidered objects are the proofs of the advanced Byzantium jewelry.

THE SELJUK CIVILIZATION (1071 - 1300 B.C)

The first nation to settle and inhabit in the entire Anatolia had been the Turks. Hittites, Frigs and the Greeks had been able to settle in particular sections of the peninsula as the preceding nations. The Persians (543 - 333 B.C) and later the Romans (30 B.C 395 A.D) had succeeded in conquest of the entire Anatolia but they did not settle in entire Anatolia, instead they hold the political control of the entire land.

The Turks had reached Anatolia by continuos raids from Central Asia and by migration. The Turks had gained the sympathy of the Anatolian nations, the majority of which are of Indo - European origin by their administration based on tolerance. The citizens accepting the Islam Religion had become Turks, so the native nations and the Turks began to fuse with each other starting from 1071. Therefore, Turks have accepted the ancient civilizations as the heritage of all humanity, not only as their national riches.

The Seljuks had developed a high-level tolerance culture in accordance with the boundaries of the above-mentioned first Renaissance movement developed in the Islam world in 9th -12th centuries A.Din the Ion civilization section. Mevlana Celaleddin Rumî was teaching and writing about a humanist point of view with a modern expression in 13th Century in the Province of Konya and the value of his teachings is appreciated especially in the current century. Medical studies and researches were executed at the major hospitals founded in every Seljuk province and astronomic studies were executed at the observatories.

As in the Roman Period, The Seljuks had connected various regions of Anatolia which are separated from each other by mountain chains and different climates by strong, well-maintained roads and stone bridges. And the trade caravans could stay at the beautifully crafted and constructed caravansaries, which are the bright artworks of architecture.

Although the Seljuks are greatly influenced from the Arabic and Persian art and culture, they had developed an original civilization. The originality of the Seljuk art is formed from the elements, which they had carried together from their motherland, Central Asia. The mausoleums are the monumental interpretations of Turkish tents transformed into stone buildings. The tile crafting, metal and woodworking, art of miniature greatly demonstrate the effects of Central Asia. The method of curved carving is an original method used in Central Asia originating to Turkish clan of İskit.

The Seljuks had granted appropriate volumes and adobes to the structures of caravansaries, mosques, mausoleums and theological schools relevant with the Anatolian climate. The Persian originated monumental entrance gates are adorned with the beautiful representations of Turkish art.

Either these high entrance gates or their adornment elements resemble the Gothic churches. The Gothic architecture structures constructed with bricks in North Europe are of Seljuk origin and carried among that distance after the Crusades. There are unpaired and unique Seljuk structures in the cities Konya, Kayseri, Niğde, Sivas, Divriği, Amasya, Urfa and Malatya. The art of the Seljuk civilization is present in Anatolia with the selected samples of original tiles, metal and wood works.

THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE (1299 - 1923)

Anatolia had been the power source of the great Ottoman Empire, which had leaded the Islam world for six centuries. The Ottomans had improved the culture and art of the Seljuk Turks and adapted new dimensions to these facts. The Ottomans were inspired from the Byzantium architecture and combined this inspiration with new progress and stages and therefore granted one of the most authentic architecture styles to the history of art.

The Turkish art of construction had encountered a development from the disorganized volumes of Seljukian Period towards an assembled residence. In fact, the Turkish architecture had undergo a stage by stage evolution of 300 years towards the assembled and gathered under a dome cover construction style. The Seljuk theology schools in Konya, Karatay and the Şehzade (prince) and Selimiye mosques represent this evolution.

The Yeşil Mosque in Bursa (1424) is also assembled under two relatively large domes. However, the presence of a heavy wall between two domes had definitely separated the interior section into two parts. Despite this fact, this solution was the fist step for the space integrity. As a matter of fact, the south dome of the Rumî Mehmet Paşa Mosque (1471) in Istanbul and the Atik Ali Paşa Mosque (1497) in the vicinity of Çemberlitaş had been transformed into semi - domes in order to remove the walls encountered in the Yeşil Mosque and therefore instead of two separate rooms, a single interior section was obtained. In fact, the two domed interior sections had been decreased into a one and a half domed interior section, meaning that the volume had been shrinked though the space integrity had been obtained. This is the second major step.

When Sinan was in charge, he had found the Turkish art of construction following this development line and he had carried this evolution to its final stage. Besides the two semi - domes of Bayezit Mosque, one is located in the south, and other is located in the north, we see four semi domes in Şehzade Mosque (1548) one of each in the either direction. Therefore, the sections excluded from the space integrity in the west and east directions until that day had been assembled under the same space integrity.

If we consider the style of the mosques of the Turkish architects following Sinan, we should say that these architects consider Şehzade Mosque as the most important artwork of Sinan. Because, the works like Sultan Ahmet Mosque (1616), Yeni Mosque (1663) and Fatih Mosque (1771) are the reproductions of the Şehzade Mosque from the point of plan and style. Therefore the apprenticeship work of Sinan had become the classical sample of the Turkish Architecture. However Süleymaniye and Selimiye are so unique and one-time monuments that no architect had dared to copy these artworks and therefore preferred to employ the Şehzade Mosque as the sample to obtain the space integrity objective.

Sinan had exposed the most successful and most harmonious sample of central construction style in the world with Selimiye Mosque. The increasing of the number of the supporting pillars from four to eight and therefore shaping the structure in a way that it could be seen exactly the same from each direction faced is an unmatched success of Architect Sinan. Architect Sinan could not materialized this will in Şehzade and Süleymaniye mosques. The four minaret of the mosque support this harmony of masses. The excellence of the harmony of the inner and exterior view and the beautiful and effective silhouette reaching up to the sky grants Selimiye Mosque to be among the wonders of the world.

The architects of the Ottoman Empire produced marvelous works of architecture and engineering with the construction of mausoleums, theology schools, libraries, mansions, palaces, baths, commercial buildings and especially aqueducts and bridges. The mansions are counted among the most attractive structures of the world art.
The Ottoman art of miniature carries a different meaning from the other eastern miniature by the embroidered daily and historic subjects.

At the end of the World War I, the empires were scattered and instead new nation - states were founded. After the collapsing of the Ottoman Empire, The Republic of Turkey was founded as a nation - state. At the presidency of Atatürk, The Government of Great National Assembly had saved the land from the invasion of foreign forces with the Independence War and with the Lozan Treaty the existence of the new Turkish Republic was approved by the nations of the world.


The months following the Lozan Treaty had passed with the preparations of a new political formation. In order to take the leadership, the Cumhuriyet Halk Fırkası (Partisi) (National Republic Party) had been founded ( September 9,1923). Mustafa Kemal Atatürk was appointed for the presidency of the party. The military personnel who were in charge at the Independence War and the senior bureaucrats were appointed for the administration staff of the party. The party was defending the subjects like continuance of the national strife in a civilian medium, the modernization of the country and execution of the Western system, institutions and life style which was chosen as a model. In order to shape the government according to the democratic and modern facts declaration of Republic was realized in September 29,1923. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, who was the great and successful leader of the national strife was elected to become the first President of the Turkish Republic by a unanimous vote. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk had appointed İsmet İnönü as the first Prime Minister. Four months later, the caliphate organization, which was not concordant with the principle of republicanism, was removed and the members of the Ottoman Dynasty were deported from the country. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk was fully aware that for the foundation of a modern community, the religious and the governmental tasks should be separated from each other, so he had realized the most important social deviation by the principle of "secularism". As the caliphate organization was removed, a series of severe reforms were realized at the associations bounded to this organization. Major steps in the subject of the Women Rights were realized. The marriage with several women was prohibited and the necessity of legal marriage was obliged. The law for divorcement right by the court is issued. Before most of the European countries, the women had attained the rights of election and electing for the municipalities in 1930, village elder committees in 1933 and TBMM in 1934. One of the major steps realized in the path of modernization was executed in the field of Turkish language. A new Turkish alphabet was prepared by the Ministry of National Education and the law suggesting the usage of Latin letters was approved by TBMM in November 1,1928. The former weight and length measures were changed in 1931.

The "Law of Surnames" was issued in June 21,1934, and the founder of the Turkish Government and Republic Mustafa Kemal had been granted the surname "Atatürk" by TBMM. He was now the ancestor of the entire Turks.

The endeavors for creating a modern country on the basis of secularism was reflected to the constitution level and with a modification in 1928, the "the religion of the Turkish Republic is Islam" verdict was removed from the constitution. In 1937, the verdict stating that the Turkey is a secular government was inscribed in the constitution. Atatürk has executed the evolutions under the leadership of the National Republic Party, which was founded as a party representing the entire nation, and he had inspired this evolutions and principles to the entire nation.

The Government of the Republic had adopted a model primarily based on private enterprises in order to develop the collapsed economy taken as a heritage but obliged to apply state control policy growing in time.

A foreign policy depending on peace and the borders of Milli Misak (National Borders) during the period of Atatürk. With the application of a successful diplomacy, Istanbul and Çanakkale Straits remained inside the national defense system (Montreux Treaty, 1936). With the Balkan (1934) and Sadabad (1937) pacts, the amity policy displayed towards the entire neighboring nations were widespread. Peaceful policies directed towards Europe and the utilization of the international conditions had allowed the reunification of Hatay, which was abandoned to the French before, with the motherland.

With all of his dynamism, strong intuitions, ability to truly calculate the power balances, the true evaluation of the inner and foreign conditions, Atatürk had passed away in November 10,1938 leaving big traces in the direction of the Western model behind. His descendant country had adopted his principles.

After the death of Atatürk, İsmet İnönü was elected to become the second President of the Turkish Republic. He was the "single chief" of his period as the President of the Government and the political party. He was in the service during the most depressed period of the world and Turkey. During his Prime Minister service, he tried to resist to the economic crisis of the world with the policy of state control. He attempted to improve the industry by the assistance of Public Financial Enterprises (KİT) and executed major reforms in this fact.

The most important achievement of İsmet İnönü was the success to exclude Turkey from the World War II. His policies concerning this fact were being executed in the ways of obtaining the balance between various powers at the same time and the securing this situation of the country in some directions. Turkey was invited to San Francisco Summit in March 5,1945 and was located among the countries founding the United Nations. Turkey had not participated to the World Wear II but was affected in negative way.

İnönü was a farsighted man of politics, so he could not be a mere spectator either to the winds of freedom and democracy starting to blow in the world after the World War II or to the social reactions aroused from the depressions of war. As a matter of fact, he talked about the necessity of the "liberalization of the regime" in 1945. And later, he vocalized "the necessity for an opposition party". From this path he cleared he tolerantly watched the foundation of Demokrat Parti (Democrat Party) from the CHP, and in 1950 DP had gained the governmental power as a result of the countrywide elections.

DP who speaks in the favor of democracy and a liberal economy had developed rapidly, managed to participate to the General Assembly in1946 and to attain the power of government alone in the elections of May 14,1950. Thus the period of the single party in Turkey was ended and the first change of power by the vote of nation was realized. DP had increased the number of the votes in the 1954 elections, therefore riveted its status of power. Although the votes of the party had greatly decreased in 1957, the party had attained the status of power until 27 May 1960.

During his ten-year period of rulership, DP had brought a significant vigor to the economy and the daily life of the community. The economy expanded, the income of the people had increased and numerous villages had attained the services like roads, infrastructure and electricity. New cultivation fields were arranged, the mechanization in agriculture field was initiated, there was a significant increase in trade and major steps were taken in the field of Industry. The process of transference of foreign and commerce capital to industry had started.

After 1954, the public support to the DP government began to weaken and because of the political and economic factors in Turkey, the Turkish Armed Forces had seized the power in the morning of May 27,1960.

The Adalet Partisi (Justice Party) which effected the political life of Turkey between 1960 and 1970 was founded in February 11,1961. The retired full general Ragıp Gümüşpala was elected as the first general chairman of the party. After the death of Gümüşpala in 1964, The Government Water Processes Former General Director Süleyman Demirel was elected to the position of the General Chairman. The government period of AP between the years 1965 - 1971 was one of the brightest periods of Turkey in economic, social and political aspects.

The student actions and movements initiated in France in 1968 and spread throughout the world had entered to the agenda of Turkey from the first place by the end of 1960's. These student actions initially had the characteristics of revolt against the education and examination system in universities but would gain the political and ideological content afterwards. The freedom medium of the 1960's ended with the March 12,1971 memorandum. At the 1972 General Assembly, Ecevit and friends had stated their candidacy for the party administration against the group of İnönü. After the succession of the list of Ecevit, İnönü had resigned from the general director position, deputy position and CHP membership. At the urgent assembly of the extraordinary General Assembly, Ecevit was elected for the position of General Chairman. A new period was started for CHP. In the 1973 elections, CHP had gathered the highest vote amount. After long negotiations CHP General Chairman Ecevit had established a coalition government with the Milli Selamet Partisi (National Security Party) (MSP) displaying the Islamic movements. Although this extraordinary coalition had resulted in some positive outcomes, the effects of petroleum crisis occurring throughout the world had been reflected to Turkey.

After the stroke of ENOSIS against the Makarios government in Cyprus in 1974 June, Turkey was forced to use its rights of guarantorship arising from the London Treaty and 1960 Cyprus Constitution and had executed a military intervention against the island. In this period, the economic problems become much heavier. The basic nutriment materials, petroleum and gas were out of stock. The queues and the black market begin to exist. Although the January 24,Decisions issued by the Demirel government had positive consequences in the short term, the terror actions continued. In order to continue the liberation and economic stability programs initiated with the 24 January Decisions, the Anavatan Parti (Motherland Party) (ANAP) was founded by the demand of power. The parties to participate the 6 November 1983 elections was ANAP, MDP and HP and ANAP was elected with the vote ratio of 45.1 percent and attained the power alone. The first ANAP government was founded in 13 December at the presidency of Turgut Özal.

ANAP had attained the power alone in the 1983 elections under the presidency of Turgut Özal and continued the succession of being in power in the 1987 elections. The most important characteristic of the Özal Period was the transformation of the economy into a brand new direction with the brave and resolute reforms. Özal had described this liberal transformation as "Big Transformation", and in this transformation the Law of Preserving The Value of the Turkish Money and the foreign exchange regime was totally altered, the import and export policies become free, the "free exchange rate system" in foreign exchange was adopted. A new economic model granting priority to exportation replaced the "import establishment" model, which is an economic model closed to the foreign countries. The most important development in the foreign policy was the relative improvement of the relations with the European countries. As a matter of fact, the European Committee Consultation Council had accepted the participation of Turkish parliamentary to this committee in May 1984. In addition, Turkey had attained a neutral policy during the war of Iran and Iraq and therefore the trade relations with these countries had improved in positive way. The income obtained from export and tourism processes had greatly increased in this period as a result of the increasing interaction of Turkey with the countries of Middle East and Europe.

After the separation of the Soviet United Nations in 1991, Turkey had improved its relations with the recent Independent Central Asian Republics as a result of the enterprises executed by President Özal and the government. Therefore, the new horizons for Turkey of being a "Regional government" had been set. The Black Sea Economic Cooperation, which became an institution by a summit meeting in June1992 and including the total area of Black Sea Basin as the Caucasia and Balkans had increased the importance of Turkey in the Region. Turkey had also played an important and active role in the subjects of Bosnia - Herzigova and Somali.

After the death of Turgut Özal in April 17,1993, Süleyman Demirel was elected to the position of the President of the Turkish Republic. As a result of the power of the coalition governments of various political parties between the years 1993 - 2000 the political structure had gained a new multi dimensional structure. After the formation of this particular new political intellect assisting the settlement of democracy culture in the country, Turkey had taken major steps among the path leading to the European Community.

According to the results of the General Population Determination executed in November 1997, the population of Turkey is 62.8 millions. There is a tendency for decreasing in the population growth rate in recent years. The annual population growth rate between years 1990-1997 had been determined to be 15.1 in one thousand. If the population growth rate is assumed to be stable, the calculated and expected population of Turkey in the midst of the year 2000 would reach to 65,3 millions. The most important characteristic of the population in Turkey is the amount of young population. Turkey is among the fastest urbanizing countries of the world. The general sexuality ratio in Turkey is 103 men for each 100 women. This result is obtained from the 1990 Population Count. Marmara Region, which is the most rapidly developing region of Turkey in the fields of commerce and industry has the most concentrated and dense population. Furthermore, the population is concentrated among the river banks and plains suitable for agriculture.

Turkish is the native tongue of 90 percent of the population in Turkey. Turks had used numerous written tongues since 8th century but the most common alphabets used by the Turks are the Kök Turk, Uygur, Arabic and Latin alphabets.

After the declaration of republic and the completion of the national unification, especially between 1923-1928 years, the problem of the alphabet is discussed and debated. In order to carry the new Turkish Republic to the modern civilization level, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of the Republic had believed to use the Western Culture and Civilization and therefore with this aim Latin letters which are rearranged in a manner that they are convenient to the vocal structure of the Turkish language are accepted instead of the Arabic alphabet which was currently in use in 1928.

The Historic development of Turkish Language as a written tongue:

Ancient Turkish (VI - X Century) : The language used in Uygur tongue written documents with the Orhon and Yenisey Inscriptions.

Intermediate Turkish (XI - XV Century) : This language certifies the period between the first Islamic written document and completion of the formation of the new written Turkish dialects. (Anatolian Turkish - Azerbaijani Turkish - Turkoman Turkish)

New Turkish (XV - XX Century) : (Uzbek language - Kipchak Language)

In Anatolia, a written language called Ottoman language which was developed from Oğuz language was used during this period.

Modern Turkish (XX Century) : The modern Turkish includes the Turkish dialects used in various locations all around the world in XX. Century. In this century, Turkey Turkish language is used in Anatolia.

Turkish is located among the ending languages in the world tongue classification. The root of the words are not altered while the word structure and declination. The declinations and building of the words are executed by the affixes. The order of the words and affixes are as "root + building affix + declination affix" .

There are 29 letters in Turkish language in the Republic period Latin letters. ç,ğ,ı,ö,ş letters are peculiar only to Turkish alphabet.

99 % of the Turkish population is Muslims. Turkey is a secular government and therefore the members of other religions are free to realize their religious activities and ceremonies.

In Turkey, the constitutional movements had initiated in the second half of the nineteenth century and the first constitution was accepted in the final periods of the ottoman Empire, in 1876 under the name of Kanun-i Esasi (The Principle Law)

The 1921 Constitution was the second constitution founded and issued during the years of Independence War and had contained obligatory rules compelled by the war situation and conditions. Three constitutions were issued in the Republic Period. The first constitution of the Turkish Republic was accepted in 1924, the second constitution was accepted in 1961and the third and still valid constitution was accepted in 1982

As all of the contemporary democracies, The republic of Turkey had adopted the principle of the separation of powers. In the preface of the constitution, which is also a section of the constitution and the foundations of the government is stated, the fact of separation of powers is emphasized as a limited cooperation between the state departments, the application of definite authorizations and services and it is underlined that this principle do not mean any superiority order among the state organs. In the first constitution of the Turkish Republic, which was accepted and applied after 1924, the principle of separation of powers was not included. In this constitution, it is stated that the dominance belongs to the nation without any condition, however the application of this dominance was charged to the parliament. As a result, although the article stating that the laws should not be contrary to the constitution is present in the constitution, no supervision unit, in other words the constitution judgement was not suggested in 1924 constitution. However, after the transition to the multi partisan system in 1946 and the dominance of the power by the opposition at the democratic elections in 1950, it was clearly observed that the problems were still present and the necessity of the supervision of legislation council has appeared. This opinion was primarily supported by the intellectuals and later t5he political parties pledged their support to this opinion and in 1961 Constitution, the principle of the separation of powers was adopted for the first time and the constitution judgement was anticipated and the Supreme Court of Constitution had been inserted into the constitution. Therefore, the verdict of the laws should not be contrary to the constitution had gained validity.

According to the constitution, the dominance is unconditionally of the nation. The nation applies this dominance under the circumstances stated by the verdicts present in the constitution directly by elections and indirectly by the authorized departments. The legislation, execution and judgement units use the fact of dominance. The legislation authority is granted to TBMM (Turkish Great National Assembly) and could not be transferred by any means to anyone. The execution authority and service is used and executed by the President of the Turkish Republic and the Board of Ministers in accordance with the constitution and laws. Independent courts use the judgement authority.

The jurisprudent state principle had initiated and assisted the adoptation of the principle of separation of powers. This principle supplies the dominance of the law in the living of public and state. The power present in the legislation and execution authorities are limited and balanced in accordance with the principle of the dominance of jurisprudence.

The legislation processes and the activities and processes of execution are supervised by the judgement. Therefore, the medium of democracy is obtained and preserved in the government management. The constitution is ornamented with these regulatory laws.

The constitutional laws, which have the status of being obligatory and superior, are the basic jurisprudent rules, which are obligatory to the organs of legislation, execution and judgement, administration and other relevant persons or organizations. In addition, the hierarchy of the norms is adopted and the transverse between the junior norms and senior norms was prevented. The decisions of the Supreme Court of Constitution obliges the organs of legislation, execution and judgement , administration and all natural and legal persons and these decisions compose the legal sources of the governmental processes.

The Modification of the constitution; There are unmodifiable verdicts of the constitution, even some verdicts are unsuggestible for modification. Verdicts concerning that Turkish Government is a Republic, the basics which the government regime is dependent, the unified structure of the government, the shape of the flag, the Independence march is the Turkish National Anthem, that Turkish is the national language and that the capital of Turkey is Ankara are the verdicts of the constitution which are unmodifiable even unsuggestible arrangements.

From the point of verdicts other than the above stated, the qualified majority condition was suggested for the modification of the constitution and a specialized method was developed. In order to modify the constitution, the inscribed proposal signed by at least one third of the TBMM members is necessary and the proposal should be discussed twice at the General Assembly and the hidden election with the precipitation of the whole members is necessary and the required majority at this election is three to five of the numbers of the members.

The President of the Turkish Republic has the right to return the law modifications concerning the modifications in the constitution back to the TBMM for the purpose of re-assembly and reconsideration and the right to present this modification to the public vote.

The services and the authorities of the organs of legislation, execution and judgement and the public associations and organizations were determined in the constitution in accordance with the principle of the separation of power.

LEGISLATION

TBMM is composed of 550 Deputies. The Deputy elections are executed in five-year periods. The Assembly can decide for a re - election before the election period is fulfilled. The President of the Turkish Republic can also decide for a re - election under the scope of the authority granted by the constitution. The Assembly can postpone the elections for one year in the situation of war. In the situation of the membership of the TBMM become vacant, a single intermediate election is executed for every election period.

The elections are executed under the supervision and administration of the judgement organs, with the principles of equal, free, hidden, one degree, general vote, public count and expression. The last authority of the manners concerning elections is the Supreme Election Committee. The Supreme Election Committee is composed of the members of the Supreme Court and Council of State. Each Turkish citizen over age 18 and completed his or her primal education had the right of selecting and each Turkish citizen over 30 and completed their primal education had the right of being elected. Law determines the method of the election. The law should regard the principles of "Justice in Representation and Stability in Administration". These principles were determined by the decisions of the Supreme Court of Constitution and had been valid after the final modification in 23 July 1995.

The Deputies represent the entire nation and pledge an oath dependent on a text quoted from the constitution. The Deputies had the legal immunity right for their expressed intellects and votes at the studies in the Assembly. The situation of investigation and legal proceeding to the Deputies are dependent to the removal of the immunities by the General Assembly except for the situations of in the act of the crime scene. The stated and decided punishments could be executed only after the end of the Deputy period.

The Assembly decides for the ending of the Deputy service. The Deputy service of the persons whom are decided to be guilty for the closing of their political parties by their oral or written statements and actions also ends by the decisions and statements of the Supreme Court of Constitution. The departure from the Deputy service requires the acceptance of the General Assembly. If a deputy departs from his political party, his deputy service becomes an independent Deputy. The legislation could apply to the Supreme Court of Constitution for the reconsideration and termination of the statements about the removal of the immunity and ending of the Deputy service.

TBMM executes its studies in accordance with the internal regulations which is prepared by TBMM itself. The constitution and the internal regulation suggest the study of the assembly in the shape of committees. These committees are formed according to various specialization subjects and the commissions execute prepatory studies and every citizen can apply to these committees and inform the committee about their complaints.

Beside the special tasks and authorizations granted to TBMM by constitution, issuing laws, modification of the laws, supervision of the laws, granting authorization to the Board of Ministers to issue written decrees at the influence of law on specific subjects are among the other tasks and authorities of the Assembly. In addition, the tasks like decision of minting money, declaration of war, martial law and extraordinary situation, supervision and decision of the signing of the international contracts, execution of the general and specific election conditions and the execution of the death penalty statements approved by the courts are among the tasks and authorities of TBMM.

EXECUTION

The execution organ is composed of The President of the Turkish Republic and the Board of Ministers.

The President of the Turkish Republic is the chairman of the government. He represents the Republic of Turkey and the unification of the Turkish nations with this position.

The President of the Turkish Republic is elected by TBMM, among the Turkish citizens who have sufficient aspects of being elected for the Deputy service or are at the Deputy service and are at or higher at the age of 40 and taken higher education. The elections are executed with hidden vote and the necessary vote is the majority of the votes which is the two third of the number of the members of the Assembly. The service period is seven years. The person elected for the President of the Turkish Republic had to end its membership with any political parties and had to resign from the duty of Deputy. One person can not be elected to become the President. The President pledges the oath written in the constitution at the beginning of his duty.

The President of the Turkish Republic observes and regards the application of the constitution and the regular and cooperative studies among the state departments. He also has the authority and tasks regarding the legislation, execution and judgement.

His tasks regarding the legislation are; to call for the meeting of TBMM when necessary, to issue laws and return back to the Assembly when necessity arouses in order to reconsider and discuss, to go to the public vote for the modifications of the constitution when necessary, to issue law and written decrees at the influence of the law, to apply to the Supreme Court of Constitution with the assertion of incongruity to the constitution relating to the internal regulations and to decide for the re - election of the TBMM when the conditions are met.

The tasks concerning the judgement are limited to the election of members to the supreme courts.

The President of the Turkish Republic assigns the Prime Minister and later the Ministers with the proposal of the Prime Minister. He consigns the representatives of the Turkish Government to the foreign countries and he receives the representatives of the foreign countries consigned to the Turkish Republic.

The Presidents of the Turkish Republic

* Mustafa Kemal ATATÜRK (1923 - 1938)
* İsmet İNÖNÜ (1938 - 1950)
* Celal BAYAR (1950 - 1960)
* Cemal GÜRSEL (1961 - 1966)
* Cevdet SUNAY (1966 - 1973)
* Fahri S. KORUTÜRK (1973 - 1980)
* Kenan EVREN (1982 - 1989)
* Turgut ÖZAL (1989 - 1993)
* Süleyman DEMİREL (1993 - 2000)
* Ahmet Necdet SEZER (2000 - ....)

There are two constitutional institutions stated in the constitution about the President of the Turkish Republic. The General Secretariat of the Presidency and the Government Supervision Institution are charged with the tasks of supervision and development of the government according to law in an organized and effective way. With the demand of the President, these two institutions executes all sorts of investigation, research and supervision activities of the public associations and organizations, professional organizations displaying the properties of public organizations, laborer and employer public organizations of all levels and the societies and cognizant beneficial to the public. The Military Organization and the judgement organs are beyond the task scope of the Government Supervision Institution.

The Board of Ministers

The Board of Ministers is composed from the Prime Minister and other Ministers. The Prime Minister is assigned by the President among the Deputies. The ministers are elected among the Deputies or the persons covering the necessary properties for being elected for deputy service by the Prime Minister and are appointed by the President. The President could end the service of the ministers with the proposal of the Prime Minister.


After the formation of the Board of Ministers, their program is declared in TBMM and is subjected to the vote of reliance. After the vote of reliance, the government begins its task. The removal and foundation of ministries, their tasks, authorities and their formation is stated and decided by law.

The subject of the national defense is stated in the section of constitution relevant with the Board of Ministers. In this section, the institutions arranging the tasks and authorizations are stated as High Command, General Staff Headquarters and Committee of National Defense.

The Committee of National Defense is composed of Prime Minister, Chairman of the General Staff , Ministers of National Defense, Internal Affairs and Foreign Affairs, Commanders of Land, Air and Sea Forces and Commander of Gendarme directed by the President. Decisions concerning the determination, application and designation of the national security policy are taken in the Committee. These decisions are proposed to the Board of Ministers. The proposed decisions concerning the existence, independence, unification and indivisibility of the state and the preservation of the peace and security of the nation are priory considered by the Board of Ministers.

JUDGEMENT

The independent courts and supreme judgement organs use the judgement authority in Turkey. The judgement section in the constitution is set on the basis of the guarantee of the judges and the independence of the court based on jurisprudent state basis. The necessity of this search of justice is the basic guarantee of the human rights.

The courts are open to public unless there is a required secret condition. The principle of being equal in punishment and crime, The individuality of the crime responsible, the innocent evidence is in force. Every individual had the right to demand justice before Judge.

There is a functional judgement system determined in constitution and according to this fact the judgement competent authorities, juridical judgement and the administrative judgement are two layered. The Private Judgement Competent Authorities stated in the constitution are the Military Courts and the Government Security Courts.

The Supreme Court of Constitution, the Supreme Court, State Council, Military Supreme Court, Military Administrative Court and the Court of Conflict are the supreme courts stated in the constitution.

The Supreme Committee of the Judges and Attorney Generals and the Audit Department are the two institutions stated in the judgement section of the constitution.

The uniter structure of the Turkish Republic is determined by Misak-ı Millî (National Borders) approved during the Independence War.

There is the unification of legislation, execution, judgement, jurisprudence and law in the government. The responsibility and authorization of this unification is given to the central government. The Uniter government is organized in the forms of central government and local government. The central administration is composed of Prime Ministry and Ministries beside legislation and judgement.

The Turkish Republic has adopted the locally administrated uniter government model instead of central, unistructure uniter government model. The administrative services of the state are executed not only by central administration but also by the persons elected by the folk accommodating in various districts. The local administration organizations, province special boards, municipalities and villages possess public judicial personalities, tasks and authorizations and possess properties. The local administration organizations are directed according to laws issued by the central administration and act in accordance with the mentioned laws. In order to prevent the benefits of the political parties from the local administration organizations and actions contrary to equivalence principle, the supervision application named "idari vesayet" (administrative testament) was put in force. The central administration uses the authority of administrative wardship and the jurisprudentially appropriateness and congruousness supervisions are sometimes executed. However the administrative wardship can never replace the local administration and execute any processes. For example, the decisions taken by the Province General Council are dependent to the approval of the governor.

The jurisprudential order of the Turkish Republic is obtained by the processes of law and execution (rules and regulations, statutes and written decrees), primarily by constitution. Also the administration had assisted to obtain this order by organizer processes (general announcements, notices and budget application directives). The organizer processes of the execution and administration could be at general status including all of the organizations of the state or could be relevant with the specific subjects, organizations, local administrations and autonomous associations.

The basic gain of the Republic Period is the adoptation of the secular jurisprudential order together with the principle of secularity. At the first years following the foundation of the Republic, as the recreation of an appropriate jurisprudential system would take long, the usage of the western sources with modifications required by the conditions of the country was approved. In this scope, the Law of Marriage and Law of Debts was arranged and put in force according to the Switzerland Law of Marriage, The Jurisprudent Courts Procedure Law was arranged and put in force according to the Switzerland Neuchatel Procedure Law, The Law of Penalty was arranged and put in force according to the Italian Law of Penalty, The Penalty Judgement Procedure Law was arranged and put in force according to the German Penalty Judgement Procedure Law, The Law of Commerce was arranged and put in force according to the laws of Germany, Britain, Japan and even Brazil. The verdicts of the laws, which do not suit the necessary conditions of the period, are changed in time. The Supreme Court of Constitution plays an active role at the annulment decisions in cleaning some rules, which oppose the rules, especially the ones opposing the equality of man and woman.

Either Law of Marriage had Law of Commerce preserved the liberal spirit of the arrangement period until nowadays. The freedom of agreement principle is dominant in both laws.

The universal principles of the Punishment Law are stated both in the constitution and the Law of Punishment. No individual could be punished for an action, which is not accepted crime, by the law in force; and the punishment judge could not decide verdicts with comparison. If the current law in force is different from the law in the period, which the crime is committed, the beneficial law is applied. Until the guiltiness becomes totally definite, no individual could be accepted to be guilty. No individual could be charged to more severe punishments from the stated punishment for that crime in the law. The responsibility of the punishment is personal. The individual freedom could only be limited by law. The judge decides for arresting and the period. The arresting without the decision of the judge could only be in the in-the-act situations or in the situations in which postponing the action could cause a drawback. The reason of arrest is notified to the arrested or caught individuals and their relatives are informed. These individuals are taken faced with judge in maximum period for 48 hours if the crime is relevant with the scope of Government Security Courts and maximum 24 hours for other crimes, maximum 15 days when the crimes concerning the mass crimes. No individual could be imprisoned without the decision of the judge. These periods could be extended in the conditions of extraordinary state, martial law and war.

Every individual had the right to claim and defend as plaintiff or defendant at the courts. This is a right determined by the constitution and is a major principle of the jurisprudential state. No individual could be faced with a competent authority other than his legally bounded court. The judgement authority is granted only to independent judges. The judges and attorney generals are commissioned as legal and administrative judgement. The judges can not be forced to retirement without their will until the age of 65 principally.

The legal Judgement is two ranked. The juridical cases are executed by the peace and fundamental courts as the first rank court except for specially charged courses. The specially charged courts are the severe punishment, business, children, traffic, cadastral, Commerce and Government Security Courts. The competent authority for appeal the legal cases is the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court is composed of punishment and jurisprudence departments. Also there are general rules of punishment and jurisprudence. There are no intermediate courts in Turkey.

The constitution had suggested military judgement for the military personnel. The cases are executed at the Military courts and the competent authority for appeal is the Military Supreme Court.

The Administrative Activities of the Government

It is stated in the constitution that the path of judgement is clear for any actions and processes of the administration as a necessary principle of the jurisprudent state. However the solitary processes of the President, the decisions of the Supreme Military Assembly and the decisions of the Judges and Attorney Generals Supreme Committee are excluded out of the judgement supervision.

The cases against the action and processes of the administration are executed at the administrative judgement. The administrative judgement is also two ranked. The administrative, regional administrative and the tax courts were founded in accordance with the issued laws, which depend on the new arrangements stated in the 1982 constitution. The administrative and the tax courts are first rank courts while the regional administrative courts are high ranked courts in some cases. The cases against the managerial actions and processes are executed by the first and last rank courts.

REGIONS OF TURKEY

If one were to claim that the most scenic vistas in Anatolia can be found on the coasts of the Aegean, he could not be accused of exaggerating. In the words of Heredotus, the Aegean coasts "have the most beautiful sky and the best climate in the world." The bays and peninsulas, coves and golden beaches stretch the length of these beautiful shores. In this region where the countless events of mythology took place, you will encounter the theaters, temples and agoras of ancient cities at almost every turn. The city of Troy immortalized by Homer and Pergamum, the art and cultural center and capital city of one of the most powerful kingdoms of the day, are both located on Aegean soil.
The provinces located in the Aegean region are Afyon, Aydın, Denizli, İzmir, Kütahya, Manisa, Muğla and Uşak.
Situated in Edremit Bay, at the meeting point of beautiful sea, the health-giving springs of Akçay and a pine forest, the scenic Ayvalık has been called the "Olive-grove Riviera." As you leave the shores of the bay and head south past a countless number of splendid holiday resort areas, you come to Foça, famous for the heroic Turkish sailors based here. If you want to see Sardis, the capital of the wealthy Lydian king, Croesus, you will have to detour inland a bit.

Located on the bay of the same name, Izmir is a modern city brimming with life. It is also a bustling commercial center and shopping in its busy markets is sure to be a pleasurable experience. The peninsula of Çeşme with its brilliant waters, superb beaches and thermal springs lies to the west of Izmir.

Among the most famous cities of the ancient world, Ephesus was one of the biggest cities of the Roman era. A treasury of all the riches of Ionian culture, Ephesus had a reputation for philosophy and critical thinking. The Temple of Artemis, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, as well as countless statues, theaters, libraries, markets and smaller temples were all architectural symbols of the city's fame. Further to the south you will see the ancient city of Priene, built according to a geometric plan designed by the great architect of Milet, Hippodamos. Milet was a great center of commerce and thought in the ancient world and important developments, scientific and otherwise, took place here. The nearby Didim, though not one of the ancient cities, is still famous for its magnificent temple dedicated to Apollo.

On the Izmir-Antalya road, Aphrodisias (Geyre) was an important cultural and art center famous for its training in sculpture. On the same road is found the world-famous Pamakkale. Passing this way without stopping and taking a look is unthinkable. The plentiful calcium-rich thermal waters flowing out of the mountain have, over time, created an extraordinary masterpiece. Here one may bath in the health-giving waters while gazing at this natural phenomenon, which is unparalleled in world geography. The ruins of the ancient city of Hierapolis lie behind this calcium terraced mountain.
When it comes to holiday resorts the first places that come to mind in the southern part of the Aegean region are Bodrum, Marmaris, Datça, Köyceğiz and Fethiye.

Bodrum (ancient Halikarnas) is the birthplace of the great historian Heredotus. The mausoleum of King Mausolos was considered one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Marmaris, with its modern marina surrounded by its lush mountains and hills, is an alluring vacation getaway with clean crystal clear waters. Nearby is Datça adorned with flowers and a little further on Köyceğiz with its pristine highlands, then it is the Lycian Graves, the Dead Sea (Ölü Deniz) and Fethiye. Mamaris is an absolute paradise of endless sand and eternal blue sea.

This central region of the country hosts a number of interesting sites. Currently the center of modern Turkey's political life, it has been the center of a number of important culture and civilizations in the past.

The cities located in this region are Ankara, Çankırı, Eskişehir, Kayseri, Kırşehir, Konya, Nevşehir, Niğde, Sivas, Yozgat, Aksaray, Karaman and Kırıkkale.

The capital city of Ankara is located squarely in the middle of Central Anatolia. The most visually impressive structure in the city is the Anitkabir mausoleum built for Ataturk. Ataturk founded the modern Republic of Turkey by winning the War for Independence and then made Ankara its capital.

Ankara is a city planned and developed for the modern world. The Museum of Anatolian Civilizations located in Ankara is among the best museums in the country. In the museum are exhibits from Anatolian civilizations starting from 50,000 BC and moving forward according to eras until the 2nd century AD.

In the area surrounding Ankara can be found important settlements of early Anatolian civilizations. The Hittites migrated to the Anatolian plateau from the Caucus Mountains and set up the first kingdom in history to encompass the whole of Anatolia from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean and from the Aegean Sea stretching east. The capital of the Hittite Empire Hattushash (now Bogazkale) and the second largest city Shapinuva are both located northeast of Ankara in the province of Çorum. Hattushash with its massive walls was a city of temples. Reliefs of all of the gods and goddesses of the Hittites can be seen in the open air temple in Yazilikaya near the Hattushash. Yazılıkaya was an important pantheon of the Hittites. Alacahoyuk is another important Hittite settlement found near Hattushash. Alacahöyük is known for the sphinxes which can be seen at the city gates.

Sometime in the 1200's BC, the Phrygians came to the Anatolian Plateau from Europe. The Phrygian capital, Gordion, was established near Polatli west of Ankara. Alexander the Great is supposed to have become the ruler of Asia by virtue of 'undoing' Gordion's knot with his sword. The tomb of the Phrygian king Midas, who according to legend turned everything he touched into gold, is located near Gordion. Near Eskişehir and Afyon there are a number of Phrygian cities and worship centers.

Now let's head down to vast fertile Konya Plain on the northern slopes of the Taurus Mountains. Catalhöyük, one of the worlds oldest cities is located here. This city, located southeast of Konya, belongs to the Neolithic Era and was an important cultural center with many temples decorated with frescoes by city artisans. Konya and the surrounding regions would later be ruled during the Chalcolithic, Bronze, Hittite, Phrygian, Persian, Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine eras. It became the capital city of the Selçuk in the 12th century AD and consequently experienced the most important "Renaissance" period of its long history. In the 13th century, Konya was completely redecorated with Selçuk architecture. The great Turkish philosopher Mevlana, who built his philosophy on human love and believed that mystical unity with God could be reached by means of the 'Sema', a whirling dance to music performed by the dervishes, lived in Konya and developed a following here.

Every year in the month of December, there is a 'Mevlana Week' in Konya, which includes performances of the 'Sema'. Mevlana is buried with his father Bahaeddin Veled in the Green Tomb (Yesil Turbe), which has become the city symbol. The Dervish Lodge and Mevlana Museum adjacent to the tomb are open to the public.

To the southwest of Konya is Beysehir Lake, a still undiscovered paradise full of natural beauty. To the southwest of the lake, Kubad Abad, the summer home of the Selçuk rulers, and the castle found on Kızkalesi Island are both sites worth visiting. The Esrefoğlu Mosque and Tomb, located in Beysehir, have an important place among the timber architectural structures of the Selçuk period.

As you leave Konya and head towards Aksehir you will probably notice that there is a smile playing at the corners of your mouth. This is undoubtedly due to the fact that you are approaching the home of Nasreddin Hoca, the famous folk philosopher and master comedian (13th c.), whose brilliant wit, quick retorts and stories with ever so subtle moral points have attracted audiences far beyond the borders of Turkey. This much-loved folk figure died in 1284 and his tomb in Aksehir is the city's most symbolic structure.

As you travel through the region of Eskişehir, your lips will undoubtedly be reciting lines from the poetry of Yunus Emre. This eminent pioneer of Turkish poetry used the language, idioms and concepts of the ordinary man in such an unpretentious fashion to convey such meaningful ideas regarding divine justice, love and friendship that to not visiting his grave, located in the village bearing his name (Yunus Emre Köyü), would be a huge loss.

With its high mountain ranges, plateaus, plains and lakes, its creek and river beds splashed with hues of purple, brown, gray, yellow and red, and some of the best Turkish architecture anywhere, this region of Anatolia is like a historical documentary on ancient life. Sivas, Divriği, Erzurum, Battalgazi, Harput, and Ahlat, all cities situated in this region, were important centers of Selçuk art.

In Eastern Anatolia are the cities of Ağrı, Bingöl, Bitlis, Elazığ, Erzincan, Erzurum, Hakkari, Kars, Malatya, Muş, Tunceli, Van, Ardahan and Iğdır, while in Southeaster Anatolia the larger cities are Adıyaman, Diyarbakır, Gaziantep, Mardin, Siirt, Şanlıurfa, Batman, Şırnak and Kilis.

Erzurum is located on a large plain at an altitude of 1950 meters. In the city, there are many religious schools, tombs and mosques from both the Selçuk and Ottoman period which are well-worth seeing. The city of Kars in the northeast is famous for its castle and nearby Ocaklı (Ani) is a historical city with rich architecture from the 10th and 11th centuries.

Mount Ararat (Ağrı Dağ), whose peak soars up 5165 meters is important for a number of different faiths. It is believed that after the Flood, in which all humanity was destroyed, the ark of Noah came to rest on Mount Ararat and as the waters receded Noah and his family settled on the nearby Plain of Iğdır. As their numbers increased, they eventually spread along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers to other parts of Anatolia. Accordingly, Iğdır is seen as the center from which the second generation of humanity multiplied and again spread over the world. The magnificent palace complex of Ishak Paşa, which looks down upon Dogubeyazit, was built in the later part of the 17th century by the Ottoman governor, Ishak Paşa. The site of the castle is superb and it is made up of a kitchen unit, a mosque and separate womens and mens quarters.

Lake Van is Anatolia's beauty center. In order to see all of this beauty, it is absolutely essential that a tour of the entire lake be made, during which time the beautiful mountain silhouettes, bays, beaches, islands and important Turkish cultural and art centers may be seen. The city of Van, which lies on the southeastern shores of the lake, was the capital city of the Urartu empire. The Van Castle, which was built by the Urartus around 1000 BC, is a dynamic example of the age in which it was built and is definitely worth seeing.

South of Van, the city of Edremit is a poplar vacation getaway famous for its beaches, camping spots and restaurants. On the island of Akdamar is located the Akdamar Museum, which was originally a 10th century church.

As the Tigris and Euphrates flow towards the plains of Mesopotamia, they pass through an important region of Anatolia. Some of the bigger cities in this region are Diyarbakir, Mardin, Adiyaman, Şanlı Urfa and Gazi Antep. The region is the oldest cultural settlement center in Anatolia. North of Diyarbakır is Cayonu, the most important neolithic settlement of the area. The basalt walls of Diyarbakır, which are more than 5 kilometers in length, have the distinction of being the longest city walls in the country.
Mardin is one of the few cities in the country which has actually preserved its traditional aesthetic architecture. It is a unique site not only because of its well-maintained state but also because of its unusual location on top of a hill.

The prophet Abraham, who is the father of 3 different faiths, is believed to have lived in Şanlı Urfa and Harran and so they are considered holy places. The Ataturk Dam, built in the town of Bozova near Şanlı Urfa is the biggest in Turkey and 4th largest in the world. The lake is surrounded with beautiful scenic sites. The Plain of Harran with its vast farmland will be the most productive agricultural region of the country. Gazi Antep is the most important industrial and agricultural area in southeastern Anatolia. We doubt that any visitor who has come all the way to Gazi Antep will leave without first having tasted the famous local varieties of kebap, lahmacun and baklava or without buying a few packages of Antep pistachios for friends and relatives.

To the northeast of Adıyaman, on top of Mount Nemrut (Nemrut Dağ) is the mausoleum made for the Commagene King, Antiochus I. On the east and west of the memorial grave site are ritual terraces and on these terraces are gigantic statues of the gods. The best time to see Mount Nemrut is at sunset.

Malatya is an important industrial and agricultural region on the lower Euphrates. It is famous for its apricots and the 13th century Ulu Cami mosque in Battalgazi with its beautiful glazed tiles

Beaches that seem to go on forever, mountains covered with verdant green and picturesque valley and plains. Fields of tea, hazelnuts, tobacco and corn. The winding blacktop road following the near strip of beach bounded by steep mountains falling, it would seem, straight into the sea. Bays, fishing villages and beaches. This is the Black Sea region.
The following cities are all located in the Black Sea region: Amasya, Artvin, Bolu, Çorum, Düzce, Giresun, Gümüşhane, Kastamonu, Ordu, Rize, Samsun, Sinop, Tokat, Trabzon Zonguldak, Bartın and Karabük.

You can begin your trip in this charming luxuriantly green little region of ours from the endless hazelnut orchards and foaming sea of Akcakoca. Let us not neglect, however, to mention the industrial cities of Eregli, Zonguldak, Karabuk and two cities of the interior one, Safranbolu, which is full of examples of Turkish architecture of unrivaled beauty, the other city being Devek, famous for its intricately carved walking canes. Along the coast you will come to the delightful recreational sites such as Inkum, Amasra and Cakraz. As you pass through Cide and Inebolu and approach Sinop, you might begin to wonder if there are still traces of the Amazons in the forests. As far as can be determined from mythological evidence the women warriors called Amazons lived in the region. The name of Sinop, one of the country's province, comes from a queen of the Amazons named Sinope. The birthplace of the philosopher Diyojen, this city, with its natural bays protected from the winds, is one of the Black Seas best holiday spots.

Samsun is one of the Black Sea biggest ports and is a industrial and commercial center. The first rays of light that would eventually lead to the birth of the Turkish Republic broke through the darkness here.
The characteristic feature of the coast between Samsun and Trabzon are the extensive hazelnut orchards. The cities of Unye and Fatsa east of Samsun are popular holiday resorts with natural scenic beauty, beaches, accommodations, camping and restaurants. Ordu is a charming Black Sea city with hazelnut orchards stretching out for miles in every direction. The Castle of Giresun, perched upon a steep rocky slope, is like a crown upon the city. From the castle, the beaches of Giresun, stretching out like cords of gold are unforgettable. The Roman general Lucullus saw cherries for the first time in Giresun and liked them so much we had them introduced into Europe.

Another important commercial port on the Black Sea is Trabzon. As the beginning of Iran's transit road, it connections with the ports of the other countries on the shores of the Black Sea. The Trabzon Castle was founded on an area shaped like a table and the architecture which has grown up around the castle reflects Byzantine, Commagene and Ottoman styles. The most important structure in Trabzon is the Ayasofya Museum. The interior is decorated with frescoes and on the exterior are a number of reliefs. The panoramic birds-eye view of the city which can be had from Boztepe Park and the Ataturk Mansion are splendid indeed. Near Macka inside the Altindere National Park is the Sumela Monastery. The Sumela Monastery, which is perched on high cliffs overlooking the Altindere valley, was founded in the 14th century by Alexius III. Inside the monastery is a church, a library, various other rooms and a sacred spring.

The area around Rize is the part of the country which receives the most precipitation. In this region where every conceivable hue of green can be see, tea is grown on terraced fields set into the mountainsides. It is the center of tea production in Turkey and the view from the Agricultural Park is as much like heaven as anyone could imagine. Hopa is the last Turkish port before reaching the Russian border. South of Hopa is the province of Artvin. Artvin was established on the terraced heights overlooking the Çoruh River valley. Artvin's highlands are very famous and there are still Georgian museum and churches in the area. Çoruh , an area full of wild beauty, is ideal for river sports of all kinds.

South of the majestic Taurus Mountains, lie the shores of the Mediterranean Sea with its beaches of fine sand, its vistas of uncommon beauty, its many ancient ruins, its hidden coves and alluring vacation getaways. Here history and mythology are inseparably intertwined and there are many legendary stories that prove this fact. Let us briefly share two of them. The monster Chimera, who spews fire out of his mouth, is supposed to have lived in the mountains west of Antalya. The Lydian hero, Bellerofontes, cut the monsters head of with his sword. Today, the fire which rises out of the ground on the southeastern slopes of Mount Olympus (Tahtalı Dağ) is still said to be coming from the mouth of Chimera. The second legend is related to one of the unlucky love affairs of Apollo, the god of all the fine arts. Apollo falls in love with a beautiful girl named Daphne, but the girl is unresponsive to his overtures. One day while chasing Daphne in an area close to Antakya, Daphne's feet turn into tree roots and her hands and arms become branches and limbs and she turns into a laurel tree, which is called 'defne' in Turkish.
According to early sources, Saint Paul was born in Tarsus and the mythological Santa Claus was actually born in the town of Patara and lived and died in what is today Kale.
The shores of the Mediterranean are just as full of antique artifacts as are the shores of the Aegean. In the ancient Lycian region west of Antalya, one may see the matchless beauty of the mountain cities, Termessos and Arikand, as well as the coastal towns such as Olimpos, Kale, Kekova and Kaş.
The ancient cities of Perge, Aspendos and Side are located on the coastal plain east of Antalya, which was called 'Pamphylia'.

Antalya is one of the Mediterranean's most important cities and is Turkey's hottest vacation spot, with the Konyaltı beaches on the west and the Lara beaches to the east lying at the foot of Antalya's massive mountain range. It is an attractive holiday getaway with palm-lined streets, beautiful parks, plentiful accommodation, restaurants, lots of night-time entertainment and a cozy marina. The symbol of this city, founded in the 2nd century BC is the Yivli Minaret, which dates back to the Selçuk era. The Asağı Düden Waterfall to the east of Antalya flows over huge boulders into the sea. West of Antalya is the cute little holiday town of Kemer, famous for its sandy beaches surrounded by pine forests and mountains.
The next big town east of Antalya is Alanya, a panoramic port city on the southern slopes of the majestic Taurus Mountains surrounded with orange, lemon and banana groves. Used by the Selçuk Sultan, Alaaddin Keykubat as a winter residence, Alanya has a shipyard that dates back to the same era and was one of the most advanced in the world at that time. It is also famous for its 9th century castle and its charming beaches.
Near Anamur is a castle from the Middle Ages. It is situated between two beaches and is certainly as magnificent as any of the castles along the coast. The road from Anamur to Silifke with its endless curves and bends follows a route studded with breathtaking coastal vistas.

The dilapidated caves near Narlıkuyu are called "Heaven and Hell" (Cennet ve Cehennem). The "Heaven" cave, which is quite large, also has a small church inside it. The castle of 'Kızkalesi', which is situated in the water across from the medieval castle of Korykos, seems to rise out of the sea itself.


Two of the surprises which lie on the road to Mersin are Kanlıdivane and Viranşehir, two old Roman cities. With is charming parks, its beach boulevards, commercial port and free trade zone, Mersin is ones of the most modern cities on the Mediterranean.
East of Tarsus, the 'Çukurova' plain is a fertile agricultural region known especially for raising cotton. In the middle of this plain is found the city of Adana, a rich city with a large textile industry. East of this region is the Dörtyol (Issos) Plain where Alexander the Great defeated the Persian king Darius. As a result of his victory, a port city bearing his name was established and thus we have modern day Iskenderun.

Leaving Iskenderun to the southeast, the road goes through the Belen Pass to Antakya (Antioch). This first Christian community founded by Saint Peter has given Antakya a special religious significance. The first sermons were preached in a cave outside the city. It is visited today by many as a site of pilgrimage. Antakya also has a mosaic exhibit of unusual beauty in its museum.

Kahramanmaras is another province of the Mediterranean waiting "to be discovered." Though its cuisine resembles in some ways the cuisine of the surrounding regions, the peculiar and often subtle tastes of the Kahramanmaras cuisine with its specially made orchid drink (salep), its world famous ice-cream of goat and cows milk and its various peppers, along with its gilded silver, leather and copper works, which were famous throughout the Ottoman empire, are still alive and offer a unique experience to visitors.

Hills of all sizes with vineyards and sunflower fields as far as the eye can see. This is the region of Turkey known as Trakya. It is separated from the rest of Turkey by the Bosphorus, the Sea of Marmara and the Dardenelle Straits. The first thing a visitor coming from Europe into Edirne would see is the Selimiye mosque, a masterpiece of the architect Sinan. It seems as though this city boasts proudly of hosting the structures most characteristic of Ottoman architecture.

The cities found in this region are Balıkesir, Bilecik, Bursa, Çanakkale, Edirne, İstanbul, Kırklareli, Kocaeli, Sakarya,Tekirdağ and Yalova.

The region of Marmara has a turbulent past. 481 years before the birth of Jesus, during the II Persian War, the Persian King Xerxes made a bridge of boats over the Dardanelle Straits between Abydos and Sestos. In the same place we have the renowned love affair of Leander and Hera, who were buried in the waters of the strait. And, it was here that Mustafa Kemal won the first big victory against enemy forces in World War I.

The lively city of Izmit with its fruit orchards and vegetable gardens is now an industrial center. Nearby is Hereke famous for its carpets.

The city of Gebze, on the north of the Marmara Sea, has a very rich historical past and the city of Iznik, renowned during Ottoman times for its glazed tiles, is worth paying a visit.

The land of silk, Bursa was the first capital city of the Ottoman Empire. In this city, which has come to be identified with lush green, places worth visiting are as follows: The Green Mosque (Yesil Cami), The Green Tomb (Yesil Turbe) and its splendid gardens, The Magnificent Mosque (Ulu Cami), Emir Sultan and Yildirim Mosques and the Ethnographic Museum.

The country's first ski resort was built on Uludag Mountain, which soars into the air just south of the city.

Tekirdag, which has beautiful examples of Ottoman architecture and broad beaches, is known for its vineyards and wine festivals.

Balikesir is the center of a broad and important region. To the north is Gonen with its famous thermal springs and the commercial port of Bandırma. After Istanbul this port is the biggest in the Marmara Sea. On the shores of Lake Manyas near Barindirma is the Bird Heaven (Kuşcenneti) National Park.


One the shores of the Marmara Sea are a whole host of beautiful beaches and holiday resorts. Among them are Cinarcik, Armutlu, Gemlik, Mudanya, Erdek, the Marmara and Avsa Islands, Denizkent, Sarköy, Silivri and lastly Yalova, a site famous for its thermal springs.