Turkey — books & literature

The story of Turkey

Anatolia, the Asian heartland of modern Turkey, has been continuously inhabited for over 10,000 years, home to some of humanity's earliest monumental architecture at Gobekli Tepe and later to the Hittite Empire, one of the great Bronze Age powers. Greek city-states colonised its coasts, and in 330 CE Emperor Constantine refounded the city of Byzantium as Constantinople, capital of the Roman and then Byzantine Empire for over a thousand years. Turkic peoples migrated into Anatolia from Central Asia from the 11th century, and in 1299 Osman I founded the beylik that grew into the Ottoman Empire. In 1453 Ottoman forces under Mehmed II conquered Constantinople, ending the Byzantine Empire and launching an empire that spanned three continents at its height under Suleiman the Magnificent. Defeated in World War I, the Ottoman Empire collapsed, but Mustafa Kemal Ataturk led a war of independence and proclaimed the Republic of Turkey on 29 October 1923, moving the capital to Ankara and launching sweeping secular reforms including a new Latin alphabet and women's suffrage. Today Turkey bridges Europe and Asia both geographically and culturally, built on layers of Hittite, Greek, Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman heritage.

Timeline — key moments

1. circa 1650 BCE

   The Hittite Empire rises in central Anatolia, one of the major Bronze Age powers.

2. 330

   Emperor Constantine refounds Byzantium as Constantinople, new capital of the Roman Empire.

3. 1299

   Osman I founds the beylik that grows into the Ottoman Empire.

4. 1453

   Ottoman forces under Mehmed II conquer Constantinople, ending the Byzantine Empire.

5. 1520-1566

   Reign of Suleiman the Magnificent; the Ottoman Empire reaches its territorial and cultural peak.

6. 1919-1923

   Turkish War of Independence, led by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.

7. 1923

   Republic of Turkey proclaimed on 29 October; Ataturk becomes first president.

8. 1928

   Alphabet reform replaces Arabic script with a Latin-based Turkish alphabet.

9. 1952

   Turkey joins NATO.

Top 10 things to know about Turkey

1. Istanbul is the only major city in the world spanning two continents, Europe and Asia.
2. Gobekli Tepe in southeastern Turkey is believed to be among the oldest known monumental structures, dating to circa 9600 BCE.
3. Hagia Sophia, built in 537 CE, has served as a cathedral, a mosque, a museum, and now a mosque again.
4. The Ottoman Empire ruled for more than 600 years and at its height spanned three continents.
5. Turkish is spoken natively by tens of millions of people and belongs to the Turkic language family.
6. Cappadocia's fairy-chimney rock formations and underground cities are among the world's most unusual landscapes.
7. Turkey is one of the world's leading hazelnut producers.
8. Ephesus, on the Aegean coast, was one of the great cities of the ancient Greek and Roman worlds.
9. Ankara, not Istanbul, is the capital, chosen in 1923 for its central, defensible location.
10. Turkish tea (cay) is the most widely consumed hot drink in the country.

Famous people from Turkey

Say it in Turkey's language

Did you know?

• ★Istanbul is the only city in the world located on two continents, split by the Bosphorus Strait.
• ★Saint Nicholas, the historical basis for Santa Claus, was born in Patara on Turkey's Mediterranean coast.
• ★The tulip, now iconic in the Netherlands, originated in Central Asia and was first cultivated in Ottoman gardens before reaching Europe in the 16th century.

Turkey culture

• Turkish tea (cay) is served constantly, brewed in a stacked double teapot (caydanlik), as a gesture of hospitality.
• Traditional cuisine centres on kebabs, mezze, and baklava, with strong regional variation from the Aegean to the Black Sea.
• The whirling dervishes of the Mevlevi order perform the sema, a spiritual dance tied to the poet-mystic Rumi.
• Turkish carpet weaving is a centuries-old craft, with regional patterns passed down through generations.

Why read Turkey's books

Turkish literature spans Ottoman court poetry, Sufi verse from mystics like Rumi and Yunus Emre, and a modern novel tradition crowned by Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk. Reading Turkey's books is a journey across empires and continents.