Turkey (country)

HISTORY 

After the Great Flood, the Hebrew Noah landed his ark on the summit of Mount Ararat, a volcano in eastern Turkey.

The first major empire in the area of modern day Turkey was the Hittites (from the 18th century to the 13th century BC). The Hittites developed a high culture in Central Anatolia. Their kingdom was destroyed by the Cimmerians in the 7th century BC.

The Lion Gate in Hattusa, capital of the Hittite Empire. By Bernard Gagnon 

The Turks originally came from Mongolia and spread into Turkestan in the 6th century AD. During the 7th century they adopted Islam.

The Seljuk Turks began migrating into the area in the 11th century, and their victory over the Byzantines at the Battle of Manzikert in 1071 symbolizes the start and foundation of Turkey.

The Ottoman Turks, driven from central Asia by The Mongols, entered the service of the Seljuks. Osman I, the leader of the Ottoman Turks, then founded in 1299 a kingdom of his own. 

Having overrun Asia Minor, the Ottomans began their European conquests by seizing Gallipoli 1354. They then captured Constantinople in 1453 and by 1481 were masters of the Balkans.

By 1550 the Ottomans had conquered Egypt, Syria, Arabia, Mesopotamia, Tripoli and most of Hungary. The Kingdom was ruled by Muslim law, but other religions had certain minority rights.

During the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent (1520-66) the Ottoman Empire reached the apex of its economic, military and political power. Under his administration, the Ottoman state ruled over 15 to 25 million people. 

The Christian counter-offensive opened in 1683 with the defeat of the Turks at the Battle of Vienna; in 1699 the Turks lost Hungary, and in 1774 Russia ousted them from Moldavia, Wallachia, and the Crimea. 

Battle of Vienna 1683

Between 1821 - 1829 Greece threw of Turkish rule. The country's sovereignty and full independence from the Ottoman Empire was confirmed in a London Protocol in 1830, as the final result of the Greek War of Independence.

Russia's attempts to exploit this situation were assisted by Britain and France, which in the Crimean War (1854-56) fought on the Turkish side.

The Bulgarian rising of 1876 led to a new war between Turkey and Russia, and by the 1878 Treaty of Berlin, Turkey lost Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Italy took advantage of the ensuing crisis to seize Tripoli between 1911 to 12, while the Balkan states between 1912 - 13 expelled the Turks from Albania and Macedonia. 

Turkey entered World War 1 on the German side in 1914, only to lose Syria, Arabia, Mesopotamia, and it's nominal suzerainty in Egypt. 

Sultan Mehmed V and Kaiser Wilhelm II in Constantinople, 1917. 

During World War I, the Ottoman government committed genocides against its Armenian, Assyrian and Pontic Greek subjects. 

The Greek occupation of Izmir in 1919 provoked the establishment of a national Congress with Mustafa Kemal Atatürk as president. 

The first Constitution of Turkey was adopted on January 20, 1921, making fundamental changes in the source and exercise of sovereignty by consecrating the principle of national sovereignty.

Having defeated Italian and French forces, Ataturk expelled the Greeks in 1922. 

The Treaty of Lausanne was signed in 1923 to settle the Anatolian part of the partitioning of the Ottoman Empire, establishing the boundaries of modern Turkey. Turkey became a republic with Atatürk as its first president. 

Atatürk in 1924, during his speech in Bursa

Atatürk enacted numerous reforms, many of which incorporated various aspects of Western thought, philosophy, and customs into the new form of Turkish government.

Angora replaced Constantinople as the capital of Turkey in 1923.

The names of the Turkish cities of Constantinople and Angora were changed to Istanbul and Ankara, respectively in 1930. 

The Turkish flag is red, incorporating a white star and crescent. The current design of the Turkish flag is directly derived from the late Ottoman flag, which had been adopted in the late 18th century and acquired its final form in 1844. The measures, geometric proportions, and exact tone of red were legally standardized with the Turkish Flag Law on May 29, 1936.

In regular speech, the Turkish flag is called al bayrak (the red flag), but in the Turkish national anthem it’s called al sancak (the red banner).

The Turkish Armed Forces ousted Prime Minister Süleyman Demirel during the 1971 Turkish military memorandum, often referred to as the "coup by memorandum." This event occurred on March 12, 1971, when the military delivered a memorandum to the government, effectively forcing Demirel to resign without direct military intervention or a traditional coup.

Following Demirel's resignation, the new government initiated a series of reforms aimed at addressing the economic, social, and political problems cited by the military. However, the period also saw increased repression, with arrests, censorship, and trials targeting leftist organizations and activists.

From 1971 to 1975, Demirel served as the leader of the opposition before forming a right-wing government known as the First Nationalist Front, which collapsed in 1977. He then established the Second Nationalist Front cabinet in 1977, but it also collapsed by 1978. In 1979, Demirel led a minority government that failed to secure the election of a president in 1980.

The Turkish Armed Forces ousted Prime Minister Süleyman Demirel on September 12, 1980 and would rule the country for three years before democracy was restored.

The letters Q, W and X were illegal in Turkey for 85 years until 2013 because the letters were associated with the Kurdic language. Enforcement wasn't that strict for Western companies (like Xerox), but in 2005 a group of Kurds was fined 100 lira for holding up signs with the letters.

FUN TURKEY FACTS

There are 29 letters in the Turkish alphabet which includes no Q or W but has an i without a dot on top as well as an i with a dot.
The i without a dot scores 2 in Turkish Scrabble. With a dot however it only delivers a 1.

The turkey bird gets its name from Turkish merchants who traded similar birds in Europe.

In Turkey, the word for "turkey" is "hindi", meaning "India."

Around 75 per cent of the world's hazelnuts are grown in Turkey.

The country where most tea is drunk per person is Turkey, where the average per capita annual consumption is 3.157 kg (about 7 lb).

You can travel from Europe to Asia and back underground on Istanbul's Marmaray Metro line.

The Grand Bazaar in Istanbul comprises 61 covered streets with more than 4,000 shops. With more than 91 million visitors it was listed as the world's most-visited tourist attraction in 2014.

Store inside Istanbul's Grand Bazaar By Dmgultekin 

The word "turquoise" came either from the color of the Mediterranean in southern Turkey or from the color of "Turkey stone" .

St Nicholas, the original Santa Claus, was born in Turkey. He entered this world in Patara, a port on the Mediterranean coast of Turkey, and spent most of his life in the nearby town of Myra (Demre). 

Camel wrestling, in which two male camels fight over a female in heat, is popular in the Aegean region of Turkey.

Of the 39 gold medals won by Turkey at the Olympics, 29 were for wrestling.

Sources Hutchinson Encyclopedia, Daily Express