WELCOME TO TURKEY
Learning about Turkey is a wonderful and enriching experience as you discover ancient traditions, a friendly Turkish culture, historical sites as well as places and destinations that will make a wonderful country for your holidays or to live.
In this article, I plan to give you some facts and figures about Turkey however within my blog, you can read more indepth about the country and my experiences now that Turkey is my permanent home.
Turkey has a very colourful history and evidence has been found of the earliest forms of civilizations living in the lands that now are classed as part of this country.
Empires that ruled for centuries include, but are not exclusive to the Lycians, Romans, Greeks and Selcuk Dynasty. All over Turkey but specifically on the South West coast are historical sites relating back to these periods.
One of the most prominent empires to rule was the Ottomans. If you go to Istanbul, visit the former home to rulers of the Ottoman empire, Topkapi Palace.
They ruled for approximately 900 years however by the year 1918, the Ottoman sultans sided with the losing countries of the First World War and the Anatolia region was due to be separated for ruling by the winning countries.
This prompted the war of independence led by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. The war was won in 1923 so independence was declared and the Republic of Turkey was formed. One of Mustafa’s first decisions was to move the capital, formerly Istanbul to Ankara in the center of the country.