Brief History

Turkish Historical Society is one of the leading institutions established in our country under the directives of Atatürk. In response to negative portrayals of Turks, particularly in European textbooks where they are depicted as an invading tribe using the term “barbarian,” Atatürk, who contested these inaccuracies, argued that the true historical role of the Turks and their contributions to civilization should be thoroughly investigated.

For this reason, on April 28, 1930, at the last session of the VIth Assembly of the Turkish Hearths, which was attended by Atatürk, a proposal with 40 signatures was presented by Âfet İnan with His directives, and it was stated that “We propose that a special and permanent board to study Turkish history and civilization in a scientific manner be established and that the power to elect the members of this board be left to the Central Committee”.

As a result of the discussion held at the Assembly on the same day, article 84 was added to the Law of the Turkish Hearths as: “The Central Committee shall establish a Turkish History Board to be charged with the duty of investigating and studying Turkish history and civilization in a scientific manner.” Within the framework of this decision, a “Turkish History Board” consisting of 16 members was formed, and the board held its first meeting on June 4, 1930 and elected the Board of Directors and other members.

Board of Directors: President Tevfik Bıyıklıoğlu, Vice-Presidents Yusuf Akçura and Samih Rıfat, Secretary General Dr. Reşit Galip.

Members: Âfet İnan, İsmail Hakkı Uzunçarşılı, Hâmid Zübeyir Koşay, Halil Edhem, Ragıb Hulûsi, Reşid Safvet Atabinen, Zâkir Kadîrî, Sadri Maksudi Arsal, Mesaroş (Ankara Ethnography Museum expert), Mükrimin Halil Yinanç, Vâsıf Çınar and Yusuf Ziya Özer.

This board published its first work titled Outlines of Turkish History.

On March 29, 1931, when the decision of closing down the Turkish Hearths was taken at the VIIth Assembly, it was reorganized on April 15, 1931 under the name “Turkish Historical Research Society” and continued its activities based on the principles of 1930. The name of the organization was changed to “Turkish Historical Research Institution” in 1935, and later to “Turkish Historical Society”. During this period, the institution prepared four volumes of high school history books and these books were published as the Ministry of Education publications. The first book published by Turkish Historical Society was Birinci Türk Tarih Kongresi: Konferanslar, Müzakere Zabıtları (1932) that consisted papers of the First Congress. However, this book is also labeled as the Ministry of Education. On the work titled Pîrî Reis Haritası Hakkında İzahname (1935), “Turkish Historical Research Institution Publications No: 1” is written.

Again, Pîrî Reis’s Kitâb-ı Bahriye (1935) was published with publication number 2. Later, reports of Alacahöyük excavation were published, and in 1937, BELLETEN, named by Atatürk, began its publication life.

Until the end of his life, Atatürk took a close interest in the work of the Society, determined the work plan many times and personally attended many meetings. The importance He gave to the Society and history is evident from the fact that he donated half of the income of his shares in İş Bankası to the Turkish Historical Society in his will dated September 5, 1938. As a matter of fact, all Presidents who came after Atatürk became the protective presidents of the Society as a tradition. Article 2 of the statute, which was revised according to the new law of societies approved by the Ministry of Interior on May 25, 1940, stipulates that the Institution is under the high patronage of the President İsmet İnönü, and Article 3 states that “The Minister of Education is the honorary head of this Society”. The Society was included among the “Public Benefit Associations” by the Council of Ministers’ decree dated October 21, 1940 and numbered 2/14556. The Turkish Historical Society, as a legal entity, was incorporated into the Atatürk Supreme Council for Culture, Language and History, which was established by Article 134 of the Constitution of the Republic of Türkiye adopted on November 7, 1982. Since then, the Turkish Historical Society has continued and continues to work in line with its initial founding objectives.

In addition to its scientific research and publications, the Turkish Historical Society periodically organizes international “Turkish History Congresses,” with the inaugural congress held from July 2-11, 1932, and up to the XIXth congress having been conducted to date. The Second Congress, held in Dolmabahçe on September 20-25, 1937, acquired an international character and foreign scientists also participated in this Congress. This Congress aimed to explain and document Turkish history. Furthermore, on the occasion of the Congress, an exhibition was organized. In this exhibition, the significant civilizations that emerged in our country and the Middle East from prehistory to the Republican era were represented through models, collages, paintings, and graphics. This exhibition remained in Dolmabahçe until the death of our Great Leader.

After that, Turkish Historical Society organized the following congresses:

15-20 November 1943, IIIrd

10-14 November 1948, IVth

12-17 April 1956, Vth

20-26 October 1961, VIth

25-29 September 1970, VIIth

11-15 October 1976, VIIIth

21-25 September 1981, IXth

22-26 September 1986, Xth

5-9 September 1990, XIth

12-16 September 1994, XIIth

4-8 October 1999, XIIIth

9-13 September 2002, XIVth

11-15 September 2006, XVth

20-24 September 2010, XVIth

13-15 September 2014, XVIIth

1-5 October 2018, XVIIIth

3-7 October 2022, XIXth

The papers presented at these congresses were published in 65 volumes, including the XVIIth Congress.

Starting from its foundation, the Society carried out its activities in the former Turkish Hearth Public Houses building and moved to a section allocated in the Faculty of Language and History-Geography at the end of 1940. However, due to its ever-increasing library, activities and developing printing house, this place became insufficient, and on November 12, 1967, it moved to its modern building, the project of which was drawn by Mr. Turgut Cansever. This building received the “International Agahan Architecture Award” in 1980.

The Turkish Historical Society, as stated in its Law No. 2876, has continued to work on the purpose of its establishment in 1931, which was to scientifically examine, research, promote, disseminate and publish the history of Turkey and Turkish history and related issues, the contributions of Turks to civilization, and to write Turkish history and the history of Turkey based on these, and has collected its publications in a total of XXXI series (Old series). These series were renewed by the Publication Committee of the Turkish Historical Society. Since the beginning, within the old and new series, a total of nearly 1400 works, including journals, have been published. As of April 2024, the 311th issue of Belleten, which has been published since 1937, was published. The 43rd issue of the journal Belgeler was published. The Yearbook of History, which we published for the first time, was published in 2 volumes under the name of Turkish Historical Society – Kırkambar 2013.

Another important development in terms of journal publishing is the resumption of Höyük, which was published for a single issue in 1988 and discontinued. The Höyük Journal, in which articles on archaeology, art history, etc. will be evaluated was planned to be published twice a year. Accordingly the last issue (No: 13) has been published in 2024.

Apart from the “Alacahöyük Excavation”, which was the first excavation initiated by the Society with its own budget and staff on August 22, 1935, with the directives of Atatürk, archaeological researches were continued in various regions of Thrace and Anatolia. The artifacts from these excavations grace many of our museums. Nowadays, financial support is given to approximately 40-50 excavations every year. In addition, Turkish Historical Society, in accordance with its aims, also supports projects prepared to shed light on many issues of Turkish history.

It is possible to list extensive ones such as “Social and Cultural History of Turkey”, “History of the Turkish World from the Beginning to the Present”, “History of Turkish Sufism”, “Social and Economic History of Yozgat and Its Surroundings”, “Economic History of Ordu and Its Region Using the Exploration Method”. On the other hand, Turkish Historical Atlas studies continue. Within the scope of the “Turkish Cultural Heritage Inventory” studies, five books and eight volumes have been published and this series continues.

You can obtain our publications from the book stores located in Ankara central building, Kızılay Bayındır Street and Istanbul Üsküdar district, as well as electronically from https:\\emagaza-ttk.ayk.gov.tr, and from our contracted dealers in various provinces throughout Turkey. Our publications are exclusively distributed to readers through these authorized sales points. The sale of our institutional publications through unauthorized channels, such as street vendors, is prohibited by law. In accordance with the demands, it is planned to open book stores in centrally located provinces of Anatolia such as Erzurum, Izmir, Kayseri and Konya.

The Library established by the Turkish Historical Society for scientific studies is one of the richest specialized libraries in our country. The library, housing approximately 250,000 volumes, regularly acquires the latest publications through exchanges and purchases. It maintains exchange agreements with 220 institutions and organizations abroad and 60 within the country. Our library offers services that align with the most current technological advancements. Our library provides a service for electronic catalogue scanning. Rare materials (works in Western languages, especially the Ottoman, Arabic and Persian reference sources in our library) whose copyright has expired under international copyright regulations have been digitized. The texts of these works can also be accessed through the detailed search section of the TTK Library online catalogue. Approximately 7500 of the rare works and manuscripts have been digitized so far and the digitization process is continuing. Consequently, these works have been made globally accessible through electronic means via the catalogue scanning program.

Efforts have been initiated to enable visually impaired scholars to benefit from library services.

The Society is also quite rich in terms of archives and documentation. There are important archival documents in terms of recent history and a rich collection of Atatürk photographs. Recently, exhibitions such as the Liberation of Izmir, the Hagia Sophia Exhibition, the Atatürk Photographs Exhibition, the Hala Sultan Exhibition in Cyprus, and the 100th Anniversary of Jerusalem Exhibition have been organized using materials from the photograph and document collections. Additionally, exhibition catalogues have been published. The process of digitizing and classifying the materials in the archive continues. Finally, the analytical classification of the Enver Pasha and Fahir Iz Archive has been completed.

The Turkish Historical Society is a member of various international scientific boards such as the International Committee for Pre-Ottoman and Ottoman Studies (CIÉPO), Association Internationale d’etudes du Sud-Est Européen (AIÉSEE), the International Committee of Historical Sciences (CISH), the International Commission of Military History (CIHMC) and the Union Académique Internationale (UAI).