Did you know?
Istanbul is the only city in the world located on two continents, Europe and Asia. In its thousands of years of history, it has been the capital of three great empires - Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman.
The famous Trojan Wars took place in Western Turkey, around the site where the Trojan horse rests today
The first church built by man (St. Peter's Church) is in Antioch (Antakya), Turkey. A cave known today as the Grotto of St Peter, or Church of St Peter, is believed to be where the apostle Peter preaches when he visited Antioch (Antakya, in southern Turkey). It is widely considered to be one of the earliest Christian houses of worship. In 1963, the papacy designated the site as a place of pilgrimage and recognised it as the world's first cathedral. Every year on June 29, a special service held at the church, is attended by Christians from around the world.
The oldest known human settlement in the world is located in Catalhöyük, Turkey, dating back to 6500 B.C. The earliest landscape painting in history was found on the wall of a Catalhöyük house, illustrating the volcanic eruption of nearby Hasandag.
Two of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World stood in Turkey - the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus and the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus in Bodrum.
St. Nicholas, also known as Santa Claus, was born in Demre, located in Turkey's Mediterranean Coast. The village contains the famous Church of St Nicholas with the sarcophagus believed to be his tomb.
The word "turquoise" comes from "Turk" meaning Turkish, and was derived from the beautiful colour of the Mediterranean Sea on the southern Turkish coast.
The most valuable silk carpet in the world is in the Mevlana Museum in Konya, Turkey. Marco Polo's journeys in the thirteenth centuries took him here, and he remarked that the "best and handsomest of rugs" were to be found in Turkey.
The Turks first gave the Dutch their famous tulips that started the craze for the flower in England and the Netherlands. Bulbs brought to Vienna from Istanbul in the 1500s were so intensely popular that by 1634 in Holland it was called "tulipmania". People invested money in tulips as they do in stocks today. This period of elegance and amusement in 17th century Turkey is referred to as "The Tulip Age."
Many important events surrounding the birth of Christianity occurred in Turkey. St John, St Paul and St Peter all lived and prayed in southern Anatolia. Tradition has it that St John bought Virgin Mary to Ephesus after the Crucifixion, where she spent her last days in a small stone house on Mount Koressos. It remains a popular pilgrimage site for Christians to this day.
The First Ecumenical Council was held in Iznik,Turkey.
Writing was first used by people in ancient Anatolia. The first clay tablets in the ruins of Assyrian Karum (Merchant Colony) date back to 1950 B.C.
Many archaeologists and biblical scholars believe Noah's Ark landed on Aðrý Daðý (Mount Ararat) in eastern Turkey.
Anatolia is the birthplace of historic legends, such as Homer (the poet), King Midas, Herodotus (the father of history), and St. Paul the Apostle.
Julius Caesar proclaimed his celebrated words, -Veni, Vid, Vici (I came, I saw, I conquered)- in Turkey when he defeated the Pontus, a formidable kingdom in the Black Sea region of Turkey.
Female goddesses like Cybele dominated the Central Anatolian pantheon for thousands of years before these supernatural powers were transformed to male gods.
The Hittites sold Abraham the cave where he buried his wife Sarah, when the Israelites came to Palestine.
The first church dedicated to Virgin Mary is in Ephesus. The House of the Virgin Mary is a Christian shrine located in the vicinity of Ephesus, Turkey (7 km from Selçuk). It is believed by many Christians and Muslims that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was taken to this stone house by Saint John after the crucifixion of Jesus, fleeing the persecution of the Christians in Judea, and lived there until her assumption into Heaven according to Catholics and Orthodox.
Cherry was first introduced to Europe from Giresun (Northern Turkey). Cherry, originally "cherise" reinterpreted as a plural, from the Old French word, in turn from Latin cerasum and Cerasus - i.e., the Classical name of the modern city of Giresun in Turkey.
The first recorded international treaty in the world was the Treaty of Kadesh between the Hittite and Egyptian Empires, Hattusilis III and Ramses II, in 1284 BC.
The oldest known shipwreck on Earth was found and excavated in Uluburun near Kas, in the Mediterranean region of Turkey
King Midas lived in Gordion, capital of Phrigia.
Alexander the Great cut the Gordian knot near Ankara. The double knotting tecnique used in Turkish rugs is also called as Gordian Knot.
The Garden of Eden in the Book of Genesis was said to be watered by a river which separated into four streams as it left the garden; two of them the Tigris (Dicle) and Euphrates (Firat) rise from the mountains of Eastern Turkey.
Early Christians escaping from Roman persecutions found shelter in Cappadocia.
The Seven Churches of Apocalypse are all situated in the Aegean region of Anatolia; Ephesus, Smyrna (Izmir), Pergamum, Thyatira (Nazilli), Sardis, Philadelphia (Alasehir) and Laodicea.
Sultan Beyazit II dispatched the Ottoman Navy to bring the Jewish people who were expelled from Spain in 1492 and they were brought safely to the Ottoman lands.
Istanbul has the historical building of Sirkeci Train Station. This was the last stop of the Simplon-Orient Express - kings of trains and train of kings - between Paris and Constantinople (Istanbul) from 1883 to 1977. Agatha Christie was one of the passengers of this famous train.
The number of species of flowers in Turkey is approximately 9,000, of which 3,000 are endemic. In Europe for instance there are 11,500 species. This shows the richness of flora and fauna in Anatolia.
Turkey has many beaches which have the -Blue Flag- (an European award for the best clean water) on the Mediterranean and Aegean".
The first man ever to fly was Turkish. Using two wings, Hezarfen Ahmet Celebi flew from the Galata Tower over the Bosphorus to land in Usküdar in the 17th century.
In 640 BC, for the first time in history, coins made of electrum were used by the Lydian king Croesus in Sardis, in Aegean region of Turkey.
There has appeared a group recently in America that is believed to have the roots from Turks. Their real identities are fairly wondered about. This group has been dispersed from Sumter County towards the different regions of the country..
HOW WAS TURKS & CAICOS ISLANDS NAME DERIVED ? - The popular story is the name Turks being derived after the indigenous Turk's Head "fez" cactus, and the name Caicos, a Lucayan term "caya hico," meaning string of islands. A more romantic, origin of the name is a reflection of the Islands' pirate history, when 17th and 18th century pirates used the islands as hideouts and preyed upon the passing Spanish treasure ships bound for Europe. The term "Turk" for a pirate stemmed two centuries earlier when the Ottoman Empire dominated the Mediterranean and Turkish corsairs harried European Atlantic shipping, thus translated "Turks" Islands becomes "Pirate" Islands!
The first of four famous American merchantmen to bear the name, Grand Turk was built by the Salem merchant Elias Hasket Derby as a privateer during the American Revolution. Grand Turk was named either for the Ottoman Sultan whose nickname was "Grand Turk,"
On the midnight of August 2nd 1492, when Columbus embarked on what would become his most famous expedition to the New World, his fleet departed from the relatively unknown seaport of Palos because the shipping lanes of Cadiz and Seville were clogged with Sephardic Jews expelled from Spain by the Edict of Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand of Spain.The Jews forced either to convert to Christianity or to "leave" the country under menace "they dare not return... In the faraway Ottoman Empire, one ruler extended an immediate welcome to the persecuted Jews of Spain, the Sephardism. He was the Sultan Bayazid II.
The name for Hungarian goulash is a corruption of the Turkish kull ashi, or "soldier's food."..
The TURK surname was first encountered in the eleventh century. This surname is now encountered throughout the world. Still those who do not bear this surname usually do a double-take when first encountering it. Regardless of the origin, bearers of this surname share in common the experience of life with their distinctive name.
In 1929, a group of historians found an amazing map drawn on a gazelle skin. Research showed that it was a genuine document drawn in 1513 by Piri Reis, a famous admiral of the Turkish fleet in the sixteenth century... The most puzzling however is not so much how Piri Reis managed to draw such an accurate map of the Antarctic region 300 years before it was discovered.
European classical composers in the 18th century were fascinated by Turkish music, particularly the strong role given to the brass and percussion instruments in Janissary bands. Joseph Haydn wrote his Military Symphony to include Turkish instruments, as well as some of his operas. Turkish instruments were also included in Ludwig van Beethoven's Symphony Number 9. Mozart wrote the "Ronda alla turca" in his Sonata in A major and also used Turkish themes in his operas (The Abduction from the Seraglio). Although this Turkish influence was a fad, it introduced the cymbals, bass drum, and bells into the symphony orchestra, where they remain. Jazz musician Dave Brubeck wrote his "Blue Rondo á la Turk" as a tribute to Mozart and Turkish music.
Croissant was invented in Vienna, either in 1683 or in an earlier siege in 1529, to celebrate the defeat of the Turkish siege of the city, as a reference to the crescents on the Turkish flags. Although this version is supported by the fact that croissants in French Language are referred to as Viennoiserie and the French popular belief that Vienna born Marie Antoinette introduced the pastry to France in 1770, there is no evidence that croissants existed before the 19th century. More Details
After the siege of Vienna in 1683 by the Ottomans, the Austrians discovered many bags of coffee in the abandoned Turkish encampment. Using this captured stock, Franciszek Jerzy Kulczycki opened the third coffeehouse in Europe and the first in Vienna, where, according to legend, Kulczycki himself or Marco d'Aviano, the Capuchin friar and confidant of Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor, added milk and honey to sweeten the bitter coffee, thereby inventing cappuccino.
The word coffee is derived from the Arabic word Qah'wa over Ottoman Turkish Kahve, which originally meant wine or other intoxicating liquors. Partly due to the Islamic prohibition on drinking wine, preparing and drinking coffee became an important social ritual. Product's popularity, particularly among intellectuals, led to the reversal of this decision in 1524 by an order of the Ottoman Turkish Sultan Selim I. In the 15th century, Turks introduced coffee in Persia, Egypt and northern Africa, where the first cafeteria, Kiva Han, opened in 1475 in Constantinople.
When the Turks were pushed away from Vienna in 1683, the military bands left their instruments on the field of battle and that is how the Holy Roman Empire (and therefore the rest of "Western" countries) acquired Cymbals, Bass Drums, and Triangles.
The Eastern Orthodox Church maintains that the Saint Mary Magdelene retired to Ephesus with the Theotokos (Mary the Mother of God) and there died, that her relics were transferred to Constantinople in 886 and are there preserved.
The famous Trojan Wars took place in Western Turkey, around the site where the Trojan horse rests today
The first church built by man (St. Peter's Church) is in Antioch (Antakya), Turkey. A cave known today as the Grotto of St Peter, or Church of St Peter, is believed to be where the apostle Peter preaches when he visited Antioch (Antakya, in southern Turkey). It is widely considered to be one of the earliest Christian houses of worship. In 1963, the papacy designated the site as a place of pilgrimage and recognised it as the world's first cathedral. Every year on June 29, a special service held at the church, is attended by Christians from around the world.
The oldest known human settlement in the world is located in Catalhöyük, Turkey, dating back to 6500 B.C. The earliest landscape painting in history was found on the wall of a Catalhöyük house, illustrating the volcanic eruption of nearby Hasandag.
Two of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World stood in Turkey - the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus and the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus in Bodrum.
St. Nicholas, also known as Santa Claus, was born in Demre, located in Turkey's Mediterranean Coast. The village contains the famous Church of St Nicholas with the sarcophagus believed to be his tomb.
The word "turquoise" comes from "Turk" meaning Turkish, and was derived from the beautiful colour of the Mediterranean Sea on the southern Turkish coast.
The most valuable silk carpet in the world is in the Mevlana Museum in Konya, Turkey. Marco Polo's journeys in the thirteenth centuries took him here, and he remarked that the "best and handsomest of rugs" were to be found in Turkey.
The Turks first gave the Dutch their famous tulips that started the craze for the flower in England and the Netherlands. Bulbs brought to Vienna from Istanbul in the 1500s were so intensely popular that by 1634 in Holland it was called "tulipmania". People invested money in tulips as they do in stocks today. This period of elegance and amusement in 17th century Turkey is referred to as "The Tulip Age."
Many important events surrounding the birth of Christianity occurred in Turkey. St John, St Paul and St Peter all lived and prayed in southern Anatolia. Tradition has it that St John bought Virgin Mary to Ephesus after the Crucifixion, where she spent her last days in a small stone house on Mount Koressos. It remains a popular pilgrimage site for Christians to this day.
The First Ecumenical Council was held in Iznik,Turkey.
Writing was first used by people in ancient Anatolia. The first clay tablets in the ruins of Assyrian Karum (Merchant Colony) date back to 1950 B.C.
Many archaeologists and biblical scholars believe Noah's Ark landed on Aðrý Daðý (Mount Ararat) in eastern Turkey.
Anatolia is the birthplace of historic legends, such as Homer (the poet), King Midas, Herodotus (the father of history), and St. Paul the Apostle.
Julius Caesar proclaimed his celebrated words, -Veni, Vid, Vici (I came, I saw, I conquered)- in Turkey when he defeated the Pontus, a formidable kingdom in the Black Sea region of Turkey.
Female goddesses like Cybele dominated the Central Anatolian pantheon for thousands of years before these supernatural powers were transformed to male gods.
The Hittites sold Abraham the cave where he buried his wife Sarah, when the Israelites came to Palestine.
The first church dedicated to Virgin Mary is in Ephesus. The House of the Virgin Mary is a Christian shrine located in the vicinity of Ephesus, Turkey (7 km from Selçuk). It is believed by many Christians and Muslims that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was taken to this stone house by Saint John after the crucifixion of Jesus, fleeing the persecution of the Christians in Judea, and lived there until her assumption into Heaven according to Catholics and Orthodox.
Cherry was first introduced to Europe from Giresun (Northern Turkey). Cherry, originally "cherise" reinterpreted as a plural, from the Old French word, in turn from Latin cerasum and Cerasus - i.e., the Classical name of the modern city of Giresun in Turkey.
The first recorded international treaty in the world was the Treaty of Kadesh between the Hittite and Egyptian Empires, Hattusilis III and Ramses II, in 1284 BC.
The oldest known shipwreck on Earth was found and excavated in Uluburun near Kas, in the Mediterranean region of Turkey
King Midas lived in Gordion, capital of Phrigia.
Alexander the Great cut the Gordian knot near Ankara. The double knotting tecnique used in Turkish rugs is also called as Gordian Knot.
The Garden of Eden in the Book of Genesis was said to be watered by a river which separated into four streams as it left the garden; two of them the Tigris (Dicle) and Euphrates (Firat) rise from the mountains of Eastern Turkey.
Early Christians escaping from Roman persecutions found shelter in Cappadocia.
The Seven Churches of Apocalypse are all situated in the Aegean region of Anatolia; Ephesus, Smyrna (Izmir), Pergamum, Thyatira (Nazilli), Sardis, Philadelphia (Alasehir) and Laodicea.
Sultan Beyazit II dispatched the Ottoman Navy to bring the Jewish people who were expelled from Spain in 1492 and they were brought safely to the Ottoman lands.
Istanbul has the historical building of Sirkeci Train Station. This was the last stop of the Simplon-Orient Express - kings of trains and train of kings - between Paris and Constantinople (Istanbul) from 1883 to 1977. Agatha Christie was one of the passengers of this famous train.
The number of species of flowers in Turkey is approximately 9,000, of which 3,000 are endemic. In Europe for instance there are 11,500 species. This shows the richness of flora and fauna in Anatolia.
Turkey has many beaches which have the -Blue Flag- (an European award for the best clean water) on the Mediterranean and Aegean".
The first man ever to fly was Turkish. Using two wings, Hezarfen Ahmet Celebi flew from the Galata Tower over the Bosphorus to land in Usküdar in the 17th century.
In 640 BC, for the first time in history, coins made of electrum were used by the Lydian king Croesus in Sardis, in Aegean region of Turkey.
There has appeared a group recently in America that is believed to have the roots from Turks. Their real identities are fairly wondered about. This group has been dispersed from Sumter County towards the different regions of the country..
HOW WAS TURKS & CAICOS ISLANDS NAME DERIVED ? - The popular story is the name Turks being derived after the indigenous Turk's Head "fez" cactus, and the name Caicos, a Lucayan term "caya hico," meaning string of islands. A more romantic, origin of the name is a reflection of the Islands' pirate history, when 17th and 18th century pirates used the islands as hideouts and preyed upon the passing Spanish treasure ships bound for Europe. The term "Turk" for a pirate stemmed two centuries earlier when the Ottoman Empire dominated the Mediterranean and Turkish corsairs harried European Atlantic shipping, thus translated "Turks" Islands becomes "Pirate" Islands!
The first of four famous American merchantmen to bear the name, Grand Turk was built by the Salem merchant Elias Hasket Derby as a privateer during the American Revolution. Grand Turk was named either for the Ottoman Sultan whose nickname was "Grand Turk,"
On the midnight of August 2nd 1492, when Columbus embarked on what would become his most famous expedition to the New World, his fleet departed from the relatively unknown seaport of Palos because the shipping lanes of Cadiz and Seville were clogged with Sephardic Jews expelled from Spain by the Edict of Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand of Spain.The Jews forced either to convert to Christianity or to "leave" the country under menace "they dare not return... In the faraway Ottoman Empire, one ruler extended an immediate welcome to the persecuted Jews of Spain, the Sephardism. He was the Sultan Bayazid II.
The name for Hungarian goulash is a corruption of the Turkish kull ashi, or "soldier's food."..
The TURK surname was first encountered in the eleventh century. This surname is now encountered throughout the world. Still those who do not bear this surname usually do a double-take when first encountering it. Regardless of the origin, bearers of this surname share in common the experience of life with their distinctive name.
In 1929, a group of historians found an amazing map drawn on a gazelle skin. Research showed that it was a genuine document drawn in 1513 by Piri Reis, a famous admiral of the Turkish fleet in the sixteenth century... The most puzzling however is not so much how Piri Reis managed to draw such an accurate map of the Antarctic region 300 years before it was discovered.
European classical composers in the 18th century were fascinated by Turkish music, particularly the strong role given to the brass and percussion instruments in Janissary bands. Joseph Haydn wrote his Military Symphony to include Turkish instruments, as well as some of his operas. Turkish instruments were also included in Ludwig van Beethoven's Symphony Number 9. Mozart wrote the "Ronda alla turca" in his Sonata in A major and also used Turkish themes in his operas (The Abduction from the Seraglio). Although this Turkish influence was a fad, it introduced the cymbals, bass drum, and bells into the symphony orchestra, where they remain. Jazz musician Dave Brubeck wrote his "Blue Rondo á la Turk" as a tribute to Mozart and Turkish music.
Croissant was invented in Vienna, either in 1683 or in an earlier siege in 1529, to celebrate the defeat of the Turkish siege of the city, as a reference to the crescents on the Turkish flags. Although this version is supported by the fact that croissants in French Language are referred to as Viennoiserie and the French popular belief that Vienna born Marie Antoinette introduced the pastry to France in 1770, there is no evidence that croissants existed before the 19th century. More Details
After the siege of Vienna in 1683 by the Ottomans, the Austrians discovered many bags of coffee in the abandoned Turkish encampment. Using this captured stock, Franciszek Jerzy Kulczycki opened the third coffeehouse in Europe and the first in Vienna, where, according to legend, Kulczycki himself or Marco d'Aviano, the Capuchin friar and confidant of Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor, added milk and honey to sweeten the bitter coffee, thereby inventing cappuccino.
The word coffee is derived from the Arabic word Qah'wa over Ottoman Turkish Kahve, which originally meant wine or other intoxicating liquors. Partly due to the Islamic prohibition on drinking wine, preparing and drinking coffee became an important social ritual. Product's popularity, particularly among intellectuals, led to the reversal of this decision in 1524 by an order of the Ottoman Turkish Sultan Selim I. In the 15th century, Turks introduced coffee in Persia, Egypt and northern Africa, where the first cafeteria, Kiva Han, opened in 1475 in Constantinople.
When the Turks were pushed away from Vienna in 1683, the military bands left their instruments on the field of battle and that is how the Holy Roman Empire (and therefore the rest of "Western" countries) acquired Cymbals, Bass Drums, and Triangles.
The Eastern Orthodox Church maintains that the Saint Mary Magdelene retired to Ephesus with the Theotokos (Mary the Mother of God) and there died, that her relics were transferred to Constantinople in 886 and are there preserved.