Turkey Frontier
The history of Turkey
From the world's oldest temples to a modern republic — the peoples and empires that shaped Anatolia, era by era.
c.9600 BC
Göbekli Tepe, world's oldest temple
330 AD
Constantinople founded
1453
Ottoman conquest of the city
1923
The Republic proclaimed
- Ancient Anatolia: Troy, the Hittites and the First CivilisationsAnatolia is one of the oldest inhabited regions on earth — from Göbekli Tepe and Çatalhöyük to the Hittites, Troy, the Phrygians and the Lydians.
- Greek and Roman AnatoliaHow Greek colonists and then Rome shaped western Anatolia — Ephesus, Pergamon, Aphrodisias, Hierapolis, and the roots of early Christianity.
- The Byzantine Empire and ConstantinopleConstantine's new capital, Justinian's Hagia Sophia, and a thousand years of Byzantine rule from Constantinople until its fall in 1453.
- The Seljuks and the Arrival of the TurksHow Turkic peoples reached Anatolia — the Battle of Manzikert, the Sultanate of Rum at Konya, Rumi and the whirling dervishes, and Seljuk architecture.
- The Ottoman EmpireFrom a small frontier beylik to a world empire — the conquest of Constantinople in 1453, the golden age of Süleyman, and the long Ottoman decline.
- Modern Turkey: The Republic and AtatürkFrom the Ottoman collapse to the Republic — Atatürk's reforms, a new capital at Ankara, and Turkey's rise as a modern nation and travel destination.