Trabzon

Culture plays an important role in the life of the people of Trabzon. From the past to the present, Muslim and Christian communities, sharing the same atmosphere side by side as a whole, created a significant cultural richness. Folklore is still very much alive in our province and region.

The folk dance known as the "Horon" in and around Trabzon is danced today, as in the past, by men, women, old and young at celebrations, festivities, weddings and harvest days.

The horon is danced to an instrument called the "kemençe" (Black Sea fiddle), and can also be danced to the davul, zurna and kaval; it is plain to see that with the kemençe the dancers catch a more spirited, lively mood and dance a nimble horon.

We can even see horon dancers and people who make and keep alive the special costumes worn by folk dancers or horon troupes, and who still wear those clothes on special occasions. The men wear, besides upper garments such as shirts, jackets and waistcoats, woven woollen trousers gathered at the knee (zıpka) and black boots.

They wear amulets and amulet cases decorated with silver work and various ornaments. Inside these pieces of jewellery they keep religious phrases believed to protect against "the evil eye and harm". The women wear colourful dresses with waistcoats and tie headscarves with a great variety of motifs on their heads.

Trabzon carries on the educational and cultural richness of the Ottoman period with Karadeniz Technical University (KTÜ) and other educational institutions.

KTÜ first opened in 1963 with its faculty of engineering, and today most students have fields of study in many areas and subjects, including oceanography.

The first Turkish newspaper, "Trabzon", was printed here in 1866, and significant periodical progress was made in this field (newspapers, magazines and so on).

Because of the interest the people of Trabzon have shown in amateur and professional theatre and folk theatre, the State Theatre opened in Trabzon in 1987.

Our traditional cuisine is very broad, focused on hamsi (anchovy) and fish, and the many kinds of fish play an important role in our local food culture. Among our other dishes, cabbage soup, kuymak (made from a mixture of cheese, cornmeal and butter) and pide, a kind of bread, are also important flavours.

Trabzonspor has made an important contribution to the promotion of our region and province and to its success in sport. It has achieved national and international success in football in Anatolia outside Istanbul. The first football team was founded in Trabzon in 1921, and the city of Trabzon is home to 5 professional clubs, led by Trabzonspor, and over 100 amateur clubs.

Trabzon has an important position in traditional handicrafts, and hand-made souvenirs can be found. In Trabzon, which had copper mines in the Ottoman period, various handicraft products made from this metal, such as cauldrons, bowls, pans and pots, can be found in our province.

The metalwork made in the 19th century and hammered copper and the products made from it are used as raw material in many fields, in knife making and the jewellery sector, and there are also handicrafts still being produced, such as amulet case making and tea scissors.

In our region, which has dense, thick forests, our people favour wood in building. In woodwork, too, many small wooden handicrafts are produced for the furniture industry and small crafts, such as churns, cheese containers (külek), baskets and spoons.

Textiles, one of the oldest handicrafts of our region, produce various fabrics, saddlebags, bags and so on from raw materials such as wool and linen on hand looms. Twine (ropes) used for loads and braided ropes are also woven on simple hand looms. Unfortunately, the colourful hand weavings made in the villages have been replaced by synthetic work and materials.

Our customs and traditions

TRABZON FOLKLORE RESEARCH

A society can earn the title of "Nation" through values such as unity of homeland, language, history and purpose. As is well known, folklore is a science that collects, researches, classifies and analyses the people's material and spiritual culture, bound to their traditions, with its own methods, and evaluates folk culture. We will take our place in the world of tomorrow with a bridge linking the past to the future, and we will rise to the level of contemporary civilisation by these steps. That is why our folklore will be the greatest heritage we leave our children.

To make a great musical work from a small melody, to create compositions from a motif of needlework or handicraft, to pioneer a new model, to make fashion from a piece of clothing, to produce a new architectural style from an old mansion: in short, to create. To see district, provincial and even national borders as if they were cultural borders, and as a result to differentiate the costumes, dances and music of neighbouring provinces and districts, to strive to find new dances, costumes and music for every province and even every district, in short the effort to corrupt and destroy culture, is regrettable in the name of science. Let us not forget that culture and science were created not by a single person but by human society, based on the labour of millions. People are not born with ready skills; they learn and teach. Every generation adds something new to humanity's common treasury of experience, and experience keeps growing.

The "CULTURE" we have today was created by the efforts of peoples and generations. So that the descriptions in my work could be presented in a way the reader will understand better, the figures, technical drawings and photographs were made by me. Let us not forget, too, that time has woven a story on the loom with tens of thousands of threads. Each thread has its own colour. Every people has added its own line to the pattern of world culture, and from these a many-coloured fabric has been made.

FACTORS AFFECTING TRABZON'S CULTURE

We can group the factors that make up Eastern Black Sea culture in two:

• Natural conditions

• Historical factors

1. NATURAL CONDITIONS

The natural environment a society lives in greatly affects the character of its people. People who grow up in mountainous areas are more agile, brave and enterprising in adapting to their surroundings. These hard, harsh natural conditions push them to work and strive more. The landforms of the Eastern Black Sea Region are mountainous, with steep slopes. There is very little arable land. That is why land is very valuable to the people of the Black Sea. Extraordinary effort is made to get the most out of the land. For the local people, a great struggle is unavoidable. Where the mountains and steep slopes end lies the Black Sea, with its fierce waves that change from day to day. To take from the sea what the land does not give, the local people have to fight these fierce, merciless waves. They must be brave and combative, because the natural conditions they live in demand it. The very strong spirit of unity and solidarity among the local people formed as a result of these conditions.

2. HISTORICAL FACTORS

Handicrafts

In and around Trabzon, traditional handicrafts such as making hasır (woven-wire) bracelets,

stone and woodwork, weaving, coppersmithing, knife making and quilt making continue, if not with their former splendour.

One of the features that distinguishes humans from animals is that humans are historical beings. An animal adapts to life through its instincts; so it has no need to inherit or learn the knowledge and cultural heritage that existed before it. But humans are constantly surpassing and renewing themselves. This progress draws its support and strength from the historical cultural heritage. In this respect, the richer and more advanced a society's historical experiences and findings, the higher its chances of rising.

Source: http://www.trabzonkulturturizm.gov.tr

Trabzon with its magnificent history:
with 4,000 years of history,
having lived through the Roman and Byzantine periods,
conquered by Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror,
governed by Sultan Selim I (Yavuz),
birthplace of Süleyman the Magnificent,
the city visited three times by the founder of our Republic, the Great Leader Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.

The city centre rises in irregular terraces from the sea in the north up to Boztepe in the south. The Değirmendere, Kuzgundere (or Tabakhane) and Zağnos streams divide the settlement from south to north with deep gorges. On the area between the Tabakhane and Zağnos streams, shaped like an irregular high table, the city's oldest known settlement remains have been found. This is why the view that the name Trabzon comes from the ancient Greek word "trapezos", meaning table or trapezium shape, has gained weight. The name Trabzon first appears, as Trapezos, in the ancient source "Anabasis", written by the Greek commander Xenophon, which describes events of the 4th century BC.

The Milesians, of Ionian origin, came to the Black Sea in the 7th century BC after western Anatolia and founded colony cities on its shores. Trabzon is counted among these colonies, whose centre was Sinop, and many researchers point to this period as the city's first foundation. Yet native peoples such as the Colchians, Drilae and Macrones had lived around Trabzon since much earlier.

In the same century the Black Sea region suffered raids by the Cimmerians from the Caucasus and, after them, the Scythians. But whether these raids came before or after the founding of the colonies is debated. In the 6th century BC Trabzon came under Persian rule and stayed within the satrapy called Pontic Cappadocia.

Alexander the Great, king of Macedonia, ended Persian rule over all Anatolia in 334 BC. In the confusion after Alexander's sudden death, Mithridates, son of Ariantes II, satrap of Pontus, founded the Pontic State on the Black Sea with the support of the local people. In 280 BC Trabzon was within the borders of the Pontic State, whose centre was Amasya.

In the 1st century BC the Romans, growing powerful in the west, began to occupy Anatolia too. When the Roman king Pompey routed the Pontic King Mithridates V in the Kelkit valley, the Kingdom of Pontus broke up. So Trabzon came under Roman rule in 66 BC. In Rome, the imperial period began with Augustus in 27 BC. As a result of Augustus's administrative arrangements, Trabzon was part of the client state called Pontus Polemoniacus, and in the time of Emperor Tiberius (AD 14–37) it stayed within the province of Cappadocia, another administrative division. In the time of Emperor Nero (54–68) it was given the privilege of being a free city. In this period Trabzon appears in historians' books described as "famous" and "rich". In the time of Vespasian (69–79), who gave importance to the defence of the Roman Empire's eastern frontier, Trabzon was included in the province of Cappadocia–Galatia.

In the time of the famous Roman Emperor Hadrian (117–138), important building work was carried out in Trabzon as throughout the empire: many religious and military buildings, roads, aqueducts and an artificial harbour, whose remains could be seen until recently, were built. After Hadrian, Trabzon's golden age came to an end, and in 244 it lost the right to mint coins. The coins of Trabzon minted in the Roman period carried busts of Roman emperors on the obverse, but on the reverse they showed the city's own mythological figures, continuing from the Pontic period, and used Greek inscriptions.

In 276 Trabzon was attacked by the Goths, who raided the whole Eastern Black Sea region, and the whole city was burned and destroyed in this attack. A Latin inscription in the Trabzon Museum tells us that, in the last period of the Roman Empire, at the start of the 4th century, during the Tetrarchy of Diocletian, Maximian, Constantius and Galerius, building work was again carried out in Trabzon.

When the Roman Empire split in two in 395, Trabzon remained within the borders of the Eastern Roman / Byzantine Empire, whose centre was Istanbul. The Byzantine Emperor Justinian (527–564) began a new phase of building in Trabzon by having the city walls restored. In the time of Heraclius (610–641) the empire began to be divided into military districts, and Trabzon became the centre of the Theme of Chaldia, founded in the time of Theophilos (829–842).

The Muslim Arabs reached the Eastern Black Sea and Trabzon in the raids they made into Anatolia from the early 8th century.

When the Byzantine Empire fell into the hands of the Latins who came with the Fourth Crusade in 1204, Alexios and David, grandsons of Emperor Andronikos I Komnenos who had fled Istanbul, founded the independent Komnenos Kingdom in Trabzon in 1204 with the help of the Georgian Queen Tamar. The Komnenos Kingdom, which kept its political existence by forming marriage ties with the Anatolian Seljuks and paying tribute, had its most brilliant period under Manuel I Komnenos (1238–1265). Manuel I, who also grew economically strong thanks to the silver mines in Gümüşhane, carried the title "most fortunate" on his coins.

After Bayezid I took the Samsun area in 1398, the Komnenos Kingdom of Trabzon was forced to pay annual tribute to the Ottoman State. David Komnenos, during his reign (1458–1461), stopped paying tribute, asked through Uzun Hasan, Sultan of the Akkoyunlu State, for what had been paid before to be returned, and proposed an alliance against the Ottomans to the great powers of Europe. At this, Ottoman forces led by Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror besieged the region, took Trabzon in 1461 and ended the rule of the Komnenoi.

In the Ottoman period Trabzon was first governed as an eyalet and sanjak by princes and governors. The first sanjak bey was Hızır Bey. In 1470 the sanjak was given to the young Prince Abdullah; Abdullah lived in Trabzon with his mother Şirin Hatun until 1479. Selim I (Yavuz), while a prince (1491–1512), was also sanjak bey in Trabzon, and his son Sultan Süleyman, who would later take the title Kanuni (the Lawgiver), was born here.

In the 16th century Trabzon was merged with the Lazistan sanjak, whose centre was Batumi, turned into an eyalet, and became the centre of this new administrative unit. In 1867 a great fire broke out in Trabzon, many public buildings burned at that time, and the city was later rearranged. In 1868 it became a vilayet, and besides the central sanjak, the sanjaks of Lazistan, Gümüşhane and Canik were also attached to it.

During the First World War, the Russians attack Trabzon (14 April 1916). Strike forces made up of people from Trabzon (militia) wage guerrilla war during this attack. At this time, ammunition arriving at Trabzon harbour with the support of the battleship Hamidiye, to be sent to the front, is unloaded with great enthusiasm by the young people of Trabzon and carried to Maçka.

Successful battles are fought against the Russians at Sultan Murat Yayla in Çaykara (10 June 1916), and in the Baltacı stream valley in Of and the Yanbolu stream valley in Arsin, but under the conditions of those years the enemy cannot be prevented from entering Trabzon, and the Russians enter Trabzon on 14 April 1916. During the one year, ten months and ten days the Russians stayed in Trabzon, the Greeks and Armenians in particular inflicted great torture on the local people and killed countless people.

In 1917 the "Bolshevik Revolution" takes place in Russia and the Tsarist regime falls. At this, great panic begins in the Russian army. This also leads to the Russians withdrawing from Trabzon. Meanwhile, Turkish irregular bands, moving from west to east and gathering on Karadağ, come down to Akçaabat and march on Trabzon in three columns under the command of Captain Kahraman Bey, entering Trabzon on 24 February 1918.

The Great Leader Atatürk comes to Trabzon three times in the Republican period, in 1924, 1930 and 1937; the day of his first visit, 15 September 1924, is adopted by the people of Trabzon as "ATATÜRK DAY", and this is reported to him by telegram.

THE CONQUEST (26 OCTOBER 1461)

After Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror took Istanbul in 1453, destroyed the Byzantine Empire and created the Ottoman Empire, the conquest of Trabzon was necessary to secure the eastern borders, and after the necessary preparations the fleet and the land army set out for Trabzon. In 1461 Trabzon, capital of the Komnenos Kingdom, besieged by the army commanded by the Conqueror himself, could not hold out long against the siege and surrendered, and so came under Turkish rule.

The Conqueror, having taken Trabzon and added it to the Ottoman Empire, stayed in the city for a few days and then left, appointing Kazım Bey, the sanjak bey of Gelibolu, as governor of Trabzon. Trabzon, governed for a while as an independent sanjak, also earned the title "city of princes" after Selim I (Yavuz), son of Bayezid II, was appointed its sanjak bey.

With the appointment of Selim I as governor in 1487, building work in the city also gathered pace, and in 1515 the Hatuniye Mosque and its külliye were built in the name of his mother, Gülbahar Hatun. Süleyman the Magnificent, called "Suleiman the Magnificent" in the West, who brought the Ottoman Empire to its peak in almost every respect, was born in Trabzon in 1495. After Süleyman, who spent his childhood in Trabzon until the age of 15 and received his first education here, became sultan, Trabzon was merged with Batumi and made the centre of an eyalet.

TRABZON DURING THE FIRST WORLD WAR

Trabzon is one of the provinces that took the heaviest blows of the First World War. Russia declared war on the Ottoman Empire and from 1 November 1914 began crossing the eastern border and advancing into Turkish territory. Facing the Russian armies, which aimed to take the Eastern Black Sea coast and seize Anatolia, Türkiye joined the war on Germany's side on 3 November and declared Holy War on 14 November.

With Russian warships bombarding the Black Sea ports, Trabzon was caught in a ring of fire. Indeed, on 17 November 1914 a Russian fleet of twenty-three vessels bombarded Trabzon, causing great destruction and loss of life.

The bombardments followed one after another. Trabzon was largely destroyed by Russian bombardment on 8 and 11 February 1915, and more than 1,000 people died. From 23 January 1916 the Russians intensified their coastal attacks. As a result of these attacks, supported by 17 warships, our units had to withdraw. At this time our warship Yavuz came to Trabzon. It brought 32 heavy machine guns, a battery, mountain guns, some military supplies and two aircraft for use on the Caucasus front. When the 3rd Army Commander Kamil Pasha, unable to get the help he asked for from Istanbul, pulled his units back towards Ilıca, the Russians occupied Erzurum on 16 February 1916.

THE OCCUPATION OF TRABZON:

The Russian forces, with the support of their fleet, occupied Rize on 24 February 1916. Against the Russians, who had reached the Of border, our military units and forces made up of local people put up a defence full of heroism at the Baltacı stream.

When the people of Trabzon, who had resisted the Russian army for 22 days and 22 hours, withdrew as the enemy's attacks from sea and land intensified and no support came from anywhere, the Of district fell to the enemy on 15 March 1916.

Then Sürmene was occupied and the enemy reached the gates of Trabzon. On 18 April 1916 a delegation of Trabzon Greeks informed General Lyakhov, commander of the occupation forces, that the Turks had evacuated the city on 15–16 April, and invited him into the city. Amid the crude frenzy and welcoming ceremonies of the minorities, the occupation forces entered along Erzurum Avenue to Belediye Square and took over the city. Trabzon's painful days of captivity and exile began. The Muslim people who could not leave and stayed in the city and villages suffered great torture.

The local Greeks and Armenians in particular set about what amounted to massacre and plunder. Valuables and works of culture and art were carried off to Russia by the chestful. No place was left unentered and unplundered. The brave men of Trabzon, fighting the enemy heroically, cleared out the treacherous Greek and Armenian bands.

THE LIBERATION OF TRABZON:

When the Bolshevik revolution took place in Russia in 1917, great panic began in the Russian army. The Treaty of Erzincan was made on 18 December 1917 with the Russians, who were forced to withdraw. When the Armenians did not abide by this treaty and began massacres against the Turks, Army Commander Vehip Pasha was ordered to advance. Our army, receiving the general order to move on 11 February 1918, advanced in one column on the Caucasus, while in another column the 37th Division under Colonel Hamdi Bey (Pirselimoğlu) of Trabzon, reinforced from Giresun by the 123rd Regiment, set off for Trabzon. Our units, advancing and clearing the bands in the region, retook Vakfıkebir on 14 February 1918 and Akçaabat on 18 February 1918. Clearing the surroundings of enemies in a few days, our units entered Trabzon on 24 February 1918.

The ordeal of captivity and exile of Trabzon and its people, which lasted nearly 2 years, came to an end. With the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, the Ottoman State freed its eastern lands from occupation. But Trabzon could not enjoy the joy of liberation. For poverty and misery awaited the people returning from exile in a Trabzon that had been reduced to ruins. Despite this, prayer was banned in the old churches that had been converted into mosques by the Turks centuries earlier, and the buildings were given to the Greeks. Using Turkish printing presses, a Russian-language newspaper called "Trapezuntsky Voyenny Listok" (Trabzon Military Gazette) was published. This newspaper was published in Russian for four months between 1916 and 1917. The worst event of this period was the Russians' destruction of the provincial archive.

Source: http://www.trabzon.gov.tr/tarihcaografya

There are transport options from many parts of Türkiye for reaching Trabzon, which has some of the leading beauty in the world and in Türkiye. If you are coming from the Black Sea Region, there are bus services to Trabzon from every city. By bus you can get to the city without it taking too long. But if you are coming from other regions of Türkiye, you can choose the plane as the quickest way. There are many flights from all cities landing at Trabzon International Airport. Because tourism here has increased a great deal in recent years, Trabzon International Airport is also very busy. It will be well worth booking your ticket in advance for the date you plan for your Trabzon trip. If you are travelling in your own car, you can easily come to Trabzon by the route you plan from your city.

For many centuries Trabzon was an important trading port on the Black Sea. In the Byzantine and Genoese periods, trade between Europe and Asia passed through the city, and some of the Silk Road caravans stopped here. Customs revenue was also among the state's important earnings.

In the first half of the nineteenth century Trabzon was the main port for trade with Iran. The opening of the Suez Canal seriously weakened this position. The port was equipped with cranes by a British firm in 1901, and today's Port of Trabzon entered service in 1954.

In farming, hazelnuts and tea are mentioned among the city's main products. Collard greens, corn, hamsi and tea also form the basis of the local cuisine; in other words, table and economy are intertwined here. In industry, the Visera Hydroelectric Power Station came into operation in 1929 and a cement factory in 1967.

In the last decades of the nineteenth century many young people and families went to Crimea and southern Ukraine to find land and work, and some went to Istanbul. Those who went to Istanbul worked in jobs such as baking, pastry making and tailoring.

When it comes to sport in Trabzon, the first thing that comes to mind is undoubtedly football. And football means Trabzonspor, which has won a place in the hearts of everyone from seven to seventy. Because of its successes in our country and in Europe from past to present, it has played an important role in promoting our province and our country. The city of Trabzon, which has also made undeniable progress and achieved success in other sports, has trained players who have made their mark in various branches at home and abroad, and is an important sporting city that has played a role in producing important coaches and world-renowned sportspeople.

One of the most important developments in sport in Trabzon is the holding of the European Youth Summer Games in our city and our province's being declared the host city of the 2011 European Youth Olympics. This will give our province better sports complexes and, with the investment to be made in our province and region, make it better known.

Source: http://www.trabzonkulturturizm.gov.tr/TR,57710/spor.html