Turkey

Seasonal calendar — from climate data and curated definitions.

National holidays — closures and days off.

UNESCO World Heritage sites in this country.

• Historic Areas of Istanbul

  1985Cultural

  ©

  Hagia Sophia, officially the Hagia Sophia Grand Mosque, is a mosque and a major cultural and historical site in Istanbul, Turkey. It was formerly a church (360–1453) and a museum (1935–2020). The last of three church buildings to be successively erected on the site by the Eastern Roman Empire, it was completed in AD 537, becoming the world's largest interior space and among the first to employ a fully pendentive dome. It is considered the epitome of Byzantine architecture and is said to have "changed the history of architecture". From its dedication in 360 until 1453, Hagia Sophia served as the cathedral of Constantinople in the Byzantine liturgical tradition, except for the period 1204–1261 when the Latin Crusaders installed their own hierarchy. After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, it served as a mosque, having its minarets added soon after. The site became a museum in 1935, and wa

  Text: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
• Archaeological Site of Troy

  1998Cultural

  ©

  Troy or Ilion was an ancient city located in present-day Çanakkale, Turkey. It is best known as the setting for the Greek myth of the Trojan War. The archaeological site is open to the public as a tourist destination, and was added to the UNESCO World Heritage list in 1998.

  Text: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
• Ephesus

  2015Cultural

  ©

  Ephesus was an ancient Greek city on the coast of Ionia, in present-day Selçuk in İzmir Province, Turkey. It was built in the 10th century BC on the site of Apasa, a city-state that was also the capital of Arzawa, by Attic and Ionian Greek colonists. During the Classical Greek era, it was one of twelve cities that were members of the Ionian League. The city came under the control of the Roman Republic in 129 BC.

  Text: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
• Göbekli Tepe

  2018Cultural

  ©

  Göbekli Tepe is a Neolithic archaeological site in Upper Mesopotamia (al-Jazira) in modern-day Turkey. The settlement was inhabited from around 9500 BCE to at least 8000 BCE, during the Pre-Pottery Neolithic. It is known for its large circular structures that contain large stone pillars – among the world's oldest known megaliths. Many of these pillars are decorated with anthropomorphic details, clothing, and sculptural reliefs of wild animals, providing archaeologists insights into prehistoric religion and the iconography of the period. The 15 m (50 ft) high, 8 ha (20-acre) tell is covered with ancient domestic structures and other small buildings, quarries, and stone-cut cisterns from the Neolithic, as well as some traces of activity from later periods.

  Text: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
• Pergamon and its Multi-Layered Cultural Landscape

  2014Cultural

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  Pergamon or Pergamum, also referred to by its modern Greek form Pergamos (Πέργαμος), was a rich and powerful ancient Greek city in Aeolis. It is located 26 kilometres (16 mi) from the modern coastline of the Aegean Sea on a promontory on the north side of the river Caicus and northwest of the modern city of Bergama, Turkey.

  Text: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
• Hattusha: the Hittite Capital

  1986Cultural

  ©

  Hattusa, also Hattuşa, Ḫattuša, Hattusas, or Hattusha, was the capital of the Hittite Empire in the late Bronze Age during two distinct periods. Its ruins lie near modern Boğazkale, Turkey, within the great loop of the Kızılırmak River.

  Text: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
• Neolithic Site of Çatalhöyük

  2012Cultural

  Çatalhöyük is a tell of a very large Neolithic and Chalcolithic proto-city settlement in southern Anatolia, which existed from around 7500 BC to 5600 BC and flourished around 7000 BC. Çatalhöyük overlooks the Konya Plain, southeast of the present-day city of Konya in Turkey, around 140 km (87 mi) from the twin-coned volcano of Mount Hasan. It is notable for its large size, apparent egalitarian social structure, and value as a well-preserved example of early Neolithic-era permanent human settlements.

  Text: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
• Selimiye Mosque and its Social Complex

  2011Cultural

  

  The Selimiye Mosque is an Ottoman imperial mosque, located in the city of Edirne, Turkey. It was commissioned by Sultan Selim II and was built by the imperial architect Mimar Sinan between 1568 and 1575. It was considered by Sinan to be his masterpiece and is one of the highest achievements of Islamic architecture as a whole and Ottoman architecture in particular. The mosque, together with its külliye, was included on UNESCO's World Heritage List in 2011.

  Text: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
• Nemrut Dağ

  1987Cultural

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  Mount Nemrut or Nemrud is a 2,150-metre-high (7,054 ft) mountain in southeastern Turkey, notable for the summit where a number of large statues are erected around what is assumed to be a royal tomb from the 1st century BC. It is one of the highest peaks in the east of the Taurus Mountains.

  Text: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
• Sardis and the Lydian Tumuli of Bin Tepe

  2025Cultural

  ©

  Sardis or Sardes was an ancient city best known as the capital of the Lydian Empire. After the fall of the Lydian Empire, it became the capital of the Persian satrapy of Lydia and later a major center of Hellenistic and Byzantine culture. Now an active archaeological site, it is located in modern day Turkey, in Manisa Province, near the town of Sart. Sardis was also mentioned as the campsite of Brutus and Cassius in William Shakespeare's play, Julius Caesar (1599).

  Text: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)