The city of Samsun where Atatürk started the Turkish War of Independence on May 19, 1919; has a special place in the history of Turkish independency. Samsun has been a trade and culture center, and a harbor city since the ancient times. It has stayed the same until this day. It still has this feature, today. It is a window of Central Anatolia that opens on the Black Sea. It has highway, airway, seaway, and railway communications.
Samsun which plays a special role in the beginning of the National War of Independence and in the establishment of the modern Turkish Republic, has been an important center of the Black Sea Region and of our country in the history of our republic. Even though it has natural and economic resources that cannot be evaluated properly, it is still the biggest city of the Black Sea Region in terms of population, industry, trade, natural and cultural wealths.
History of Samsun
Samsun is a very old residential area for the history of humanity. With the inclusion of today’s city center, people have been living in Kızılırmak valley, Kavak, Tekkeköy, and Çarşamba savannas.
In the middle stone age ( B.C 10000 – 5000) it is known that people were living in shelters in Tekkeköy and they are the primal residents of the region. Again, in Neolithic and Calcolithic periods, it is known from the excavations that people were living in Dündar Tepe, Kalenderoğlu, and Bafra İkiztepe.
The primal community that lived in Samsun and established a state is Gashkas.Tthis community is also called Gasgas ( B.C 5000 – 3500). After this known primal community, Paflagons who were in control of the whole North Anatolian, lived in Kızılırmak Basin ( B.C. 3000 – 1100). Hittites ( B.C. 2000 – 1200), Phrygians ( B.C 1182 – 676), Kimmers ( B.C. 676), Lydians( B.C. 1200- 547, constructed a site called ENETE in the place which is known as Kara Samsun today).
Milletlies (Ionia), (B.C. 2000 – B.C. 400), settled down in ENETE. They came from the Aegean by using the Black Sea way, and they called ENETE “Amisus” or “Amisos”. As the result of the defeat of Krezus ( the king of the Lidians), against the Persians ( B.C. 550-330), the Persian Empire captured the Amisos in B.C. 546. In B.C. 331, Alexander the Great defeated the Persian Empire, the Macedonian Empire captured the Amisos. After the death of Alexander the Great, Kont Kingdom whose origins are based on the Persian Empire was established ( B.C. 255-63). Amisos became the capital city of Kont Kingdom. Later , in the first century before Christ, Amisos fell into the hands of the Roman Empire. After the Roman Empire was divided into two branches, Amisos stayed inside the borders of the Byzantine Empire in A.C. 385. Although in A.C.860, during the Abbacy Period, with the order of Caliph Mutassım, Amisos was captured by the armed forces which were under the command of dreadful Omar; but the Byzantine Empire took it back later. After the Turks had come to Anatolia, Samsun was beleaguered by Danişmentliler, but it could not be obtained. During the Anatolian Seljuk Empire, Muslim residential areas of Samsun were captured by Anatolian Seljuk Empire in 1185. For the first time, the name Amisos was changed and it became Samsun. After the Crusade, Trabzon became the capital city. Then, Cenevizliler, had a dominance on the trade in the Black Sea; so they lived here approximately 100 years. In this period, Samsun where the Turks lived was called “Muslim Samsun”, and the trade site of the Cenevizliler which is 3 km away from the Muslim Samsun, was called as “non-Muslim Samsun”.
In 1071, after the Manzikert War, the Seljuks created the Muslim Samsun by building a castle on the coast of Samsun; with the Kösedağ War in 1243, Trabzon Rum Empire captured Samsun; but then, in 1296, Samsun was captured by Anatolian Turks. In 1389, during Yıldırım Beyazıt period, it became a part of the Ottoman Empire. While Anataolian Seljuks Empire was collapsing, it became the capital city of Canik Principality.
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If I understand correctly, I am amazed at how often Samsun changed hands. There must be quite a lot of remnants or vestiges of these different civilisations. Could you post a slide to illustrate your article so that we can have a better idea of what Samsun looks like?
Thank you Elif for this history page on Samsun. Turkey has a very rich and tumultuous history and I am looking forward to learning more about your region past and present.
Your city is right on the Black Sea which is deep blue, so I have been told recently by a Romanian friend.
Do you have ruins or some archeological sites showing the stone age shelters in Tekkeköy ? That would be interesting to see.
Your city has had a very troubled history throughout the centuries. Your city being a port, I am not surprised. You have access to Anatolia too and that is strategical. Hope to see some pics soon.
Thank you for this very dense post.
Yes, you are right Mariedebretagne. The name of the Black Sea is so real because it is quite deep blue and generally wavy all the year. In history, named Pontus Exinus (“the inhospitable sea”), the Black Sea was navigated and its shores colonized by the Greeks as early as the eighth century before Christ and later by the Romans in the third to first centuries B.C.