Atatürk's Visits to Konya: Thirty-Three Days With a City

The great leader Mustafa Kemal Atatürk named Konya as the city in Anatolia he visited most often and stayed in for days at a time, after İstanbul and İzmir. His bond with the city went far beyond an ordinary relationship of "official visits": Konya was the land he saw as the true homeland of his forebears, where "Rumi's spirit filled his whole being" and where his adoptive family lived. Let us discover together, through a guide's eyes, this relationship with Konya spread over seventeen years.

How Many Times Did Atatürk Come to Konya?

Sources differ slightly on the number of visits: the Konya Governorship says twelve, while ATAM Journal (the Atatürk Research Centre) and Konya Yenigün say thirteen — the difference probably arises from a question of counting, the last visit (20 November 1937) having lasted only a day. Whichever figure is taken, the result is the same: Atatürk spent a total of 33 days in Konya.

These visits span four different historical periods: the years of the National Struggle, the founding of the Republic, the era of the reforms, and his final years. Each has a story of its own and a legacy left to Konya.

The First Arrival: 3 August 1920 — The Heart of the National Forces

Atatürk's first arrival in Konya came on the morning of 3 August 1920, shortly after the opening of the Grand National Assembly. Learning that there had been some movements against the National Forces in Konya, he came to the city by train at around six in the morning to inform the people and the city's leading figures; with him were the Minister of National Defence Fevzi Çakmak, the Chief of the General Staff Şemsettin and the commander of the 12th Corps, Fahrettin Altay.

When the train drew into Konya station the area around it was packed, and the band of the School of Industry added to the excitement of the welcome. While Mustafa Kemal Pasha and Fevzi Pasha were received at the Governor's Residence, the other guests stayed at the Bağdat Hotel by the station. On this first visit Atatürk also visited Konya High School (then the Konya Sultani); the top student, Mahmud Sadi of Seydişehir — later Prof. Sadi Irmak, the 17th Prime Minister of Türkiye — said in his welcoming speech, "History will place you beside the Conquerors, the Selims and the Suleimans." On the morning of 5 August Atatürk left Konya by train to attend the Pozantı rally — this short visit laid the foundation of a relationship that would last seventeen years.

The National Struggle Years: The Visits of 1922

The three visits to Konya in 1922 are directly connected with preparations for the Great Offensive; in this period Konya was the supply centre of the Western Front. He called in on 1 April on his way back from inspecting the front at Akşehir, made a short visit on 24 July as preparations for the offensive were being completed, and was in Konya again on 19 August, around the time of the Battle of Sakarya. All three visits show that Atatürk saw this not as an ordinary Anatolian city but as the logistical heart of the National Struggle.

1923: Konya With Latife Hanım, the Turkish Hearth and "Let This Door Stay Open"

The visit of 20–23 March 1923 is the most meaningful, both personally and culturally. Atatürk stayed four days and three nights at the Governor's Residence (today's Atatürk House Museum) with Latife Hanım, whom he had married on 21 February 1923. On 20 March he accepted the honorary presidency of the Konya Turkish Hearth and, talking with young people, said: "We are in the city of a very great Islamic genius, of Rumi. He was always the representative of advanced thought, of tolerance, of constructive ideas." In the Hearth's book he wrote these lines: "Konya is the hearth of a great light that has burned for centuries. It is one of the essential wellsprings of Turkish culture."

On 22 March he visited the Mevlana Mausoleum and the Mevlevi lodge; the sheikh of the lodge, Abdülhalim Çelebi, met him with all his dervishes. Reciting the Fatiha with respect before the sarcophagus, Atatürk said with deep feeling during the sema ceremony that followed: "Rumi was very great." When Rumi's Persian quatrain above the Niyaz Window was translated for him, he drew attention to the line about "this door remaining open while all doors are closed" and said: "When I came here in 1923 I had already said, 'Let us not close the Mevlevi lodge and the mausoleum; let us open them to the public as a museum.' Look what a fine museum it has become." After the closure of the dervish lodges, the Mevlana Lodge was, in keeping with those words, opened to the public as the "Museum of Antiquities" — one of the first cases in Türkiye of a lodge turned into a museum. Visiting the museum again in 1931, Atatürk noted in the book: "I was very pleased with the organisation and order, which emerged as a work full of knowledge."

What Atatürk Said About Konya

Atatürk's affection for Konya is plain in these words, spoken on various occasions:

• "Konya is the true homeland of my forebears. They migrated to Rumelia from Anatolia."
• "Whenever I come to this city, Rumi's spirit fills my whole being."
• "The Mevlevi way is an example of Turkish tradition permeating Islam."
• "Rumi was a great reformer. The Mevlevi order was the most advanced of the lodges."

Atatürk and His Adoptive Family

Another dimension of Atatürk's bond with Konya is his adoptive family. According to the sources, on every visit to Konya Atatürk called on his adoptive father, Hüseyin Ağa of Konya, who lived in the Sedirler quarter, and addressed him as "my son". These visits show that in Konya Atatürk was occupied not only with official business but with a private bond too.

The Longest Stay and the Final Visits

Atatürk's longest stay in Konya was his ninth visit, between 18 February and 1 March 1931; over eleven days he carried out various inspections and studies. In later years the visits grew shorter: 25 January 1933, 6 February 1934, 7 January 1937 and finally 20 November 1937 — this last call, some eight months before his death, falling in a period when his health problems had begun.

The Atatürk House Museum: A Gift From the People of Konya

The Governor's Residence where Atatürk stayed is open to visitors today as the Atatürk House Museum. Built in 1912 on Atatürk Avenue of cut stone, rubble and brick, the two-storey building came into use as the Governor's Residence after 1916 and, registered to the treasury in 1923, became Atatürk's lodging in Konya. On 19 July 1928, as an expression of the gratitude of the people of Konya, the building was registered in Atatürk's name; the note "a gift from the people of Konya to President Gazi Mustafa Kemal Pasha" was entered in the title deed. The building was used again as the Governor's Residence in 1940, transferred to the Ministry of National Education in 1963, opened on 17 December 1964 as the "Atatürk House–Culture Museum", and restored and opened in its present form on 17 April 1982, on the 100th anniversary of Atatürk's birth.

In the museum's halls are photographs of Atatürk in Konya, objects he used (clothes, an overcoat, table services, a deckchair), the daily notes he kept, newspaper cuttings, and the bedroom, study and dining room preserved in their original state.

Visitor information: Sahibiata, Atatürk Caddesi No: 4, Meram / Konya · Tel: (0332) 351 32 06 · Every day except Monday, 09:00–16:40 · Admission free.

The Konya Atatürk Monument and the Legend of the "Turned Back"

The Atatürk Monument in Konya is Türkiye's second Atatürk monument, after the one at Sarayburnu in İstanbul. The pedestal built by Mimar Muzaffer Bey between 1915 and 1917 was, by decision of the Konya Municipal Council in 1924, to be completed; the bronze statue of Atatürk, ordered from the Austrian sculptor Heinrich Krippel for 16,000 lira, was unveiled with a great ceremony on Friday 29 October 1926. In the 2.8-metre bronze statue on its 6.5-metre marble pedestal, Atatürk is shown in a marshal's uniform, his left hand on the hilt of his sword while his right touches a sheaf of wheat at his feet.

A legend told in Konya for years holds that the monument "turns its back on the city" — but this view is groundless. The monument's orientation was chosen so as to greet passengers arriving from the railway station, the most common means of transport at the time, the moment they arrived; the broad space between the monument and the station was likewise designed with the public's use at official holidays and commemorations in mind. Today official ceremonies are held each year on 3 August in the Monument Area, on the anniversary of Atatürk's first arrival in Konya.

The Guide's Note

Atatürk's relationship with Konya went far beyond an ordinary one of "official visitor and local people" — it was a rare meeting of a city's love for the founding leader and a leader's admiration for the city's spirit. On your next visit to Konya, stand facing the bronze figure of Atatürk saluting in the Monument Area; picture a president reciting the Fatiha with respect before the tomb at the Mevlana Museum; and walking among those objects at the Atatürk House Museum, feel the quiet but profound seventeen-year appointment between the founder of a nation and a city. Because for Atatürk, Konya was not merely a province: it was the true homeland of his forebears, the city of Rumi, the soil of his adoptive family and a place of embrace where thirty-three days of memories gathered.