THE MUSEUM OF ANATOLIAN CIVILIZATIONS - MUSEUM HISTORY

    THE HISTORY OF THE BUILDINGS

The Anatolian Civilizations Museum is located in the district called Atpazari,("the horse market") to the south of Ankara Castle. The Museum occupies two Ottoman buildings which have been renovated and altered to suit their new role. One of them is the Mahmut Pasha Bedesten and the other is the Kursunlu Han.

It is believed that the Bedesten (part of a bazaar where valuable goods were stored) was built between 1464 and 1471 by Mahmut Pasha,the grand vizier of Sultan Mehmet the Conqueror.There isno inscription on the building. Documentry sources,however, indicated that Ankara "sof" (cloth made from goat or camel hair) was distributed from here. The building has a plan of standard type. There is a covered rectengular area with 10 domes in the middle.There is a surrounding vaulted arcade, occupied by shops arranged so that those of the,same trade face each other.

Recent research, into the land registers and judicial records of the Ankara province show that Kurshunlu Han was built by Mehmet Pasha who succeeded Mahmut Pasha to the post of grand vizier in the reign of Sultan Mehmet.He held the post until 1470, and he founded the Han to provide revenue for his soup-kitchen or the poor and needy in the Uskudar, where finally he was buried. The building lacks an inscription, but during restoration work carried out in 1946 coins of Sultan Murat II were found, proving that the Han was in existence by the first half of the 15th century. The building has a typical plan for a Han of the Ottoman Period.In the middle there is a courtyard.It is surrounded by a series of rooms in two storeys. There are 28 rooms on the ground floor and 30 on the first. All of the rooms have fireplaces.In the basement of the west and south sides of the building there is a L-shaped stable. There are 11 shops on the north side, 9 on the east and 4 facing each other in the open-ended vaulted antechamber.

The two buildings, which are used as a Museum today, fell out of use after a fire in 1981.

Today, the two buildings that form the museum, were left after the last fire in 1881.

THE HISTORY OF THE MUSEUM

The first Museum in Ankara was established in 1921 by Mubarek Galip Bey, Director of Cultural Affairs, in one of the towers of Ankara Castle called the Akkale. In addition, object were also collected together at the Temple of Augustus and at the Roman Baths. As a result of a suggestion by Ataturk that a Hittite Museum should be established, objects belonging to the Hittite period that were located in other museums began to be sent to Ankara. The need thus arose fro a larger museum. Dr Hamit Zubeyir Koşay, Director of Cultural Affairs, submitted a proposal to Saffet Arıkan, the Minister of Education, sataing that the kurshunlu Han colud be used after some essential alretations as a Museum. This proposal was accepted and work started in 1938. Restoration was only completed in 1968. However, after the work on the domed central room of the Bedesten had been partly finished in 1940, a start was made on the arrangement of display objects under the direction of Prof. H.G. Guterbock. This display was opened to the public in 1943 while other parts of the museum were still under construction. The restoration project of this part was drawn up by the architect, Macit Kural, and the restoration itself was carried of by the architect, Zühtü bey, after competitive bidding. In 1948 the museum moved into the four rooms at the Kurshunlu Han, the restoration of which was then finished, there bye leaving the building at Akkale as a depot. The restoration and display projects of the shops around the domed area were drawn and carried out by İhsan Kıygı, an architect at the Monuments Department. Five of the shops were removed and a large surrounding corridor was created as an exhşbştşon area. The Museum building took its present from in 1968.

Today the Kurshunlu Han is used as the administration section. Located there are study rooms, the library, a conference hall, a laboratory and workshops. The Mahmut Pasha Bedesteni is used as the public display area. The Anatolian Civilizations Museum is among the leading museums of the world on account of its unique collections of material. The archaeology of Anatolia from the Paleolithic Age to the present day is displayed by periods in chronological order in the pleasant ambience of Ottoman surroundings.