CLASSICAL PHILOLOGY IN ISTANBUL UNIVERSITY

Abstract

In Turkish, philology is the meaning of education in language and literature. Classical philology is a philological discipline which is based on logic and to make comparisons. It deals with examining Ancient Greek and Roman civilizations, explaining all aspects (language, institutions, governments, social life, etc.) of these civilizations by documents and literary texts which were transferred to us, and bringing the unknown aspects to light. In our history of higher education Classical Philology as a discipline is occurred in 1933 through the educational reforms introduced by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of the Turkish Republic. In Istanbul University, between twelve institutes, which were established in Faculty of Letters from 1933 to 1942, Classical Philology has taken place also. At the beginning, the academic staff of Classical Philology consisted of foreign academics. After a while the Turkish scholars, who have been trained abroad and have returned home, took the place of foreign scholars. Today, education and research activities which continue at undergraduate and postgraduate levels and aim to present and to explain the importance of classical culture on the intellectual and social development of people, are carried by Turkish academics who are the classical scholars trained in Istanbul University.