Dr Alessandra Ricci (Koç University), “How did it begin?: The Institutionalization of Byzantine Studies in Turkey and Sir Steven Runciman”
It was probably sometime in 1941 or early 1942 when İzmet İnönü, the second president of the Turkish Republic, summoned the minister of national education, Hasan Ali Yücel who confirmed – as İnönü had suspected – that Byzantine topics were not taught at the university level in the young Turkish Republic. Yücel was asked to immediately remedy the situation…








