Holidays & celebrations
Ramazan Bayramı
The three-day festival that ends the month of Ramadan, all visits and sweets.
The Turkish encyclopedia
Holidays & celebrations
Religious and national holidays, when they fall and what people actually do — visiting, sweets, parades, and the whole country on the road.
5 pages in this category.
Holidays & celebrations
Kurban Bayramı
The four-day feast of sacrifice, the biggest family holiday of the year.
Holidays & celebrations
Nevruz
The spring festival of 21 March, greeted with fires and painted eggs.
Holidays & celebrations
19 Mayıs
Youth and Sports Day, remembering Atatürk's landing at Samsun in 1919.
Holidays & celebrations
30 Ağustos Zafer Bayramı
Victory Day, the anniversary of the decisive battle of 1922.
Questions
Why do the bayram dates move every year?
Because Ramazan Bayramı and Kurban Bayramı follow the lunar Hijri calendar, which runs about eleven days shorter than the Gregorian one. Each of them therefore arrives eleven or so days earlier each year and drifts through the seasons.
What do I say to someone at a bayram?
Bayramınız kutlu olsun, may your holiday be blessed, works everywhere and for every holiday. İyi bayramlar is the shorter, easier version, and nobody will mind which you choose.
Is Nevruz a public holiday?
It is widely celebrated on 21 March, with fires jumped over and picnics in the fields, and it is especially large in the east and southeast. It is not a national day off across the country in the way Republic Day is.