The Surname Law of the Republic of Turkey

[Anthea]

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The Surname Law

The Surname Law, one of the founding laws of the Turkish state, was passed on 21 June 1934, published in the Official Gazette on 2 July 1934 and came into force on 2 January 1935. The law stipulated that all people living within the borders established by the Turkish state were obliged to bear a surname

The Surname Law of 1934 enforced the use of official surnames but also stipulated that citizens choose Turkish names. Until it was repealed in 2013. The eldest male was the head of household and Turkish law appointed him to choose the surname. However, in his absence, death, or mental incapacitation the wife would do so.

The articles of the Soy Adı Kanunu stipulated that:

All Turks must bear their surnames in addition to their proper names;
The surname must follow the proper name in signing, speaking and writing;
Names may not relate to military rank and civil officialdom; to tribes, foreign races or ethnicities; nor may they be offensive or ridiculous.
The use of "historical names" without the proper genealogical evidence is also forbidden.

Since the surname law stipulated that the surnames to be given had to be in Turkish, no Kurd could take a surname in their own language.
Moreover, while giving the Kurds surnames and registering them as Turkish, the Turkish state also fixed their birthdays and continued its attempts to erase the Kurds' past, not only with their surnames, but also with their birthdays. After the enactment of the Surname Law, almost all Kurds were registered as born on 1 January.

“Social engineering evolved into ethnic engineering”

The social engineering of the committee evolved into ethnic engineering with the establishment of the republic. Dr Nazım, one of the most important Ittihadists of the time, explained their aims in a meeting as follows: "What did we make this revolution for? What was our aim? Was it to remove Sultan Hamid and his friends from their seats and chairs and replace them? I do not want to believe that this is the case.

I have become your friend, comrade and brother in order to revive Turkishness. I want the Turk, and only the Turk, to live and have independent sovereignty in this community. Let us destroy elements other than the Turk. No matter what religion and sect they belong to,

it is necessary to purge this country of all elements that are not Turks. Religion has no value in my eyes. My religion is Turan. Shame on us if the complete cleansing and certain extermination is not carried out! We cannot sit where we are sitting today.

Tomorrow, they will grab us by the arms and throw us out. They will not only throw us out, but kill us. The revolution knows no mercy. It thinks only of the goal it wants to keep alive, and if there are obstacles and hindrances, it destroys and removes them."