Nene Hatun

Lore & Background

According to Turkish folklore, Nene Hatun lived in the Aziziye neighborhood of Erzurum, near a key fortification. On the night of 7 November 1877, her older brother returned home badly wounded and died. Fort Aziziye was captured by the Russian army on the evening of 9 November. When news of the capture spread the next morning, she kissed her dead brother's head, swore to avenge him, and left her three-year-old son Yusuf at home. She joined the counterattack armed with her brother's rifle and a hatchet.

Reader's Guide

Nene Hatun's significance lies in her role as a civilian participant in the recapture of Fort Aziziye, a counterattack launched by Turkish civilians—mostly women and elderly men—armed with axes and farming equipment. Hundreds of Turkish civilians were killed by Russian gunfire, but their overwhelming numbers allowed them to break down the fort's iron doors and engage in hand-to-hand combat, resulting in around 2,000 Russian soldiers killed and the rest routed. Nene Hatun was found unconscious, wounded, with her bloodied hands still gripping her hatchet, and was singled out for her heroism. She lived the rest of her life in Aziziye, lost her husband, and her son Yusuf was killed in World War I at Gallipoli. In 1954, as the last survivor of the war, she was visited by General Baransel, commander of the 3rd Turkish army, and became known as the 'Mother of the Third Army.' She was named 'Mother of the Mothers' on Mother's Day in 1955. She died of pneumonia on 22 May 1955 at age 98 and was buried in the martyrs' cemetery at Fort Aziziye. Her legacy endures in Turkish culture, including depictions in films from 1973 and 2010, and the naming of Turkey's first emergency response vessel, ERV Nene Hatun, built in 2014.

Did You Know?

• Nene Hatun was surnamed Kırkgöz after 1934.
• She left her three-year-old son Yusuf at home to join the counterattack.
• She was found unconscious with her bloodied hands still grasping her hatchet.

The Night of Oath and the Storming of Aziziye

On the night of 7 November 1877, Nene Hatun's older brother Hasan returned home mortally wounded and died in their home in the Aziziye neighborhood of Erzurum. Two days later, Russian forces seized Fort Aziziye, the key stronghold defending the city. The following morning, upon hearing the news, she kissed her brother's head and swore to avenge his death. She left her newborn daughter and three-year-old son Yusuf at home, seized her dead brother's rifle and a hatchet, and joined the counterattack. That assault was not a conventional military operation but a tide of civilians—predominantly women and elderly men—swinging axes and wielding farming tools against a fortified garrison. Russian gunfire mowed down hundreds, yet the crowd's sheer numbers let them batter open the fort's iron doors and plunge into hand-to-hand combat. Around two thousand Russian soldiers were killed and the rest routed. When the fighting ended, Nene Hatun was found unconscious and wounded, her bloodied hands still clenched around her hatchet. She was singled out for her courage and became a lasting symbol of fearless resistance in Turkish folklore.

A Life of Repeated Loss

Nene Hatun's story is inseparable from the personal grief that shaped her. She lived in the Aziziye quarter of Erzurum, close to the fortification that would become the site of her legendary stand. The death of her brother Hasan in November 1877 was the first of a long series of losses. In the years that followed, she lost her husband, and the war's shadow continued to claim those she loved. Her son Yusuf, the three-year-old she had left behind while joining the counterattack, grew up to serve his country and was killed at the Battle of Gallipoli during World War I. Despite these successive blows, she remained in Aziziye for the rest of her days, never leaving the neighborhood where her brother had died and where she had fought. Her endurance through decades of personal tragedy—losing a brother in a border war, a spouse in the intervening years, and a son in a world war—gave her public heroism a deeply private dimension. She was not merely a warrior of a single night but a woman who carried an extraordinary weight of mourning across nearly eight decades of life.

Honor in Old Age and a Martyr's Rest

In 1954, at the age of ninety-seven, Nene Hatun was identified as the last living survivor of the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878. General Baransel, commander of the 3rd Turkish Army, traveled to visit her, and from that point onward she carried the title "Mother of the Third Army," a designation that linked her personal sacrifice to the institutional memory of the nation's military. The following year, on Mother's Day in 1955, she was honored with the title "Mother of the Mothers," a recognition that elevated her from a single act of wartime bravery to a universal symbol of maternal and civic devotion. She also bore the surname Kırkgöz, adopted after Turkey's 1934 surname law. Her life ended on 22 May 1955, when pneumonia claimed her at the age of ninety-eight. She was buried in the martyrs' cemetery at Fort Aziziye, the very fortification she had helped retake seventy-seven years earlier, ensuring that her final resting place would be inseparable from the ground where her most defining act of courage had taken place.

From Folklore to the Silver Screen

Nene Hatun's legend has transcended oral tradition to become a recurring subject in Turkish popular culture. In 1973, the film Gazi Kadın (Nene Hatun) brought her story to cinema audiences, with the prominent actress Türkan Şoray portraying the heroine alongside Kadir İnanır. A second feature film bearing her name was released in 2010, indicating that new generations of filmmakers continued to find her narrative compelling. Her name has also been applied to tangible national projects: in 2014, Turkey's first domestically built emergency response vessel was christened ERV Nene Hatun, embedding her identity into the country's maritime infrastructure. She also left a written mark on the republic's early history, as a letter she addressed to President İnönü survives as a historical document. Across folklore, cinema, naval nomenclature, and archival correspondence, Nene Hatun has functioned as a versatile cultural reference point—simultaneously a local Erzurum heroine, a national symbol of civilian resistance, and a figure whose name continues to be invoked in contexts far removed from the November night of 1877.