Byzantine cultural heritage and the history of Byzantine studies in Turkey will be the topic of discussion with Byzantine art history expert Professor Engin Akyürek, director of the Koç University Stavros Niarchos Foundation, Center for Late Antique and Byzantine Studies (GABAM). Also in the conversation will be Associate Professor Koray Durak who has been lecturing on Byzantine history for fourteen years in the History Department of Boğaziçi University. The session will begin with observations on the emergence of Byzantine studies in Western Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries, their spread to Eastern Europe under the influence of nationalist movements in the 19th and 20th centuries, and then the initial steps of this field in the Ottoman Empire. Other topics will include the adventure of Byzantinology in Turkey’s Republican period, how it flourished and developed in the last two decades, and the obstacles preventing the development of the discipline. Listeners will get a firsthand account of the Byzantine cultural presence in Turkey, the evolution of Byzantine studies, and their current place in the world. Finally, an impression of Turkish academic life through the example of Byzantinology will be offered.