Hurufat Atatürk University Printing Museum

Hurufat Atatürk University Printing Museum is a museum located within Atatürk University in Erzurum, established to research, preserve, and transmit the history of printing and writing to future generations. The museum’s name derives from the Arabic word “hurufat,” meaning “letters,” which refers to the metal type characters used in printing. Spread over an area of approximately 700 square meters, the museum houses one of Türkiye’s most comprehensive and largest collections in the field of printing^【1】.

The museum’s origins trace back to the university press, established in 1959 to meet Atatürk University’s academic publishing, book, journal, and official documentation needs, following the university’s opening in 1957. For half a century, this unit served the university until it ceased operations in 2010 due to technological advancements, with its equipment preserved within the Prof. Dr. Fuat Sezgin Library. In 2021, under the “New Generation University Design and Transformation Project” initiated by Associate Professor Dr. Mehmet Ferruh Haşıloğlu of the Faculty of Fine Arts and supported by university administration, it was decided to convert the idle press into a museum. The museum was officially opened to the public on 17 October 2024, with the participation of Minister of National Education Prof. Dr. Yusuf Tekin and other state officials.

^{Hurufat Atatürk Üniversitesi Baskı Müzesi Açılışı} (Atatürk Üniversitesi)

The museum is divided into five main functional sections covering the pre-press, press, and post-press processes:

This section displays the manual arrangement of metal type characters into printing-ready layouts. Visitors are shown the meticulous work involved in aligning letters in correct order and achieving an aesthetically balanced print composition using traditional typesetting methods.

^{Mürettiphane}(Atatürk Üniversitesi)

These sections demonstrate the transfer and reproduction of typeset layouts onto paper. The museum showcases both traditional letterpress techniques and the fundamental principles of modern offset printing technology. In the offset printing section, visitors can examine high-speed printing mechanisms based on the principle that water and oil do not mix.

^Baskı (Atatürk Üniversitesi)

This final stage section displays the binding of printed materials into books or journals. Both traditional handcrafted artistic binding methods and modern functional binding techniques and materials are exhibited here.

^{Mücellithane} (Atatürk Üniversitesi)

This unit demonstrates the production of hurufat by pouring molten metal into molds. In addition to the technical details of this highly precise craft, the workshop includes a section where traditional methods are used to recycle waste paper into new paper.

^{Döküm Atölyesi}(Atatürk Üniversitesi)

The museum’s inventory includes between 32 and 40 machines used in pre-press, press, and post-press processes^【2】. The oldest items in the collection are machines dating back 80 years to the 1940s. Among the tens of thousands of metal type characters (hurufat) on display, the collection includes not only Latin characters but also Arabic characters, mathematical symbols, and various specialized typographic figures^【3】. Additionally, a section of the museum displays books printed at the press from its founding in 1959 until its closure in 2010.

The Hurufat Atatürk University Printing Museum is located at the intersection of the Library and Faculty of Agriculture on the Atatürk University campus in the Yakutiye district of Erzurum. The museum is open free of charge daily from 10:00 to 16:00 (some sources list 09:30 to 16:00) on weekdays. It is closed on weekends and public holidays.