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Süleyman Özerol

Retired teacher and journalist born in Ballıkaya. Since the 1980s he has collected the folk songs, deyiş and oral culture of the Arguvan and Hekimhan area; one of this site's main local sources.

Translated from the Turkish original.

Who
Retired teacher, journalist, collector of folk culture
Period
1 November 1953 –
Basis
Reported

This page was compiled from sources by mezirme.com.

According to the life story on Antoloji.com, Süleyman Özerol was born in Ballıkaya (Mezirme) on 1 November 1953; his mother was Zehra and his father Hasan. He attended primary school in the village and graduated from the Akçadağ Primary Teacher Training School in 1972. He taught in Urfa and Malatya and retired in 1998. In the same year he became editor-in-chief of the newspaper Yorum in Malatya; he later wrote a column for the newspaper Malatya Söz (Antoloji.com).

According to the same source, the Malatya Journalists’ Association (MAGDER) gave him an award in 2004, and the Folklore Research Institute (Folklor Araştırmaları Kurumu) gave him its Award for Service to Turkish Folklore in 2005. He paints, plays the bağlama (long-necked lute) and sings folk songs (Antoloji.com).

His collections

Özerol’s work centres on the folk culture of the Arguvan and Hekimhan area. His study “Yenilenen Köy Ballıkaya”, published in 1989 in Görüş Gazetesi in Malatya, and Arguvan Türküleri (2004), prepared with Hüseyin Şahin, are used as sources in Levent Çoban’s academic study of the musical culture of Hekimhan (Çoban 2018). Alemdar Yalçın and Hacı Yılmaz also mention his collections of local legends, poems and nefes (devotional hymns) in their 2004 article on the Şah İbrahim ocak (Yalçın – Yılmaz 2004).

His writings on the village are among this site’s main local sources (Özerol, blog).

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Sources for this page

  1. Local studyAntoloji.com (erişim 2026). Süleyman Özerol: Hayatı. Antoloji.com (poet's page). antoloji.com Accessed: 18 October 2026.Biographies on poets' pages are usually supplied by the poets themselves.
  2. Academic publicationAlemdar Yalçın, Hacı Yılmaz (2004). Şah İbrahim Ocağı Üzerine Yeni Bilgiler. Türk Kültürü ve Hacı Bektaş Veli Araştırma Dergisi, no. 30, Gazi University, pp. 11 ff.. isamveri.org Accessed: 18 October 2026.
  3. Academic publicationLevent Çoban (2018). Hekimhan Müzik Kültürü Üzerine Bir Araştırma. İnönü Üniversitesi Kültür ve Sanat Dergisi, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 77–84. dergipark.org.tr Accessed: 12 October 2026.
  4. Local studySüleyman Özerol (2010–2026). Mezirme Köyü (Ballıkaya Mahallesi) İle İlgili Bilgiler, Haberler ve Diğer. Blogger. mezirmeballikayakoyu.blogspot.com Accessed: 12 October 2026.A local researcher's work. Information taken from it and not confirmed by another source is marked as "reported" on this site.

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