Book of Dede Korkut
The epic story cycle of the Oghuz Turks, framed around the legendary bard Korkut Ata. Its compilers are unknown; the bard is the frame, not a documented author.
- Original byline
- Anonymous
- Published
- Date not recorded
- Form
- Poems
- Authorship
- Still unknown
- Reason for anonymity
- Unrecorded
- Copyright
- Public domain
- Reference
- Wikipedia · Wikidata
The authorship story
The Book of Dede Korkut collects twelve heroic tales of the Oghuz Turks, written down in the fifteenth or sixteenth century from much older oral tradition. The stories are framed as the songs of Korkut Ata, a legendary bard and sage, and manuscript tradition presents him as their teller. That framing is literary, not biographical: no historical compiler is documented, and the bard himself belongs to legend. The work is the national epic of Turkic peoples from Anatolia to Central Asia, and its authorship is recorded here as unknown.
Questions readers ask
Who wrote Book of Dede Korkut?
Nobody knows. No author for Book of Dede Korkut has been identified in the documented record.
Can I read Book of Dede Korkut for free?
Yes. Book of Dede Korkut is in the public domain and the full text is free to read at the Internet Archive.
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