Alanköy is one of the seventeen villages of the Hamamözü district of Amasya Province, a settlement that has lost two-thirds of its population in eighteen years: in 2007, 346 people were registered in the village; in 2025 there were 117. In the language of the municipality and of local announcements the village is more often called "Alan Köyü". The same name occurs a second time in Amasya, since there is also an Alanköy among the villages of Göynücek district. The village described here is the one in Hamamözü. No monograph, article or record of a registered building concerning the village has been found. What information exists consists of the population series and a few official announcements from recent years.

Name and Past

Bekir Başalan, in his study of the renamed settlements of Amasya, counts four places in Hamamözü district whose names were changed: Damladere (formerly Dankaza), Dumanlı (Şıhlar), Kağnıcı (Kanlıca) and Kızılcaören (Kızılcaviran). Alanköy is not on this list, meaning that the village's name has not been officially changed since the village lists of the Republican period. There is, however, no record explaining what the name refers to. No village of this name appears in Hüsâmeddîn Yasar's description of the nahiye of Hamamözü, and no trace of it has been found in Ottoman records; when and by whom the village was founded is therefore unknown. The district's official descriptions state that most people living in Hamamözü's villages are the descendants of those who migrated into inner Anatolia during the Ottoman-Russian War of 1877-1878, the majority of them from Gümüşhane. Whether this general statement also applies to Alanköy is not specified.

The Village Today

In the municipality's list of village muhtars, the muhtar (village headman) of Alan Köyü is given as Muharrem Güler. One of the most recent official announcements concerning the village is of a Ramadan gathering: in March 2026 an iftar was given in the village, hosted by Adil Çamlı, a native of the area, at which the District Governor of Hamamözü, Ertuğrul Arslan, Mayor Cihan Demir and the district's political party representatives met the villagers. No published information has been found on whether the village has a mosque, a school or any other building.

Population

The population of Alanköy has fallen almost every year since 2007. Rather than a single great wave of emigration, the series shows a slow and unbroken emptying; the only sharp break is the fall from 173 to 117 between 2024 and 2025. Of those registered in 2025, 56 were men and 61 women.

  • 2007: 346; 2008: 327; 2009: 328; 2010: 312; 2011: 288
  • 2012: 286; 2013: 279; 2014: 264; 2015: 251; 2016: 240
  • 2017: 235; 2018: 236; 2019: 206; 2020: 201; 2021: 195
  • 2022: 192; 2023: 176; 2024: 173; 2025: 117

Bibliography

Primary sources

Academic studies

Official sources

Other sources

Online sources