N. İlgi Gerçek is a faculty member at the Department of Archaeology, Bilkent University. She holds a BA in Archaeology and History of Art from Bilkent University, and obtained her MA and PhD in Hittite and Mesopotamian Studies from the University of Michigan. Her professional affiliations include a postdoctoral research fellowship at the University of Copenhagen, as well as research and teaching positions at ANAMED (Koç University) and the İstanbul University Department of Hittitology.

Most of her research concentrates on the social and political history of Anatolia in the Late Bronze Age and she has written on diverse topics such as imperialism, frontiers, identity, mobility, historical geography and landscape studies Hittite Anatolia. Her most recent research explores local agency and governance and in Hittite Anatolia. She is also invested in the public promotion of cuneiform studies in Türkiye and the academic dissemination of the cuneiform collections housed in Turkish museums. To this end she has been co-directing the İstanbul Sippar Project with Selim Adalı, the preliminary results of which are in preparation for publication. 

N. İlgi Gerçek’s research as a fellow of KFG 2615 Rethinking – Governance in the Ancient Near East centers on the socio-political history of Hittite Anatolia, particularly the intertwined processes of state formation, imperialism, and anti-state resistance. To this end, she will pursue two distinct but complementary tracks. The first track, provisionally titled “Dealing in Absolutes: The State and its Discontents in Hittite Anatolia,” problematizes prevalent descriptions of the Hittite polity and its governance, focusing on how these descriptions relate to the nature of the evidence and its interpretation. The second track aims to collect and analyze textual evidence for local governance and local or non-state political agency in Hittite Anatolia.

• Forthcoming  “The Language of Geography,” in Integrated Approaches to the Political Geography of Southern Anatolia, İ. Gerçek and M. Massa (eds.) (special issue of Anatolian Studies scheduled for publication in late 2024-early 2025).
• Forthcoming  Integrated Approaches to the Political Geography of Southern Anatolia, 1650-550 BCE co-editor with Michele Massa (edited book as special issue of Anatolian Studies, scheduled for publication in late 2024-early 2025).
• Forthcoming “Borderlands and Mobility in Hittite Anatolia,” in Mobility in Antiquity: Rethinking the Ancient World through Movement, J. Mokrisova et al. (eds.), Routledge.
• Forthcoming  “Rites Aquatic: The Role of Water in the Constructions and Perceptions of Sacred Landscapes in Hittite Anatolia,” in Aquatic Worlds of Anatolia, M. Harpster et al. (eds.), Koç University Press.
• 2024  “Going Local: An Agency-Based Approach to Collapse, Resistance, and Resilience in Hittite Anatolia.” Journal of Ancient Near Easter History 11: 143-60.
• 2023“Citizenship in Late Bronze Age Hatti,” in Citizenship in Antiquity: Civic Communities in the Ancient Mediterranean, Filonik, J. et al. (eds). pp. 98-110, Routledge.
• 2023 Review of Officials and Administration in the Hittite World. Tayfun Bilgin. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter. 2019. JNES (Journal of Near Eastern Studies).
• 2022“Tapariya- and tapariyalles: Local Communities and Local Agency in the Hittite Period and its Aftermath.” N. İlgi Gerçek and Lorenzo d’Alfonso, in A Festschrift Volume, M. Leonard-Fleckman et al. (eds.). Brill.
• 2020“Rivers and River Cults in Hittite Anatolia,” in Cult, Temple, Sacred Spaces: Cult Practices and Cult Spaces in Hittite Anatolia and Neighbouring Cultures, Susanne Görke and Charles W. Steitler (eds.), StBoT (Studien zu den Boğazköy Texten) 66. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag.
• 2020 Review of Hittite Landscape and Geography. Edited by Mark Weeden and Lee Z. Ullmann. Handbook of Oriental Studies 1/121. Leiden: Brill, 2017. Reviewed byMüge Durusu-Tanrıöver and N. İlgi Gerçek. JNES (Journal of Near Eastern Studies) 79.2.
• 2018 “Hittite Geographers: Geographical Perceptions and Practices in Hittite Anatolia” Journal of Ancient Near Eastern History 4: 39–60.
• 2018 “Frontiers, Hittite,” in The Encyclopedia of Ancient History, Wiley Online Library.
• 2017 “‘A Goatherd Shall Not Enter!’: Observations on Pastoralism and Mobility in Hittite Anatolia,” Questions, Dialogues and Approaches in Eastern Mediterranean Archaeology, Kozal, E. et al. (eds.) (AOAT). Münster: Ugarit-Verlag.
• 2017 “‘The Knees of the Storm-god’: Aspects of the Administration and Socio-political Dynamics of Hatti’s Frontiers,” Places and Spaces in Hittite Anatolia: Hatti and the East, ed. Metin Alparslan. İstanbul: Zero Books.
• 2017 “Approaches to Hittite Imperialism: A View from the ‘Old Kingdom’ and ‘Early Empire’ Periods (c. 1650-1350 BCE),” in Innovation vs. Persistence. What makes the difference of the Hittite Empire in 2nd Millennium BC Anatolia?, Schachner, A., Schoop, U. and Genz, H. (eds.)(BYZAS). İstanbul: Ege Yayınları.