Ardahan is a city in northeastern Turkey, near the Georgian border.

Its historical names include Ardahan (Armenian: Արդահան), Ardagan (Russian: Ардаган) and Artaani (Georgian: არტაანი).

In Ancient times the region was called Gogarene, which is assumed to derive from the name of Gugars, who were a Proto-Kartvelian tribe. First surviving record about this region is attributed to Strabo, who mentions that it was a province of Caucasian Iberia. Ardahan was incorporated into the Kingdom of Armenia during 2nd century BC and was renamed as Gugark. It was located in the canton of Ardahan, which was a part of the province of Gugark'. In the ninth century, the city was taken by the Bagrationi princes of Artanuj. From the ninth to eleventh centuries, Ardahan was an important transit point for goods arriving from the Abbasid Caliphate and departing to the regions around the Black Sea. During the 8th to 11th centuries it was part of georgian principality of Tao-Klarjeti. After the liberation from the arab rule it was incorporated into the Kingdom of Georgia and was part of it from 11th century onwards. According to the Arab historian Yahya of Antioch, the Byzantines burned down Ardahan and slaughtered its population in 1021. The Mongols took hold of the city in the 1230s but the Georgian princes of Samtskhe-Saatabago were able to capture it from them in 1266.

Abdullah Gül (Turkish: [abduɫˈɫɑh ˈɟyl]; born 29 October 1950) is the 11th and current President of the Republic of Turkey, serving in that office since 28 August 2007. He previously served for four months as Prime Minister from 2002-03, and as Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2003-07.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's nomination of Gül as a presidential candidate drew strong and highly vocal opposition from ardent supporters of secularism in Turkey. In May 2007, Gül's first bid for presidency was blocked by the Constitutional Court, due to concern over views Gül expressed during his Welfare Party years, and the fact that his wife, Hayrünnisa, wears a headscarf. However, following the parliamentary elections in July of the same year, which were won by the Justice and Development Party with 46.6% of the popular vote, he was eventually elected President on 28 August 2007 and was sworn in the same day, becoming the first openly devout Muslim President in the modern history of Turkey.

President Gül was born in Kayseri, a city in central Anatolia. His father is Ahmed Hamdi Gül, a retired air force mechanic, and his mother is Adviye Gül (née Satoğlu). His family has lived in the Güllük district of Kayseri for about a century. His ancestry/ethnicity according to a Çankaya Presidential Residence statement is "Turkish Muslim." Gül was also called with the name Cumhur (which means 'people') by his family.