Ali Rıza Efendi
Ali Rıza Efendi was the father of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and the husband of Zübeyde Hanım.
He was born in Selanik, but then the most important city in the Ottoman Empire in Europe after Constantinople/Istanbul. He worked as a customs official and died in 1888 at age 49, when his son was 7 years old. He is thought to be of local descent: Albanian or Slavic by some scholars as Andrew Mango, Lou Giaffo, Ernst Jaeckh, etc. However the village where his family was born has still a Turkish majority population, and Falih Rıfkı Atay, journalist and close friend of Atatürk, claimed he descends partially from Turks of Söke, in Aydın Province. According to other historians such as Vamik D. Volkan, Norman Itzkowitz, Hasan İzzettin Dinamo, etc: Ali Rıza's ancestors were Turks, ultimately descending from Söke in the Aydın Province of Anatolia.
Ali Riza's family comes from Kodžadžik, in Centar Župa Municipality, today in North Macedonia, where there is a memorial house.
, North Macedonia
