Turkey

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History

Turkey, mainly consisting of the Anatolian peninsula, is situated at the border of both Europe and Asia, and therefore has been inhabitated since the Neolithic. Since then, settlements like Troy thrived and enriched the world with their culture. The first major empire in the region was that of the Hittites (18th-13th century BC). Western Anatolia was settled by the Ionians, one of the ancient Greek peoples. The entire area was conquered by the Persian Empire during the 6th and 5th centuries and later fell to Alexander the Great, then, by the mid-1st century BC, to Rome. In 324, the Roman emperor Constantine I chose Byzantium to be the new capital of the Roman Empire, renaming it New Rome (later Constantinople and Istanbul). After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, it became the capital of the Byzantine (or Eastern Roman) Empire. Following their victory over the Byzantine Empire in 1071, the Turks founded the Seljuk Empire, which evolved into the Ottoman Empire. It included vast territories from Arabia to Northern Africa, thus dominating the Islamic world. After the defeat in World War I, Turkey lost most of those territories. Parts of the West coast of today's Turkey were occupied by Allied forces. Under the leadership of Mustafa Kemal Pasha (who later became the famous "Atatürk"), the new Turkish national movement became a strong force. By September 18, 1922, the occupying armies were repelled and the country saw the birth of the new Turkish state. On November 1, the newly founded parliament formally abolished the Sultanate, thus ending 623 years of Ottoman rule. The Treaty of Lausanne of 1923 led to the international recognition of the sovereignty of the newly formed "Republic of Turkey" with the new capital Ankara.

Geography and climate

Turkey is encircled by seas on three sides: the Aegean Sea to the west, the Black Sea to the north and the Mediterranean Sea to the south. Turkey also contains the Sea of Marmara in the northwest. The European section of Turkey, in the northwest, and forms the borders of Turkey with Greece and Bulgaria. The Asian part of the country, Anatolia (also called Asia Minor), consists of a high central plateau with narrow coastal plains.The climate is a Mediterranean temperate climate, with hot, dry summers and mild, wet and cold winters, though conditions can be much harsher in the more arid interior. Mountains close to the coast prevent Mediterranean influences from extending inland, giving the interior of Turkey a continental climate with distinct seasons. The central Anatolian Plateau is much more subject to extremes than coastal areas. Winters on the plateau are especially severe. Temperatures of −30 °C to −40 °C (−22 °F to -40 °F) can occur in the mountainous areas in the east, and snow may lie on the ground 120 days of the year. In the west, winter temperatures average below 1 °C (34 °F). Summers are hot and dry, with temperatures generally above 30 °C (86 °F) in the day.

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