Edremit, Balıkesir

Template:Other uses Template:Infobox Turkey place Edremit is a municipality and district of Balıkesir Province, Turkey.<ref>Büyükşehir İlçe Belediyesi, Turkey Civil Administration Departments Inventory. Retrieved 8 June 2023.</ref> Its area is 682 km²,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and its population is 167,901 (2022).<ref name=tuik>Template:Cite web</ref>

It is situated at the tip of the gulf with the same name (Gulf of Edremit), with its town centre a few kilometres inland, and is an important centre of trade, along with the other towns that are situated on the same gulf (namely Ayvalık, Gömeç, Burhaniye and Havran). It is also one of the largest district centres of Balıkesir Province. The district of Edremit, especially around Kazdağı, is largely covered with forests. The mayor of Edremit municipality is Selman Hasan Arslan.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

History

Template:Main The modern city of Edremit is named after the ancient Greek city of Adramyttion (Template:Lang) or Adramytteion (Ἀδραμύττειον), a city of Asia Minor on the coast of Aeolis which is in near city Modern Burhaniye

Tahtacı Turkmen, descendants of the army of Shah Ismail I, settled in the mountains near Edremit after their defeat in the Battle of Chaldiran in 1514.Template:Sfnp

By 1819, Henry Alexander Scammell Dearborn recorded that Edremit was only populated by "a few Greek fishermen".Template:Sfnp In 1912, the town had 6200 inhabitants, 1200 of which were Greeks.Template:Sfnp At this time, the district had 19 Greek schools and roughly 600 pupils.Template:Sfnp

In May 1914, thousands of Muslim refugees who had fled from the Balkans arrived in the town of Edremit and proceeded to ransack the shops and homes of the town's Greek community. According to Arnold J. Toynbee, the Ottoman government armed and organised the refugees. Many Greek refugees found refuge in the town church before fleeing to the harbour where they were then granted passage to the nearby Greek island of Lesbos. Turks continued to massacre or expel Greeks in the following months in surrounding villages as part of the wider Greek genocide throughout Turkey.Template:Sfnp

Amidst the Greek Summer Offensive of the Greco-Turkish War of 1919–1922, Edremit was seized by the Army of Asia Minor on 19 June 1920 and a Turkish Nationalist counterattack near the town was repelled.Template:Sfnmp It remained under Greek control until their withdrawal in late August 1922, following which all remaining Greeks fled or were killed by the Turkish army.Template:Sfnp

Composition

There are 47 neighbourhoods in Edremit District:<ref>Mahalle, Turkey Civil Administration Departments Inventory. Retrieved 22 May 2023.</ref> Template:Div col

Akçay
Altınkum
Altınoluk
Arıtaşı
Atatürk
Avcılar
Beyoba
Bostancı
Çamcı
Camivasat
Çamlıbel
Cennetayağı
Çıkrıkçı
Cumhuriyet
Darsofa
Dereli
Doyuran
Eroğlan
Gazicelal
Gaziilyas
Güre
Güre-Cumhuriyet
Hacıarslanlar
Hacıtuğrul
Hamidiye
Hekimzade
İbrahimce
İkizçay
İskele
Kadıköy
Kapıcıbaşı
Kavlaklar
Kızılkeçili
Mehmetalanı
Narlı
Ortaoba
Pınarbaşı
Şahindere
Sarıkız
Soğanyemez
Tahtakuşlar
Turhanbey
Tuzcumurat
Yaşyer
Yaylaönü
Yolören
Zeytinli

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Climate

Edremit has a hot-summer Mediterranean climate (Köppen: Csa),<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> with hot, dry summers, and cool, wet winters.

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Economy

Edremit's economy relies largely on the production of olives, as well as on tourism. Edremit is known as the olive capital of Turkey. Kaz Dağı National Park, extending around the ancient Mount Ida (mentioned in Homer's epic poems such as the Iliad), is situated within the boundaries of Edremit district and is an important tourist attraction with its natural scenery and a number of picturesque small villages around it.

Demographics

In ethno-cultural terms, the population of Edremit is a mixture of Balkan Turks and Balkan Albanians, descendants of immigrants from Balkans, Aegean Islands, some Circassians, as well as Tahtacı Turkmens, who pursue their own traditions and life-style to this day. A private museum of ethnography in the village of Tahtakuşlar is one of the rare institutions in Turkey focusing on Tahtacı culture.

Notable people

Germanos Karavangelis (1866–1935), Metropolitan Bishop of Kastoria and later Amaseia
Benjamin I of Constantinople (1871–1946), Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople
Panos Dukakis (1896–1979), father of American politician Michael Dukakis
Sabahattin Ali (1907–1948), author and journalist
Hülya Avşar (b. 1963), actress
Caner Erkin (b. 1988), professional footballer