Datça is a municipality and

district A district is a type of administrative division that in some countries is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or county, counties, several municipality, municip ...

Muğla Province Muğla Province (, ) is a Provinces of Turkey, province and Metropolitan municipalities in Turkey, metropolitan municipality of Turkey, at the country's southwestern corner, on the Aegean Sea. Its area is 12,654 km2, and its population is 1 ...

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

. Its area is 436 km², and its population is 25,029 (2022). The town center is situated midway through the peninsula which carries the same name as the district and the town (

Datça Peninsula Datça is a municipality and district of Muğla Province, Turkey. Its area is 436 km2, and its population is 25,029 (2022). The town center is situated midway through the peninsula which carries the same name as the district and the town ( Dat ...

). It was a

nahiya A nāḥiyah ( , plural ''nawāḥī'' ), also nahiyeh, nahiya or nahia, is a regional or local type of administrative division that usually consists of a number of villages or sometimes smaller towns. In Tajikistan, it is a second-level divisi ...

Marmaris Marmaris () is a municipality and Districts of Turkey, district of Muğla Province, Turkey. Its area is 906 km2, and its population is 97,818 (2022). It is a port city and tourist resort on the Aegean Sea, Mediterranean coast, along the shorel ...

District until 1928. Datça's first center in village of Reşadiye till 1947, when it was moved to present borough of İskele.

Name

The name Datça comes from Stadia, an ancient town near

Cnidus Knidos or Cnidus (; , , , Knídos) was a Ancient Greece, Greek city in ancient Caria and part of the Dorian Hexapolis, in south-western Asia Minor, modern-day Turkey. It was situated on the Datça peninsula, which forms the southern side of the ...

. ''Stadia'' developed into ''Tadya'', ''Dadya'', ''Dadça'', and then ''Datça''. Both the town and the peninsula of Datça were called Reşadiye for a brief period in the beginning of the 20th century, honoring the penultimate Ottoman Sultan Mehmed V Reşad, and some maps may still refer to the peninsula under this name; today Reşadiye is the name of one of the quarters of the town.

Geography

The long and narrow Datça Peninsula, whose outline follows the undulations of small bays and coves facing south or north all along its length which reaches near , corresponds almost exactly to the Datça district, with the addition beyond its

isthmus An isthmus (; : isthmuses or isthmi) is a narrow piece of land connecting two larger areas across an expanse of water by which they are otherwise separated. A tombolo is an isthmus that consists of a spit or bar, and a strait is the sea count ...

of a small panhandle in the direction of the south-east. The isthmus itself is only several hundred meters wide. The extreme end of the western tip of the district and the peninsula, the locality called Tekir, is the location of the ancient city of

Knidos Knidos or Cnidus (; , , , Knídos) was a Greek city in ancient Caria and part of the Dorian Hexapolis, in south-western Asia Minor, modern-day Turkey. It was situated on the Datça peninsula, which forms the southern side of the Sinus Cerami ...

. There is an ongoing debate on whether or not this location was the original site of the ancient city, a number of sources claiming that until the mid-4th century BCE, Knidos was halfway along the peninsula, near the present-day district center. The peninsula's eastern end is marked by the

fjord In physical geography, a fjord (also spelled fiord in New Zealand English; ) is a long, narrow sea inlet with steep sides or cliffs, created by a glacier. Fjords exist on the coasts of Antarctica, the Arctic, and surrounding landmasses of the n ...

-like indentation of Bencik Cove, 1.5 km in length, at the end of which the narrow isthmus where it joins the mainland is found. This point is a natural curiosity which offers a wide view of the

Gulf of Gökova Gulf of Gökova () or Gulf of Kerme (; ; , ; or Gulf of Cos), is a long (100 km), narrow gulf of the Aegean Sea between Bodrum and Datça peninsulas in south-west Turkey. Administratively, the Gulf of Gökova coastline includes portions o ...

in the north and the Gulf of Hisarönü in the south and is called ''Balıkaşıran'' (literally, ''the place where fish may leap across'') and is also often used for the portage of small boats. According to

Herodotus Herodotus (; BC) was a Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus (now Bodrum, Turkey), under Persian control in the 5th century BC, and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria, Italy. He wrote the '' Histori ...

, during the Persian invasions in 540 BC, the Knidians had sought to dig a canal at this spot as a defensive measure and in order to transform their territory into an island. But an oracle was consulted who reportedly said "If the gods had so willed, they would have made your land an island. Do not pierce the isthmus." Whereupon they surrendered to the Persians.

Climate

Datça has a

hot-summer Mediterranean climate A Mediterranean climate ( ), also called a dry summer climate, described by Köppen and Trewartha as ''Cs'', is a temperate climate type that occurs in the lower mid-latitudes (normally 30 to 44 north and south latitude). Such climates typic ...

(

Köppen Köppen is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Bernd Köppen (1951–2014), German pianist and composer * Carl Köppen (1833-1907), German military advisor in Meiji era Japan * Edlef Köppen (1893–1939), German author ...

: ''Csa''), with very hot, dry summers, and mild, wet winters.

Settlement

The quarters of the city of Datça are Reşadiye, Eski Datça 'Old Datça' and İskele 'quay', separated by about a mile from each other. Reşadiye was the original administrative core when the town was renamed Datça and turned into a district center in 1928, before it was moved to İskele quarter. The center town is crossed by the short course of the Datça Stream (''Datça Çayı'' in Turkish). Datca2

The Datça district has nine villages scattered along the peninsula. These are; Cumalı, Emecik, Hızırşah, Karaköy, Kızlan, Mesudiye, Sındı, Yakaköy, Yazıköy. Historically, apart from small coastal patches, Datça Peninsula has two fertile areas along its length. The whole of the eastern half is bare, mountainous and scarcely inhabited. The western part is also mountainous, rising in places over 1,000 meters, but has towards its western end on the south side a considerable extent of well-watered land reaching to the coast at Palamutbükü locality and supporting a group of villages known collectively as ''Betçe'' (''the five villages''). These are; Mesudiye, Sındı, Yakaköy, Yazıköy, Cumalı. The village of Mesudiye, very near the sea shore has a jetty owned by the community of villagers. The village's bay is called Hayıtbükü. Palamutbükü locality, more to the west, also has a little pier which allows boats to moore. Palamutbükü today is a holiday village with a long beach. The second and larger area of good land is in the middle of the peninsula southwest of the median isthmus dividing the two halves and centered on the town of Datça. The region's promising potential was noted already in the 1880s by the

hydrographer Hydrography is the branch of applied sciences which deals with the measurement and description of the physical features of oceans, seas, coastal areas, lakes and rivers, as well as with the prediction of their change over time, for the primary ...

Thomas Abel B. Spratt in the following terms: A point of note on the general settlement pattern of these villages is that the locations chosen were never in the immediate coastline, but always at a mile's distance or more from the sea and at a relatively safe altitude on the slopes of a hill. The reason was from times immemorial was the fear of

pirates Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and valuable goods, or taking hostages. Those who conduct acts of piracy are call ...

, advantaged as they were by the intricate geology of shores of southwestern Turkey and of the many islands and islets that are its natural extensions, in an environment not unlike that of the

Caribbean Sea The Caribbean Sea is a sea of the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean in the tropics of the Western Hemisphere, located south of the Gulf of Mexico and southwest of the Sargasso Sea. It is bounded by the Greater Antilles to the north from Cuba ...

. Piracy remained a serious security problem well until the beginning of the 20th century.

Composition

There are 12

neighbourhoods A neighbourhood (Commonwealth English) or neighborhood (American English) is a geographically localized community within a larger town, city, suburb or rural area, sometimes consisting of a single street and the buildings lining it. Neighbourh ...

in Datça District: * Cumalı * Datça * Emecik * Hızırşah * İskele * Karaköy * Kızlan * Mesudiye * Reşadiye * Sındı * Yakaköy * Yazıköy

Tourism

Datça Peninsula is popular among tourists, especially by mariners, because of its many coves and larger bays, which are promoted as part of the

Blue Cruise A Blue Cruise, also known as a ''Blue Voyage'' () or ''Blue Tour'' (), is a term used for recreational voyages along the Turkish Riviera, on Turkey's southwestern coast along the Aegean and Mediterranean seas. The cruise is typically a week- ...

along Turkey's southwest coast. Boats (usually gulets) depart from

Bodrum Bodrum () is a town and district of Muğla Province, Turkey. About 200 thousand people live in the district, which covers 650 km2 and includes the town. It is a port town at the entrance to the Gulf of Gökova. Known in ancient times as Hal ...

, or Datça. The road from Marmaris to Datça is rough in parts. Apart from the traditional settlements, there are also a dozen recently constructed vacation villages on the peninsula. Datça has become a major rock climbing destination since about 2013, most popular from fall to spring.Rock climbing in Datça
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Forest Fires

On 29 August 2012, a fire in the town of Emecik, Datca burned 75 hectares of forest.

Notable natives

Turkish literature Turkish literature () comprises oral compositions and written texts in the Turkish language. The Ottoman form of Turkish, which forms the basis of much of the written corpus, was highly influenced by Persian and Arabic literature,Bertold Sp ...

, Datça is associated with the poet and the accomplished translator (notably of

Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 23 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...

)

Can Yücel Can Yücel (; August 21, 1926 – August 12, 1999) was a Turkish poet noted for his use of colloquial language. Biography Can Yücel was the son of a former Minister of National Education, Hasan Âli Yücel, who left his mark on the history of ...

who spent the last decades of his life in Datça and is also buried here.

Twin Towns

Houma, Louisiana Houma ( ) is the largest city in and the parish seat of Terrebonne Parish in the U.S. state of Louisiana. It is also the largest principal city of the Houma– Bayou Cane– Thibodaux metropolitan statistical area. The city's governme ...

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

Footnotes

External links

Official Datça HistoryShort movie about Eski DatcaRock Climbing in Datça
{{DEFAULTSORT:Datca Turkish Riviera Populated coastal places in Turkey Aegean Sea port cities and towns in Turkey Populated places in Muğla Province Fishing communities in Turkey Districts of Muğla Province Metropolitan district municipalities in Turkey