Tekirdag

Tekirdag is a city in Turkey. It is a part of the region historically known as East Thrace, located on the Balkan peninsula in southeastern Europe. In 2019 the city’s population was 204,001. There are honorary consulates of Greece and Bulgaria in Tekirdag.

Probably founded in the 7th century BCE as a Greek settlement called Bisanthe, it was renamed Rhaedestus when it became the capital of Thrace in the 1st century BCE. Taken by the Ottoman Turks in the second half of the 14th century, it was later occupied successively by Russia (1877–78), Bulgaria (1912), and Greece (1920–22). For centuries it served as the port for the Adrianople (modern Edirne) area, but it declined when Alexandroupolis (Dedeagaç, now in Greece) on the Aegean Sea became the terminus of the railway up the Maritsa River in 1896. The city’s historical buildings include the Rustem Paşa Cami (mosque) and the Bedestan (covered bazaar), both attributed to the 16th-century Ottoman architect Sinan.