Dardanelles campaign, Dardanelles - the unsuccessful campaign in World War I (1915) by the English and French to open a passage for aid to Russia; defeated by the Turks

Aga, Agha - title for a civil or military leader (especially in Turkey)

bulghur, bulgur, bulgur wheat - parched crushed wheat

Jerusalem Warriors - ethnic Turkish Sunni terrorists who are linked with the Turkish Hizballah; killed a United States Air Force sergeant in 1991

Kurdistan Labor Pary, Kurdistan Workers Party, Partiya Karkeran Kurdistan, PPK - a Marxist-Leninist terrorist group of Kurds trying to establish an independent Kurdish state in eastern Turkey

Revolutionary People's Liberation Front, Revolutionary People's Liberation Party - an extreme Marxist terrorist organization in Turkey that is opposed to NATO and the United States; attacks Turkish security and military officials

Turkish Hizballah - an ethnic Kurdish group of Sunni extremists formed in the late 1980s in southeastern Turkey; seeks to replace Turkey's secular regime with an Islamic state and strict shariah law; responsible for bombings and the torture and murder of Turkish and Kurdish journalists and businessmen; receives support from Iran

NATO, North Atlantic Treaty Organization - an international organization created in 1949 by the North Atlantic Treaty for purposes of collective security

country, land, state - the territory occupied by a nation; "he returned to the land of his birth"; "he visited several European countries"

Anatolia, Asia Minor - a peninsula in southwestern Asia that forms the Asian part of Turkey

Balkan Peninsula, Balkans - a large peninsula in southeastern Europe containing the Balkan Mountain Range

Middle East, Mideast, Near East - the area around the eastern Mediterranean; from Turkey to northern Africa and eastward to Iran; the site of such ancient civilizations as Phoenicia and Babylon and Egypt and the birthplace of Judaism and Christianity and Islam; had continuous economic and political turmoil in the 20th century; "the Middle East is the cradle of Western civilization"

Adrianople, Adrianopolis, Edirne - a city in northwestern Turkey; a Thracian town that was rebuilt and renamed by the Roman emperor Hadrian

Kurdistan - an extensive geographical region in the Middle East south of the Caucacus

Abydos - an ancient Greek colony on the Asiatic side of the Dardanelles; scene of the legend of Hero and Leander

Adana, Seyhan - a city in southern Turkey on the Seyhan River

Ankara, capital of Turkey, Turkish capital - the capital of Turkey; located in west-central Turkey; formerly known as Angora and is the home of Angora goats

Adalia, Antalya - a port city in southwestern Turkey on the Gulf of Antalya

Antakiya, Antakya, Antioch - a town in southern Turkey; ancient commercial center and capital of Syria; an early center of Christianity

Dardanelles, Hellespont - the strait between the Aegean and the Sea of Marmara that separates European Turkey from Asian Turkey

Constantinople, Istanbul, Stamboul, Stambul - the largest city and former capital of Turkey; rebuilt on the site of ancient Byzantium by Constantine I in the fourth century; renamed Constantinople by Constantine who made it the capital of the Byzantine Empire; now the seat of the Eastern Orthodox Church

Brusa, Bursa - a city in northwestern Turkey

Izmir, Smyrna - a port city in western Turkey

Pergamum - an ancient Greek city located in the western part of what is now modern Turkey; the technique of preparing sheepskins as parchment was developed here

Sardis - an ancient Greek city located in the western part of what is now modern Turkey; as the capital of Lydia it was the cultural center of Asia Minor; destroyed by Tamerlane in 1402

Aegospotami, Aegospotamos - a creek emptying into the Hellespont in present-day Turkey; at its mouth in 405 BC the Spartan fleet under Lysander defeated the Athenians and ended the Peloponnesian War

Ararat, Mount Ararat, Mt. Ararat - the mountain peak that Noah's ark landed on as the waters of the great flood receded

Aras, Araxes - a river that rises in northeastern Turkey (near the source of the Euphrates) and flows generally eastward through Armenia to the Caspian Sea; ancient name was Araxes

Bosporus - a strait connecting the Mediterranean and the Black Sea; separates the European and Asian parts of Turkey; an important shipping route