Saray (District), Tekirdağ

Saray is a town and a district of Tekirdağ Province inland in Thrace, the European part of Turkey. Population is about 17,100. It covers an area of 612 km², and the elevation is 140 m. District has cold wet winters and hot dry summers.

Geography

Saray is 78 km north of the town of Tekirdağ. The land is mostly flat and watered by the River Ergene. At the top north-east corner the land begins to rise to the Strandzha ("Yıldız Dağları") range of hills. 50% of the land is farmed, 50% forest and meadow, including the only stands of Austrian Pine (pinus negra) in Thrace, a protected area.

History

Thrace has been settled for a long, long time and relics have been found in Saray from the stone-age and the copper-stone periods (5,000 to 3,000 BC), but up until the Ottoman period there were only small villages here. Then when the Ottomans established their capital in nearby Edirne the town began to grow.

In the 18th century when the Crimean Khanate fell to the Russians, the Giray family of the ruling Khans, descendants of Ghengiz Khan himself, were settled here by the Ottoman Sultans. Many members of the dynasty are buried at the Ayaz Paşa mosque in Saray.

Saray was occupied by Greek armies for two years during the Turkish War of Independence (between 1920 and 1922). The local Greek population naturally welcomed this.

aray today

Unlike its neighbours Çorlu and Çerkezköy Saray has not industrialised and remains a small town with high schools and other infrastructure, even some nightlife, serving the surrounding countryside. Market day is Wednesdays, and as well as fruit and vegetables you can find wines from Thrace and from Bulgaria. However Çorlu and Çerkezköy are only 30 minutes away and as Saray is a much more green and pleasant environment some people do commute to work in those industrial areas. The people are liberal and Saray is a stronghold of the centre-left CHP.

There is a military garrison here, and a prison.

The professional football player Fatih Akyel (former Galatasaray player) is from Saray.

Places of interest

*The caves of Güneşkaya and Güngörmez - where stone age relics have been uncovered.
*Byzantine waterworks - the remains of a system of acqueducts built to take water from the River Ergene all the way to Istanbul.
*Ayas Paşa Camii and Hammam- mosque and turkish bath built in 1539.
*The countryside, especially the hills to the north, leading up to the Black Sea coast are popular places for trekking at weekends.
*Çamlıkoy, formerly known as Kastro, is a small village on the Black Sea coast, popular for walking and picnics. There is a forested area of national park here too. There are a small number of holiday homes here for people who really want to retreat from Istanbul.