Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

You know, I am a little tired of what is going on during the last days. I am all new to Wikipedia and I have to admit that I made some stupid mistakes in my first edits for which I honestly apologize to you and to everyone involved. I don't mind your bitter comments about Greeks or myself (man you have been very very mean, and your english is not that good!) it's clear that you have the wrong idea. Anyway, maybe you don't give a s*** about my apologies. I don't believe, though, that you are what your nickname denotes.

My grandmother was born in Sevdikoy, near Izmir. My grandfather was born in Aydin. As most of the Greek inhabitants of Asia Minor, they were not in favor of the Greek offensive. In fact, there were only a few Greeks in Asia Minor that participated in it. My grandparents told me stories about some atrocities that Greek soldiers commited against the Turks. However, in 1922, almost 1,500,000 refugees came to Greece from Asia Minor. They had many stories to tell about the way they were treated (as the Turks that left Crete or any other place in what is now Greek territory might have, I won't doubt that). They didn't give a s*** about propaganda and nobody can claim that they were all suffering from some kind of delusion. So that the Turkish atrocities, including the lynching of Metropolitan Chrysostomos, are nowadays common knowledge in Greece.

Please don't let yourself be carried away by stereotypes, nobody said that the Turkish troops that entered Izmir pulled out their machettes to cut the throat of every christian that was unlucky enough to get in their way. Just the "normal" things that happen in time of war when soldiers, tired of fighting and marching for miles and miles, enter the last stronghold of the enemy, to find people whose guts they hate, lying at their mercy.

My grandmother used to tell me that Greeks and Turks in Smyrni (allow me to spell the word just once) were getting along with each other. Her words never showed any hatred against the Turks. Moreover, you, as I, are not to blame for things that belong to the past.

I understand that in a page that was built by some Turks out of love of their city, words like "atrocity" and "lynching" do not fit, even if some crazy and stubborn Greek insists that truth (his own truth, if you will) and facts should prevail. I won't revert it anymore.

Farewell

--Avmatso 07:34, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Asia Minor is Turkish, Greco-Turkish war put the final seal on that, get over it. I know Greeks like you, you are excellent liars, Izmir is Turkish domain for nearly a millenium, just because Greek families were allowed to settle there and continue their business, doesn't mean Turks gave Greeks the right for a military occupation, after what? 900 years! And they didn't stop there, they marched to the heart of Anatolia. If Greeks didn't act as such opportunist, untrustworthy people, the decent solution would be leaving Izmir as a Greek populated Turkish city. Do you ever wonder why Izmir Jews didn't go through half of what Greeks did? Because they could be trusted, they didn't pose any threat to the nation.

Christian subjects of the Ottoman Empire were always a pain in the ass, always under the influence of Western powers including Russia. And Turks have a way of their own in dealing with troublemakers. Anyway stop pushing Greek POV in this article, I'll revert it to its last neutral version.--Kagan the Barbarian 09:27, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Sorry Kagan,but i guess u are still overheated...a pain in the ass,dealing with troublemakers.It is another thing to try to stop POV by any side on the article and another to say such things about the Greeks...--Hectorian 10:09, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Yeah I know, what I wrote is my POV, you can understand from the words I used. Anyway, thanks for reverting the article and making me feel ashamed ;). I have to leave now, laters.--Kagan the Barbarian 10:28, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

My goodness, every page that involves Turkey seems to devolve into heated arguments about how horrible and genocidal the Turks are. In this case, the Greeks invaded Turkey - preemptively striking into the heart of Anatolia far beyond their mandate according to the Treaty of Sevres, burning and pillaging along the way, and contrary to what a poster wrote below, ALL the contemporary observers agreed the Turkish army did NOT burn Izmir (see for instance, the American High Commissioner Admiral Mark Bristol, who was present - and is now under attack as being "instensely pro-Turkish", even though he loathed them), but rather retreating elements had cut the fire mains and set the city on fire. One might question the logic of going through all the trouble and bloodshed of recovering your second largest city then turning around and burning it down. What would be the motive? On the other hand, a retreating force most certainly DOES have a motive. In any case, do we really need to get into this in an article about Izmir?

160.83.73.6 16:09, 30 January 2006 (UTC)John

---

To the Turkish anon with IPs 81.212.127.249, 81.212.126.129, 81.212.126.173 and 81.212.126.245: while your contribution to the Wikipedia is welcomed, please do not distort this article by removing historic facts. I am aware official Turkish policy is to deny the Hellenic Holocaust, but since this is an encyclopedia and not a Turkish textbook facts must be used. If you feel the text is not NPOV, feel free to edit or introduce an additional point of view. Jor 19:09, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

To Darkelf: This is a topic in which "you" are trying to change historical facts, not me. Historical truths of Izmir are consistent with that I've posted so far. So, this facts are to be included on this page, not the ones of those generated by occupying nations.

If you think different, which is not consistent with the truth, this is not a place to change people's mind. Stop reading "one sided" books, and try to learn what really happened.

I'm the who have contributed the most of the text in this topic, and as a Turk, you should be able to see that I know more about this rather than you. Please stop ignoring the facts.

As I posted initially, I am well aware of the Turkish view of the aftermath of the Treaty of Sèvres. You should be aware that the Turkish view that the Greeks occupated a Turkish city and then set it on fire is a Turkish view only: historical third parties as well as the Greeks cite that this was done by the Turks as part of the ethnic cleansing commonly referred to as the Hellenic Holocaust. I will attempt another edit to try and incorporate the Turk POV more, but if you insist on removing any material which is not consistent with Turkish POV we have a problem. That is why I will request peer assistance here. Jor 19:53, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Neither Greek would say "Yes, I burned Izmir," nor a third part that wasn't cooperating with the Turks.

Here, we are not talking about the ancient city, Smyrna, but about Izmir. If you want to provide information on Smyrna, go to "Smyrna" page and tell what you have to say.

Also, this's not a place that we should judge what happened or what didn't happen. This's the job of historians. This's a topic of Izmir, a city of Republic of Turkey and of course the information resource about the city is Turkey, not Patagonia.

Guess what would an American do if an Iraqi wrote "This's the most ugly city of ever" for New York City on Wikipedia? (I'm not discussing if it's ugly or not. Just an example.) This post would be removed. Because they are dominant in Wikipedia and think that what they say is "law."

Finally, just go search for information how beautiful Izmir is or just come to see it when you have time to see and be able to write more about it. Don't blame others while sitting on your chair.

Exactly, this is not the place where we should judge what happened. Thus since history is not 100% clear, both views should be incorporated. That is what NPOV means. It is inevitable that to a Turk any indication the Turks were to blame for the fire that destroyed Smyrna is inacceptable, just like blaming the Greeks is inacceptable to the Greeks. This page is now listed as having an NPOV conflict in the hope that others may be able to establish a better version of this page. Jor 20:12, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

It's clear to me, but I'm not making judgement, I'm telling what actually happened. I've read tens of thousands of historical documents and tens of books about this issue. My uncle is a historian has a great "deep knowledge" of Izmir history. I've had a chance to meet and talk with the most known historians of Izmir. So, please stop posting the "changed" version of my city and begin to call it Izmir. (We are talking about Izmir, not ancient Smyrna.) Or open a new page titled "Historical Fire Blames" and start to type what you know about this.

"It's clear to me what actually happened": please read NPOV. I am not trying to make judgement here, just trying to introduce the other point of view. I am sure there are many Greeks who are also clear on "what actually happened". I will make one more attempt to incorporate both points of view. Jor 20:33, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Ha ha... I see your posts in every topic about Turkey or the Turks. You must be an Armenian, or a Greek or must be financed by them to change the truths everwhere about them in Wikipedia. But you are doing wrong.

To the Anon Poster: by making ad hominem attacks, you are hurting your argument. And please add either 3 or tildes (the character "~") at the end of your posts so we know who is speaking. -- llywrch 21:28, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

~ I'm not hurting the argument. BTW, see the latest version of the page.

Yes, you are hurting your position. Wiipedia is built on a basis of debate, compromise, & acknowledging other people's POVs. The words "You must be an Armenian, or a Greek or must be financed by them to change the truths everwhere about them in Wikipedia" suggest that you are not interested in finding a middle ground, but only pushing your own POV; further, those words suggest paranoia on your behalf. In both cases, it makes you appear less sympathetic, & alienates people who might agree with you. Consider my words, & act accordingly. -- llywrch 23:38, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

~ I wish Flockmeal had let it

It is so bad that Turkey following the principles of Kemalism is trying to erase a historic timeline of 3,000+ years by such a vandalistic way. You should be proud being a Turk for all your historic achievements, I am sure! Astavrou 19:20, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

---

to the anon: Hi, Can you please list here, on the talk page, some Web links which contain the info you want us to include in the article? We'll have a look and we will incorporate the info in the article in an NPOV way, acceptable by everyone. Optim^·.· 21:44, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

~ http://www.izmirturizm.gov.tr/e_history_of_izmir.html

First of all, this's a goverment site and there's no copyright issue. Some information I provided come from my mind, so I am unable to give a link for that. BTW, I hope Darkelf reads my latest edit, before Floskmeal's. We were about to come to an agreement.

~ To Flockmeal: Me and Darkelf don't do vandalism. We're from the same IPs (of two differen user) and trying to solve something. I've added some new paragraphs.

Given that there have been no more reverts can I safely assume that the history bit in this article is now sufficiently NPOV to remove the notice? Typed when the most recent edit was [1], the one edit after it was the removal of the neutrality disputed note. Jor 22:15, 7 Mar 2004 (UTC)

---

Somebody reverted my changes and plugged in the claim of killing of christians by turks around symrna, about which i had provided references. maybe that person would want to discuss these changes here? any other comments are welcome of course. Ato 15:10, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I removed the following:

This book gives an historical account of the events of Sept. 1922 when Mustapha Kemal (Ataturk) led his troops into Smyrna (now Izmir)- a predominantly Christian City as 27 Allied warships including 3 American destroyers stood by. Turkish troops proceeded to victimize the residents of this city and subsequently set fire to this historic city and totally destroyed it. A massive coverup by agreement of Western Allies followed, because of oil and trade interests in Turkey.

If there is any truth to these claims (especially predominantly Christian City and oil and trade interests in Turkey), provide sources and include them in appropiate places in the article, not in description of a book. I'd like to point out that the killings at this time is mentioned in the article, as well as the dispute about the source of the fire. AFAIK, that dispute is not resolved conculusively. at0 00:03, 9 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Should this actually be located at İzmir? Gerry Lynch 23:14, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

Shouldn't the name of the city in its history change according to whatever name was used at the time? Compare Vyborg, which was also called variously Viborg and Viipuri before it acquired its modern Russian name.

I have a proposal. We call the city Smýrna during the ancient period, then Smýrnē during the Hellenistic period, then Smýrni during the Byzantine period, then İzmirni from the start of Ottoman rule up to the point where the contraction İzmir became official by the Turkish government, with explanations about the gradual name changes. For example, Smýrna is an Aeolic name, but Smýrnē is Ionic/Attic/Koine. From the Byzantine period, ē became i in all contexts (except for Pontus and Cappadocia, but those don't pertain to Smýrni), and İzmirni was the closest available Turkish approximation of the Greek name. - Gilgamesh 20:25, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

This article has a rambly quality and needs to be edited for clarity and flow.

Also, some sections come near broaching the neutrality question, in my opinion. The "Homer" section, for instance. The article uses purple prose to describe Homer and states without equivocation that he was born in Izmir, but a quick jump to the Homer article would make it clear that many places are claimed to be his birthplace and his entire existence is tstill hotly debated. Perhaps this could be worked into a "Cases for Izmir being Homer's birthplace" section? (after adding a link to the Homer page)

It's great to have such a wealth of information about such a beautiful city (I learned much from the article), but the article deserves a higher standard of composition.

---

You are welcome to try, but anyone who tries to edit any article to do with Greece and/or Turkey is asking for trouble. The Wikipedia Greek and Turkish Nationalist Parties are always ready to restart the war. Adam 13:58, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

 Can't we all get along? :)

---

Also, the part about Tantalus doesn't belong at all in the article. Gakrivas 11:30, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

---

I edited the "Homer" part, because it wasn't neutral. Added reference to the most famous historian of its time, Thucydides:

"The hymn to the Delian Apollo ends with an address of the poet to his audience. When any stranger comes and asks who is the sweetest singer, they are to answer with one voice, "the blind man that dwells in rocky Chios; his songs deserve the prize for all time to come." Thucydides, who quotes this passage to show the ancient character of the Delian festival, seems to have no doubt of the Homeric authorship of the hymn."

Keep it neutral.

I added a boilerplate to merge Smyrna into this article. Both articles contain information about the ancient period of the city, and I think that either the information about the ancient city from this article should go to Smyrna, or the two should be merged.

On the other hand, maybe this is not the right time to attempt this, because there seems to be a Greek - Turkish edit war going on in that article, concerning the events of September 1922 (that part really belongs to this article, as it is not about ancient Smyrna). Gakrivas 11:28, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

~ reply to this izmir the city where I, -and my family, my ancestors- was born. it is sure that there will be a edit on wikipedia because I want my city with her own name izmir. Or you change your loved cities' names willinly to Turkish ones and we do the same maybe one day. does it look logical? with peace from Tukey. regards.. ~

There! a perfect reason to keep Smyrna of antiquity separate from modern Izmir, a city in its own right. We have a New Amsterdam article, don't we? --Wetman 00:39, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

"... gave recitals and performances at various venues in the city and surrounding areas, including the ancient theatres at Ephesus and Metropolis.

I've been working on disambiguating Metropolis references. What's this referring to? Is there a place named Metropolis in Turkey? Whitejay²⁵¹ 14:09, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

Metropolis is an antique Ion city near Izmir. It is actually situated near the town of Torbali and villages of Yenikoy and Ozbeykoy.

Thanks.I'm going to remove the link to Metropolis unless anyone objects. Incidentally, another Wikipedian pointed me to more info on this Metropolis: http://www.byegm.gov.tr/yayinlarimiz/NEWSPOT/24/N30.htm. Whitejay²⁵¹ 11:47, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Not sure how true this is, but a Turkish friend of mine says that the Turkish form "Izmir" isn't actually a contraction of "I Smyrni", but that the initial vowel is inserted to fit into the Turkish phonological system - the "sm" or "zm" combination is not possible at the beginning of a word in Turkish, according to him, so an initial vowel is inserted to make it possible to pronounce. I think that it would also be an idea to mention that the "z" in "Izmir" reflects Greek pronunciation, if not spelling.

Though not a turkish speaker myself I can verify that this is a plausible theory. Turkish cypriots when speaking greek would add an i in front of certain words starting with z or s. Mavros 00:00, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Being a native Turkish speaker, I would like to thank you for the explanation, because it is totally true that in Turkish we are historically inclined to use vowels as initials in words which originally have two combining consonants at the first sylable. Smyrne is a good example to that. It is not an hostile attitude or intention from the Turkish side to pronounce the word as Izmir, on the contrary it was a phonetical obligation emanating from their language for the emerging Turks in Anatolia during the 13th and 14th centuries. If the Turks had decided to change to whole name, today's derivated name would have never existed. As a matter of fact, Turks kept the ancient names as much as they could in their own phonetical way (Turkish is a totally asiatic language which even has relatives on the far end of Asia,i.e. the Japanese and Korean) Today, many city names in Anatolia are simple derivations of the Greek or Latin names, but in the Turkish manner. For instance, today's Edirne in Thrace is surely a derivation of what was once Adrinople or Adrianapolis (the city was named after its founder The Emperor Hadrian), today's Kayseri (a big city in the central Anatolia) was called Caeseria by the Romans (as an hommage rendered to their Cesar). We all know that today's Konya (another important city of the central Anatolia) was first called Ikonium by its Greek or Roman founders. Even our capital Ankara was once called Ancyra by the Greeks and Latins (Who can forget the famous "Monumentum Ancyranum" drawn up by the Emperor Augustus? The monument still stands in modern Ankara) I also have to remind you that some names continued their existence as long as they were compatible with the Turkish phonetical rules, such as Tarsus (It still keeps its biblical name without any alternation or change). We, Turks, never tried to change the names of cities that we captured or that we gradually became the masters by our increasing population in the Byzantian age. But being genuine Asiatics, we pronounced them in our own manner. I want all of you to know that we are happy with our Iskenderun (one of the 13 Alexandria cities founded by Alexander the Great on his expediton to the east, and the name Iskender is the eastern version of Alexander, the Alexandria in Turkey is on the eastern mediterranean coast of the country). Smyrniot 18:36, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

I liked this content. I'd love to give more examples:
Gallipoli=Gelibolu
Prusa=BursaZubeyr Dereli

Opinions? Tedernst 04:40, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

I am writing the page in Turkish on Smyrna, I and also made some contributions to the already existent İzmir page, and I am approaching the Smyrna page in the sense of the description of the archaeological sites (there are more than one) as well as their discovery and excavation. Anything on historical events should belong to the 'İzmir' page, starting from the beginning, since it is the history of the city. That holds with the general pattern in the Turkish wikipedia. There is a page on Foça, and there is one on the archaeological site of Phokaia (with a description of the temple etc.). Turks (I am Turkish, by the way) would say 'Smyrna excavations' or 'Phokaia excavations' etc. İzmir is the name of the city for about 700 years now, and it is its name today. If article headings for place names and the articles for their history had to be based on what they used to be called at a given period in the past, a lot of new pages would need to be opened for virtually the entire Greek geography.

As for the great fire of İzmir in 1922, the general pattern in history is that it is usually the fleeing armies who burn cities, not the victorious ones. And in the ten days between the Greek rout in Afyon on the 30th of August, 1922 and the final retrieval of İzmir by the Turkish Army on the 9th of September, there has been terrible precedents of cities other than İzmir in Western Anatolia that have been put to flames by the Greek army (Uşak, Alaşehir -a town with a great Greek and Christian past, that one, ancient Philadelphia-, Turgutlu -about 1/8 left intact-, and Manisa)

--Cretanforever 08:51, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Well this comment has really nothing to do with the merger but I'll post anyway. Concerning the fire that desrtoyed old Izmir (Smyrni as I call it). I disagree with wat you say, that is that the Greek Army burnt Smyrni. My mother, grandmother, grandfather (the latter actually fled Smyrni in 1922 as refugees) and so on say the fire was started by irregular turkish troops they call the "Chetes" (or Tsetes, I don't know how to spell it) that arrived in Smyrni before the regular troops of Kemal. And that it was the Chetes that were extremely ferocious and brutal, and commited atrocities, and started the fire. They also relate this to the lynching of bishop Chrysostomos of Izmir.

Anyway, personally I have no axe to grind at all, and I understand that there exist diversive versions of what happened. I also understand that in a chaotic situation such as a city besieged and evacuated by any means possible, anything can have happened and that all later accounts can be contradicting and all. I just hope we can work together to reach an NPOV presentation of the facts. WE ARE NOT MAKING HISTORICAL RESEARCH IN WIKIPEDIA (no original research as is said in WP-policy), this I urge all concerned parties (Greek and Turkish and otherwise) to understand. WE ARE TRYING TO WRITE AN NPOV ENCYCLOPEDIA ARTICLE. So all, stay calm and lets work together.

PS, Cretanforever, do you trace your lineage back to the Turkish Cretans that were exchanged by the treaty of Lauzanne? Do you speak any greek? Are we both children of the victims of the ferocious war that forged the nation-states of today?

-- Michalis Famelis 15:56, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Smyrna and Izmir are essentially two very different cities that have absolutely nothing to do with eachother, other than the geographic location. Smyrna should always have a separate article. --Eupator 13:12, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

I disagree. Smyrna was renamed Izmir when the Turks took it in 1922. It was very different in 1923 than it had been in 1921, but it had the same buildings, the same farms, etc. – Quadell ^{(talk) (bounties)} 01:29, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

Aydinoglu Turks took İzmir in 1320, the Genoese took back the lower castle (called St. Peter) in 1344, Turks held the upper castle (Kadifekale, Mount Pagos), Tamerlane came and destroyed St. Peter castle in 1403, chased the Genoese and gave the whole city to Aydinoglu Turks, and the Ottoman (Osmanli-Osmanoglu) took it together with the entire Aydinoglu principality in 1420. Apart from the brief interval between 1919 and 1922, the city has been a Turkish land since, and named İzmir. It wasn't renamed under the present Republic of Turkey, but before. I notice that approach in many Greek minds. As if the present names of Turkish cities were recent inventions. They are not. The Ottoman administrators (and the Turkish population) did not pronounce the names Smyrna or Constantinople, they said İzmir and İstanbul (and else). These were their official names.

I don't know what the official Ottoman name of İzmir was, but the official Ottoman name of İstanbul was actually Qusţanţaniyyeh (قسطنطنيه). I believe it was only changed under Atatürk. --Macrakis 15:11, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

On Istanbul / Konstantinopoli (and its variants inluding Kostantiniye) as well as, İslambol (music to some ears, because of the Islam conection, not to mine, I am secular) / Dersaadet (the port of felicity) / Payitaht (the place of the throne) and quite a few others, I think this page provides well-presented (and neutral) explanations:

http://www.sephardicstudies.org/istanbul.html

It is clear that the contemporary sensitivity on the origins of place names is directly attributable to the rise of nationalism as an ideology. 'The official name' of a city did not mean what it means today, say, back in the 15th century. The Ottomans certainly did use 'Kostantiniye' (among other names) in official context (edicts, other documents, coins). But not in an exclusive, or even in a predominant manner. It is understandably picked up more readily by a Western (or Greek) ear. Among the population and in the literature, Istanbul primed. And its officialization marked a point not only toward Constantinople, but toward Islambol as well. --Cretanforever. (I do not expect a Greek person to say anything other than Konstantinopoli or Smyrna or whatever when speaking or writing in Greek. Historically, they are his cities as well. That goes for any Greek source. If we are into personal connections, I did go to Ierapetra in Crete, and I see the fountain built by my great-grandfather, and I cried, so I know more or less what it feels like. When I speak in Turkish I say Selanik or Kandiye or Kaylari -do you know where that is?, it is today's Πτολεμαΐδα-, but I take care in using the actual names in a conversation with a Greek (or other non-Turkish) person. And I think that, in an encycopedia article in English, the local/current/official/standardized name should be used.)

I humbly think that Greek energies would be better spent on developing the Greek wikipedia (some 7000 articles, against 13500 in Turkish), rather than in interminable discussions on the basics and methods of the English wikipedia. We have more articles on Greek cities of antiquity than the Greeks: :) :) :) [2]

--Cretanforever

İzmir's Greek population increased due to migrations from the islands and the Peloponnese (which, at that time, were Ottoman too, sorry!, I meant Turkish:) when it became an international trade center as of the beginning of the 18th century. In 1717, there were only two Orthodox chuches in the city (compared to 19 mosques and 18 synagogues) (source: Ανάγνωστοπούλου Σ. 1997). In 1912, 58.5 % of the city's population was Greek, 33 % Turkish.

On that, pelopennese was never turkish it was Ottoman most citizens of the Ottoman Empire were not turks the Turkish nation is an invention of Kemal and turkish nationalism, even the turks of Smirna were mostly greeks who have been forced to become muslims --Reefus2 16:02, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

I tried to draw comparisons with other cities that were founded by one people and brought to our day by another. There is a brief article on Nieuw Amsterdam, but New York City is (naturally) treated under the article with that heading. There is no article for Nouvelle-Orleans, that city's whole history is recounted under 'New Orleans'. --Cretanforever 19:35, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

I really do not agree in the proposed merging. Basic historic knowledge suffice here! Astavrou 19:06, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Merge - think of the cities in Poland which were majority German (and ruled by Germans) for hundreds of years until 1945 and then the Germans fled and the cities became 100% Polish. They only have one article, eg Wroclaw. The cultural, linguistic and ethnic transformation was total but that is irrelevant. It's the same city, just with different people living there. Jameswilson 03:54, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

It is justified to then have different articles about those cities, if what is to be said is long enough. We usually do cut articles if they are long enough, for the same subject, it doesn't make sense to then merge two different articles that each are long enough to justify their existance. Fad (ix) 17:52, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Merge - Izmir is just the turkish language adaptation of Smyrna, like Istanbul/Constantinople. Same word different spelling. Same city different people. And I think this comment has its place in this particular discussion too, as extremely relevant:

I have a proposal. We call the city Smýrna during the ancient period, then Smýrnē during the Hellenistic period, then Smýrni during the Byzantine period, then İzmirni from the start of Ottoman rule up to the point where the contraction İzmir became official by the Turkish government, with explanations about the gradual name changes. For example, Smýrna is an Aeolic name, but Smýrnē is Ionic/Attic/Koine. From the Byzantine period, ē became i in all contexts (except for Pontus and Cappadocia, but those don't pertain to Smýrni), and İzmirni was the closest available Turkish approximation of the Greek name. - Gilgamesh 20:25, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

Also, a side-notice: my own grandfathers left Smyrna as refugees in 1922. Michalis Famelis 12:58, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Changed my mind. Oppose per Wikipedia:Naming conflict, section "Dealing with historical contexts". Although I still believe all that I said above Wikipedia policy is Wikipedia policy. --Michalis Famelis 18:49, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

Merge -- Many cities have had huge population and name changes over time. Consider Fiume/Rijeka; Thessaloniki/Selanik; Königsberg/Kaliningrad;... (I also have one grandparent who left Smyrna in 1922.) --Macrakis 15:11, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

There are mistakes in Wikipedia there, to dump different cities with different people by claiming they are the same. This can not be used to justify another mistake. Different name, different people(nation), I'd qualify this as a different city on the same location. Fad (ix) 17:45, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Oppose - While it is the same location, the article about Smyrna is along enough and justified enough to have its own entry. This is not an article of one paragraph. Also, even if it was taken by Turks for a long time, it was still called Smyrna for a very long time, and its historic name in one form or another should be kept in an article linked to its proper name. Izmir is not Smyrna, Smyrna had a large Greek population, in a historic city, with a dinstinct culture. Izmir is a Turkish city. Britannica and other encyclopedias have their Smyrna entry, and it is encyclopedic to have an entry for a historic city and that now on the same soil there is another city, doesn't undo that a historic city of the name Smyrna existed and that it should have its entry. Was this article short enough, we could have voted, but it is not a short article, voting to merge it is not the encyclopedic thing to do. Fad (ix) 17:45, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Fad, you say Kalingrad, Rijeka, etc are Wikipedia mistakes. But in my view they are not mistakes at all. Thinking about what you and others have written, I think we have a fundamental difference of definition - "what is a city?". For you, a city is its people (culture/civilisation) , so if the people change, it becomes automatically a different city.

• I, and some others, dont accept that at all. For us, a city is a "geographical thing" (like a river) in a specific location. Who lives there is irrelevant. If the Turks had built a new city 20 km away, it would be a different city. But they rebuilt it in the same place, so it must be the same.
• I am not disputing that the culture of pre-1922 Smyrna and modern-day Izmir are totally different. It's a historical fact. I just think that is irrelevant to this debate. Same location = same city (nothing else matters). If the Germans had taken London in WW2 and settled 5 million Germans there it would still be a continuation of the same city. Jameswilson 23:55, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

It is clearly unencyclopedic, this is not limited to the people living there, it is about a city which existed by this name, there are many cities which name was changed after the Babylonian period, we do not call those cities from their Babylonian names. When I search the city of Ur, I do not find it merged with the current borderings. It is accepted and used generally in historic publications that we name a place by the name it was called in the period we cover. I say, leave it at that, emigrate what is to be emigrated from one article to the other and link both to eachothers. That is the best solution and this is how it is done in other encyclopedias. Fad (ix) 17:49, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Merge I believe that someone reading an article about Izmir should be informed of its earlier history, from antiquity until the events of September 1922. I believe a proper presentation should include a description of the city in different historical periods, separated accordingly, in each of which the city should be referred to as it was known (to it's citizens? not sure about that) at the time. Should the articles remain separate, a presentation of the ancient history of the city should not appear here, as it belongs to the Smyrni article. The current article should then plainly be called Modern-day Izmir; this seems inappropriate, as the city's history spans over centuries, and even the modern city (w.r.t. its architecture, archaeological monuments, and to some extent its cultural identity) is influenced by it. Another issue is that it is not clear where the transition from Smyrni to Izmir should be assumed to take place, as Greeks and Turks coexisted in the city for a long period of time -again, discontinuity at a certain point seems inappropriate, and may lead to more heated arguments. Merging the articles should not however imply that the historical facts about 1922 should be suppressed, as certain posts in the discussion page suggest. These events, as well as the earlier presence of non-Turkish population in the city, contsitute a part of its history; otherwise one might as well revert to the Modern-day Izmir approach. If the events of September 1922 are described to a sufficient extend that warrants a separate webpage, that page should be linked to by this one.--Zitarts 20:48, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

OpposeWhy isn't Istanbul needs to be merged with Constantinople? Chaldean 06:55, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

I belive that to stop this greek and turkish history should be seperated as much as possible, Smyrni and Izmir can overlap but mainly devoted to greek or turkish history. Enlil Ninlil 00:23, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

It's the same region, called by different names! Why can't they just have links, or merge, with the fact that a rose by any other name would smell as sweet?

Why isn't Istanbul merged with Constantinople? Chaldean 02:48, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Uyumayın. İsimsiz birisi, Türkler İzmir'i yaktı yıktı, Yunan halkını kılıçtan geçirdi, gözlerini kan bürümüştü vs. tarzı, Yunan ilkokul kitaplarından çıkma şeyler yazıyorlar sayfaya ve birinizde üzerine gitmiyorsunuz bunun haftalardır.--Kagan the Barbarian 13:02, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

I think that it is your tricks that belong to the elementary school man. Sorry about that, friend. --Avmatso 00:49, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

Dear Avmatso, whatever you and your Greek companions pathologically do is emanating from the very common "inferiority complex" felt by the former subjects of any dismembered empire on the world. But, you know nothing about (us) Turks and their (our) mentality. Let me tell you the truth, Turks have no motive to get afraid of any particular country whose population can even be less than Constantinapolis of today (Yes, I wrote Constantinapolis in lieu of Istanbul, because it may be more populated than your whole country, so why should I be afraid? Call that city whatever you want. Istanbul will be Istanbul and Izmir will be Izmir even if we merge its article with Smyrne or not). And, the second thing: Turks didn't need to massacre, they even didn't need to capture the Anatolian cities violently, they had already become the masters of those cities by their increasing population during the Byzantine age (Surely a decisive victory in the Battle of Manzikert would suffice). Your Constantinapolis (today's Istanbul) had already become a pimple at the heart of an ever growing muslim empire founded by genuinely asiatic nomads and it was just a matter of time that those nomadic people took it over from its former owners (Well, I'm talking about your Greeks; we used to call them "Rum", it's a word that we derivated from the word "Roman", we are nomads, we act pragmatically so why should we fight instead of taking over Anatolia with our dominating demographic advantage?). This nomadic mentality did not suffer any change as there are more than 3 millions of Turks living in Germany and another 1 million in other countries of western Europe (in the beginning, they were only 3 or 4 thousand and that was only 35 years ago, and have look at our incredibly growing population in Europe) This Euro-Turkish population which grew during the last 30-35 years is nearly a half of today's whole Greece. Now, do you understand me and my compatriots? I think I've spoken frankly enough. I usually use the Greek names in my geographic articles, I even use a Greek derivated nickname. I have no problem with you and your people, why should I have such a fear? On the contrary, I have many friends from the western coast of the Aegean.Smyrniot 01:02, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

No, Smyrniot, frankly, I don't understand what you are trying to say here. First, if you want to use Greek names in the future, try Constantinoupolis, this is the correct spelling of the word. Second, I don't know whether you are a Smyrniot, but a part of me certainly is. So I have some pretty reliable sources of information about what happened those days. In fact, my grandmother and grandfather never had any hatred against your people, inspite of all that they had been through. So why should I hate you? Anyway, I'm getting sick of all that "hate" thing. Oh, by the way, why don't you publish your "epic" popular poem "The Hate"? Now this would be very amusing. Don't you know where to find it? Here is a link to a webpage, made by the Grey Wolves [3]. The only problem is that it is in Greek, but don't worry. Your Greek friends will help you translate it. And here is another "biased" page in Wpedia, about the Istanbul pogrom. I would not say that you have some fear of the Greeks, only that you have... quite a temper, that's all. --Avmatso 08:54, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

My grandfather's father was a Turkish Cretan who died of a Greek bullet which was stuck in his kneecap, which couldn't be operated and later poisoned his blood. And still, I'm trying to tell you what the Turkish mentality is. I don't have any nationalist intention, I was only talking about the demographic facts; but I'm quite sure that if we had been real killers, the fate of the Greeks would have been much worse than the American Indians, the Greeks were Ottoman subjects in the 14th century, it was nearly 150 years older than the first conquistadors who arrived on the American mainland and massacred a whole population of Aztecs in 1520s, a time where there was no international mechanism to stop them. And while editing this content, I saw the words "campaign_antiturk" in the link you provided. On this, I decided to remind you a Turkish proverb, let me translate it for you:"Even the bravest of tzigane would only tell his thefts while trying to talk about his gallantry." Thanks for the "ou" in the Greek name of Istanbul, I will use it. I'm from Izmir-Karşıyaka (I think the Greeks call it Kordelio, I may make a mistake in the letters because we read as we write in our asiatic language, simple but practical, isn't it?)Smyrniot 10:09, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

I am sure you understand that your buddies refer to the Greco-Turkish war as the anti-turkish campaign.--Avmatso 23:02, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

And what you claim to be made by Grey Wolves has, at the top of the page, the logo and emblem of "Mehmetçik Vakfı" (a charity foundation which works for disabled Turkish veterans and the orphans of Turkish martyrs), the Greeks who prepared the page has badly confused the two emblems. Oki doki?:)Smyrniot 12:20, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

u did not make mistake.it is Kordelio (Κορδελιό).it is also of a suburb of Thessaloniki, whose inhabitants are descendants of the refugees from asia minor, but i did not know from which place exactly.now i know:)--Hectorian 15:13, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm also a descendant of Turkish Cretan refugees coming from Iraklion, but we call it Kandiye:). Do not worry, many people are aware of the Greek name of Karşıyaka here, I'm serious.Smyrniot 16:18, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

To Avmatso: Let me give you a link [4] (unfortunately in Turkish) where young Turkish editors discuss on the Istanbul pogrom. I hope you find someone to translate it and see how much democratic they are. Would you show us the same democratic attitude when we try talk about the memories of Greek Commander Kolokotronis during the 1821 incidents? Kolokotronis draws up very interesting accounts telling that the shoes of his horse didn't touch the ground during the 3 days following the 23rd of September 1821. Because there were 30.000 massacred corpses of innocent Turkish civilians lying superposed in the streets (somewhere in Peloponnesus, I couldn't remember the city, read those memories and see it)(What a confession! We owe Kolokotronis so much). The knife may sometimes have two blades. You must be careful while playing the innocent victim. Please be Greek not grekilos. And do never think that the Greeks were the only victims in this conflict.Smyrniot 17:13, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Are you throwing around Greek words to impress someone? Look at this page, it is full of the Turkish perception of Democracy. And anyway, this article is about Izmir. If you have something to say about the Greek Revolution this is not the place to do so.--Avmatso 23:06, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

U are talking about Tripolitsa i guess, but u are getting it far with the numbers.Tripolitsa had at that time a population of roughly 30,000.most of them were Greeks(since the Turks were never in majority in the Peloponnese) and also some Jews.i do not know what turkish history books say,but simply there were not that many turks there.lastly,when Kolokotronis says 'for 3 days...bla bla bla' he does not mean that literary.unless u believe that Saggarius was not full of water, but of blood(as greek accounts say),when the turks attacked the greek front-line in asia minor.such poetic formulas are created to attract the reader's attention,not to be taken seriously. --Hectorian 17:55, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

It was actually from an article published in one of the Greek newspapers "To Vima" on 7 September 1999, the article was written by a Greek journalist Herkul Millas who was later sued in Greece because of this article (with the charge of treachery) and surely acquitted.Smyrniot 18:07, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

I am not debating the validity of the quot about Kolokotronis that u said(although i have not read it myself), nor that it was written in an article of 'Vima'. but were did u hear that this journalist was sued?it's totally false.such a crime does not exist in greece(but only when the country is in state of war).and in 1999 we were not. --Hectorian 18:36, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Of everything that is written here, the claim that a Greek journalist was charged with treason, is by far the most absurd. Greece is no human rights heaven but there have not been any political prisoners there, since 1974.--Avmatso 23:24, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, You're right, you're not living in the heaven. I translate for you two what he wrote later in a Turkish newspaper about this case:"Certain Greeks who didn't find my articles "national enough" were annoyed with this article too (he's talking about his To Vima article published on 7 September 1999) and they submitted it during the case (i.e. at the court) as an evidence of my treachery and as an evidence that I was "on the other's side". Here is the Turkish version of what I translated:"Yazılarımı yeterince ‘milli' bulmayan kimi yunanlılar bu yazıdan da rahatsız oldu ve bir süre sonra bir davada (yani mahkemede) ‘ihanetimin' ve ‘öteki' olduğumun kanıtı olarak sunuldu". That is to say, at the beginning, the case depended on allegations of insult against the Greek society (via these articles), but chauvinist Greeks who were interveners to the case also claimed that he was in treachery which was considered nonsense by the court, he was later acquitted. The second article where he relates to this case must have been published in the Turkish newspaper "Zaman" in 2004 (as he writes there), but I can't give you the exact date. Find it yourself. Hey man, today we're going to watch the Solar Eclipse from the shores of Izmir Bay, the very next solar eclipse in Turkey will be 54 years later. It is going to start at around 13:55.Smyrniot 09:25, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Hey boys, I've found the exact date of the second article where he relates to this court case emanating from his To Vima article. It was published in the Turkish Newspaper "Zaman" on Tuesday, 07 September 2004. All right?:)Smyrniot 09:35, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

And, you're making a big mistake by confusing the death of soldiers in the Battle of the Sakarya with the massacres commited against the Turkish civilians in Tripolitsa. Neither the Greek Invaders nor the Turkish soldiers were civilians in that battle. The Greek soldiers were at the heart of Anatolia to fight (far beyond their influence area) and capture Ankara. We lost many, so did they. It may be true that the river was red with blood (Soldiers' blood, not civilians)Smyrniot 14:56, 29 March 2006 (UTC).

I have undone the merge made by 85.97.5.112 (talk · contribs) until we can get a clearer consensus on this. I for one think that the two articles should remain separate, per "Smyrna" and "Izmir": same place, different subjects|this. Besides, Istanbul and Constantinople are still separate. --Khoikhoi 06:11, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

"Within a few days, more than 3000 years of Greek presence in Asia Minor and in the area of İzmir in particular, came to a violent end. Justified by the Greek military presence in Asia Minor or not, a great number of attrocites were reported, on behalf of the Turkish army, mainly against people belonging to the Greek and Armenian communities of the city. On September 13th, İzmir experienced one of the greatest disasters of its history. A fire that some, mainly American, eyewitnesses claim that was set by the Turkish army in Basmane Quarter, destroyed more than 20,000 buildings in an area of 2,600,000 m². However, the city was gradually rebuilt after the proclamation of the Turkish Republic in 1923.-->"

First sentence looks like it was taken from a novel. In fact I know it is. What was the American author's name, you tell me? He is also the American you are claiming to be the American witnesses, isn't he? I read some parts from his book, the man is clearly biased towards Muslims, his sentences are usually aimed to create drama for the Christian population of the city and curse the Muslims, ignoring the fact that it was Turks who were at the defensive, it was Turkish towns that were occupied at first. And he cites no sources for anything, only hear-say information filtrated through his racist biased mind and we are expected to take his words as the truth.

Anyway tell me his name and I am sure we'll find some parts from his book online.--Kagan the Barbarian 15:00, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

First: The sentence is not taken from a novel. Anyway you disagree with it because you think it is not mine, because you think it is not true or because you don't like it? Correct the number of years if you think that the numbers are lying, why don't you. Perhaps you think that the violent deportation of thousands of christian people is not an important moment in the city's history.

The only part where it is claimed that there were American witnesses is about the fire. You don't want this to be heard AT ALL? That the author obviously doesn't like the Turks doesn't mean that he is writing monstrous lies about the subject. "Colouring" some information and hiding the truth are quite different. In addition, the author has nothing to earn from this. If we cannot claim that someone who has nothing to earn or lose is impartial, for whom can we claim that for?

Here is something else: I have given some evidence. Just get in the trouble to write yours, don't just erase! I thought that presenting both sides of the story is what Wikipedia is all about. While what you are doing is censorship.

Now, I will appeal to your common sense. The Internet is full of photographs taken at the docks, with christians trying to embark some little boats, while the flames are just behind them. Yes, one could claim that they were so stupid that they set their houses on fire and then ran to docks, in case they found some means of escaping (why where they too eager to escape if no attrocity ever happened?). Or that the Greek army, having nothing else to do in the city, set the Greek houses on fire, just to see them burning. Does that make sense to you?

Well listen to this: writing none of these in an article about the city's history is by definition a POV because you are deliberately hiding the truth!

Stop erasing what you don't like! --Avmatso 15:37, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

It is not about what I don't like. It is about giving neutral information with sources, not to water the eyes of the reader with POV sentences. I find what happened tragic but I also know the tragedy of the Turks in Balkans and the Aegean during the Greek-Bulgar occupation, of course Greeks are taught nothing about these just like Turks are taught nothing about what Greeks went through. Trust me, Turks have a lot of stories too but this is not the place for this, let's keep biased, POV information out.

We don't know who started the fire and honestly we'll never know. There is no consensus on anything about this. So we say Greek population of the city were forced to seek refuge in close islands and leave the cause of the fire unknown[5]. Your sources aren't any good. We reached a consensus on this page before, please stop reverting it and cooperate for further improvement of this and other articles.--Kagan the Barbarian 16:06, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

What is wrong with you? That the Greeks were forced to leave their houses doesn't say anything. It's a terrible consensus, I don't know who agreed to it. It is far too convenient for the Turks to say nothing about the atrocities.

It is like a WWII article saying nothing about the Holocaust, or including just a vague comment, like: "some Jews that were forced to leave their houses, later formed the country of Israel".

Telling half of the truth is most certainly a POV.--Avmatso 16:45, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

I agreed to it,cause i have not so far came to a source strong enough to blame the turks for the fire.in fact i have not found any reliable source about who started it.but i have not agreed in deleting all that has to do with the greeks of the city.if u have sources neutral enough,u may add them.--Hectorian 05:25, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

I am no crazy right-wing extremist. I think that the latest version is neutral enough.--Avmatso 06:49, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Here is a link: [6] I am not saying that this is 100% objective. Maybe it is, maybe it is not. But I don't think that we can ignore it altogether. Otherwise there would be no need for a Turkish POV.--Avmatso 07:11, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Here is the article where you can tell all your stories, it is a POV heaven already: Smyrna

George Horton!!! This is the American guy I was talking about. Look at his intro to the book:

"An Account of the Systematic Extermination of Christian Populations by Mohammedans"

I rest my case, the guy is an anti-Muslim loony, I advise everyone to read the link Avmatso provided to amuse themselves with bigotry.--Kagan the Barbarian 07:46, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

I can't see your point here. You are just shouting, not talking. This book is not a novel, it is an account, written by the American consul of Izmir. I don't know if you were there at this time, I honestly don't know your age, but this guy was there alright. What is wrong with the use of the word "Mohammedans"? That the Turks are to blame of attrocities not only vs the Greeks but vs the Armenians as well, gives a religious dimension to all this, don't you think? Ok, here is another: why did the Europeans evacuate the city? What were they afraid of? Anyway this is not the point.

The point is that you don't want both POV's to be presented. The only thing that you want to appear in this article is your POV that nothing of great significance happened in Smyrna those days. I even offered you a version without the fire issue, but you still did not accept it to be neutral enough. What are you, a Wikibully?--Avmatso 08:08, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

That's why he provided it,for the others to read it.Horton,whether u like it or not,was the American consul in the region for 30 years.he was also in Smyrni in the days of 1922.noone said to consider him as the only or most reliable source.Avmatso's edit includes both POV,i really do not understand why u reverted it.it is more convinient to u to leave it just like 'a fire burnt the city'?...--Hectorian 08:10, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Him being consul means nothing. He is a POV source, his book is racist, I'll paste parts from it here if I have to. Also qs I said his copying from that book is also copyright violation.--Kagan the Barbarian 08:17, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

I do not know if he has copied from the book.u said yourself that his edits are not up to quality standards,so i guess he didn't:)--Hectorian 08:28, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

I consider that book a novel written by a Christian fundementalist loony. Everybody is free to read the link you provided and decide for themselves. It is filled with POV sentences. I knew you were copy pasting from there in the first place. And this is a violation of copyright by the way. The article makes everything clear. As I said, at the top of the page there is a link to Smyrna and everything you want to say here is said there, it is a Greek POV article currently. I won't be bothered with that page, you leave this page alone too.--Kagan the Barbarian 08:15, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Noone has ownership over the articles in Wikipedia.i am not judging Horton's beliefs,for which i do not even care!but he was in Izmir that time and he gives information about the events.this is what i care about:the events!--Hectorian 08:22, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Dude would you like to hear about the Holocaust from a Nazi officer? He was a witness after all, eh? I beg everyone to read the book Avmatso provided, it is POV. Check out the foreword:

"That it should have been possible twenty centuries after the birth of Christ for a small and backward nation, like the Turks..."

Do I need say more? It even gets better. The whole article is in this pattern, Christian POV and an anti-Muslim perspective. This guy is the only source Greeks show for their claims and in his every sentence there is bigotry. I will not accept him as a source. What we truly know is Greeks were forced to seek refuge and it is mentioned in the article. What about all this stuff about Greek deaths? I heard 100,000 perished somewhere. Are you telling me when the city was in flames, Turks were busy killing 100,000 Greeks? Dude, I don't know whether I should curse or congratulate them, they are competing with God in mass destruction. This is bullshit Hectorian, please revert it to my version. Avmatso is trying to influence the reader's opinion, from the article the reader learns about Greek presence in the city for centuries and later is informed they had to leave, let them decide the tragedy, you don't have to tell them it is tragic.--Kagan the Barbarian 08:36, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

The nazi example is irrelevant,cause in this case horton had nothing to do with what happened.i will say it once more that i do not care about his beliefs.what i do care is the events he mentioned,maybe in a biased way or maybe as an real eyewitness,it is none of my business.in the article horton is not mentioned at all,but the link was given here after i asked for it.the article does not blame anyone for the fire,but mentions both POV.as u said let the readers decide.honestly,if u have any better idea for rewording it,u may tell me and i will do it(since i know that u can).but i do think that we have to mention both POV and not just say 'a fire broke up'.--Hectorian 08:45, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

[7] [8] [9] --Avmatso 15:20, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Your point? We already acknowledged they were forced to the sea, so does every Turkish history book. No Greek occupation, none of this would happened. By the way where are all the Greeks being massacred? Where are the Turkish soldiers?--Kagan the Barbarian 09:18, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

With Americans watching and taking photographs at the shore, Turks are massacring 100,000 Greeks while the whole city is burning, which of course Turks started to keep themselves warm. By the way, these are the same Turks who after this war, started a large renovation and rebuilding of the Republic of Turkey, this is exactly what this poor country needed, burning down a properous city so they can rebuild it later... with what? Mud? Welcome to Lord of the Rings 4.--Kagan the Barbarian 09:26, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Can you see how many people are trying to get into these boats? Can you see that in two of the photographs the boats sunk from the excessive weight? I remind you that these are civilians, including women and children, not soldiers. Are these pictures of a peaceful, even hasty if you will, evacuation, or pictures of panic? Anyway, I am not getting into this conversation any more. You are still being arrogant and ironic. Whoever has eyes can draw his own conclusions. --Avmatso 03:11, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

"The Turkish side is accused of many atrocities against the Greek and Armenian communities in İzmir, including the lynching of the Orthodox Metropolitan Chrysostomos."
If I find a neutral source for this edit, is everybody in agreement to restore its place in the article? Miskin 22:06, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't know about the other editors here, but for some reason I don't find Kagan's logical conclusions to be enough of an editing indicator. Let's settle this the WP:REF way. Miskin 22:09, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

Cretanforever, are u lecturing me about the way i edit? why u remove his name? cause there is still not a wikipedia article about him? well here are some sources were he is mentioned: a cultural greek page [10], New Work Times [11], and something from St Antony’s College (maybe it has something to do with Oxford University-i am not sure) [12] I may be able to find more...So, before u revert again, provide a sorce that this man never existed and nothing happened in his life. I am reverting again... --Hectorian 09:56, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Why is it so difficult to create a wikipedia article on Krisostomos? --Cretanforever 10:25, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

It is not difficult...it just needs some time to collect, doublicate the sources(and not rely on one), and to make it NPOV, cause his case is sensitive. i am thinking of doing it myself. --Hectorian 10:36, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Good! When you have posted the article on him, and when all can contribute in it, we can put his name back in İzmir article. In fact, I am creating a stub on Krisostomos in the Turkish wikipedia this very day, and then we can establish the links. And then he will have his place -as agreed by all contributors- in İzmir article. In the Ottoman Empire article, I have inserted a mention of the Battle of Djerba, and the same day, I started a stub on the battle, so that readers will get at least an idea of what it is and it can be developped. (My discussion here is not that battle of course, just an indication on how things should work.) Regards. I will revert to my version in the meantime. --Cretanforever 10:57, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand this logic. Assuming that a historical personality has an article on his own, does that mean he's not allowed to appear in any other articles? Or are you suggesting that when someone doesn't have an article it's not allowed to mention his name? That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. Maybe you find a logic in this, but WP:POLICY doesn't, hence keep those criterions for your personal website. There's only one line in the Turkish massacres in Smyrna (when someone could write a book) and you want to remove it. Now this is irrational. After seeing your editing behaviour in Manzikert, I think your double standards are hypocritical. You edit in what in your opinion is important, and edit out what again in your opinion is not important. That's not how it works. Let's have a look at what a British historian might say on the destruction Smyrna:

"In the early afternoon, Smyrna's new military commander, Nureddin Pasa, sent for Archbishop Chriysostomos. Nureddin explained calmly that a military tribunal had already sentenced the Greek Metropolitan to death:

"The Prelate was walking slowly down the steps of the Konak when the General [Nureddin] appeared on the balcony and cried out to the waiting mob, 'Treat him as he deserves!' The crowd fell upon Chrysostomos with guttural shrieks and dragged him down the street until they reached a barber's shop where Ismael, the Jewish proprietor, was peering nervously from his doorway. Someone pushed the barber aside, grabbed a white sheet, and tied out the Prelate's beard, gouged out his eyes with knives, cut off his ears, his nose, and his hands..." [from ibid, p. 133-4, a contemporary account]" (The Balkans, Misha Glenny)

Let's see what happens later on...

"As Smyrna sank in the blood of Armenians and Greeks, and the crazed people begged any non-Turk for refuge or a passage out... Within hours, 300,000 men, women and children in a state of total panic were packed on the quayside. A huge wall of fire pushed them even closer to the water. Hundreds took their chances and jumped, hoping, in most cases in vain, that the Allied ships would rescue them. Many of them were used as target practiced by Turkish troops." (same source).

Thus, I hope you realise why I'm not willing to give up on my edits. Have a nice day. Miskin 14:58, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

u are right, i had not thought in creating a stub, but a whole article.with a stub article everything will seem in place. I would suggest to leave it as it is, without any (red) internal link. but if u want to remove it, do so, but the sentence that has to do with him, not the paragraph. i may create a stub for him during the day. --Hectorian 11:10, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

I do believe that we need a separate article (and separate discussions) on the fire as well. See Great Fire of London. Regards. --Cretanforever 11:15, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

i agree with u. but also have in mind that the fire is also mentioned (briefly) in London article. so, maybe the best would be to mention it in the article as a sentence, and then have a whole article about it. but it seems that both London and Rome (whose fire was also of extreme historical importance) are very expanded and cover every side of the city's history,culture,etc in detail in respective articles. if there will be sister-articles about the city of Izmir, i will also suggest a further expansion (and subsequent discussion) of the event there. Perhaps we could work together in such an article (and also ask someone non-greek non-turkish to be involved), cause i believe that if only one will be about to write it,it will be 'flooted' with POV (i am not implying that u are pushing POV). Cheers! --Hectorian 11:32, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

I think we are at the same wavelength Hectorian. Inside İzmir article, reference should of course be made to the controversial events of 1922. I had in mind a phrase like this, (exact terminology can be decided upon later)

"İzmir was occupied by the Greek army as of 15 May 1919 until its retrieval by the Turkish army in 9 September 1922. The Greco-Turkish War of 1919-1922, and in its final days, the 1922 Great Fire of Smyrna*, the lynching of Metropolitan of Ephesus** (collaborator for the Turkish side)***, Chrysostomos Kalafatis, and the 1923 agreement for the Exchange of Greek and Turkish Populations have left marking traces in the psyches of the two nations."

(*) that seems to be the established denomination in English, we can look it up later.
(**) Ephesus or Smyrna? One source I had read said Ephesus, I do not have the time to look it up now.
(***) We can omit that in the main article on İzmir if it will hurt sensitivities. Or put some adjective before the "lynching", like "terrible" or "monstrous", It's up to be decided.

Of course, we can have other sister articles as well. İdeas would abound. Regards. --Cretanforever 12:38, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Seems good. and i guess we are both willing to work on this:)

• The word controversial is the accurate one, i believe so.
• İzmir was occupied by the Greek army:i would prefer the usage of the neutral term the Greek army landed (since they were asked and backed up to do so, according to an international treaty).
• until its retrieval by the Turkish army:in fact, the Greeks landed in an Ottoman Izmir, and were driven away by forces of the Turkish state. i will not insist in that, since we are talking about the same people. I do not know if there should be a distinction between Sultan's forces (who surrendered the city, according to the Treaty of Sevres) and Ataturk's forces (who captured it later). It seems that the Turkish army retrieved something they gave. I do not know if u understand what i mean. As i said, i will not insist on that. I am leaving it up to u.
• Great Fire of Smyrna:this must be the exact reference that we have to make. Having in mind that this fire has been compared to the Great Fire of Rome or London and it is considered one of the greatest urban disasters of the 20th century, i cannot think of a better denomination.
• According to what i know since childhood, he was Metropolitan of Smyrni (i will have to look whether his title mentioned two city names, Metropolitan of Smyrni and Ephesus-it is quite possible, since many metropolitans have such titles-or if he was formally called '...and of Ephesus', cause of the importance of the place in the Bible).
• (collaborator for the Turkish side): this will hurt sensitivities...I have heard nothing about him been considered collaborator, but this may just be my POV. we will think about putting an adjective or rewording it...we'll see about that. but even if we just leave it lynching it just shows the act, without any possitive or negative backround. Also, pls do not write his surname 'Kalafatis':).we never use the surnames of the high priests (compare Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I). afterall, his birth name most likely was not Chrysostomos...

...and something irrelevant:when i first saw your username i thought u were Greek. and now i saw u used the word 'psyches'. do u know Greek? Regards --Hectorian 13:24, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

"İzmir was occupied by the Greek army as of 15 May 1919 until it was taken over for the Turks by the re-constituted Turkish army in 9 September 1922. The Greco-Turkish War of 1919-1922, and in its final days, the controversial events specifically involving the city of İzmir; i.e. the 1922 Great Fire of Smyrna and the lynching of Metropolitan Chrysostomos of Smyrna&Ephesus; and then the 1923 agreement for the Exchange of Greek and Turkish Populations have left marking traces in the psyches of the two nations."

I will put it as worded like this. I am sorry for the term "occupied" but I will stick to it. It has to do with the duration and the posterity, as well as the basis. Never mention the Treaty of Sevres to Turks! :) It is parallel to bringing the Munich Agreement as an argument toward the Czechs (I am not drawing an analogy between Hitler and Venizelos here). The way I see it, that's another article to put in context in the wikipedia. As for the Metropolitan Chrysostomos, I have put it as you read above for the moment. My Turkish source says Ephesus (and Ephesus only), but there might be some POV involved in omitting his Smyrna title.

I have knowledge of Greek-rooted international terminology, but that's all. My family is Cretan Turkish. In Turkey's context, Giritli (Cretan) has special connotations regarding the accent, the customs, the outlook towards life etc. The term actually covers (in Turkish) those Turks who migrated from other Aegean islands as well. So someone's grandfather might have come from Kos or Rhodes, but he could still be called Giritli in Turkey.

Regards, --Cretanforever 14:06, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi!i know about the mentioning of the Treaty of Sevres to Turks...Imagine how the mentioning of the Treaty of Lauzanne sounds to the Greeks!:). Anyway... I thought that we were making a discussion in order to end up somewhere. i did not expect u to edit what was mentioned above, before we agree in all. Furthermore, i never agreed in removing the whole paragraph and replacing it with another(u erased the 2/3 of info). Not that u have to ask for my 'permission' to do it, of course, but u cannot say that i made a compromise for that. I had to leave in the afternoon, thus i was not able to reply to u at that time. so, after making some research, Chrysostomos appears to be only Metropolitan of Smyrni (not also Ephesus). About the other thing, i would insist in using the neutral term landed, cause this appears to be the only NPOV. according to the turkish POV, the greek army occupied Smyrni (cause it was seen as a foreign army in turkish soil). according to the greek POV, the army liberated Smyrni (cause it was an ancient greek city with greek population majority at that time). also, do not forget that the greek army was officially (internationally) aloud to have control in Smyrni and its area of 17,000 sq.km, but not aloud to have control over the rest of Anatolia(as it later attempted and to some extent succeed in it)-it would be wise not to mix these two things. so, i cannot accept neither the turkish nor the greek POV in the article. i will wait for your reply to see if we can find a common ground, but meanwhile i will restore the version to the point we started discussing about that. Regards --Hectorian 20:54, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Hmmm...it is already reverted, so i do not have to do that (saving a rv if things will get wild:p) (i hope this won't happen, though).btw, i thought that an article about Cretan Muslims/Cretan Turks/Turkocretans(as we call u/them) would be really interesting! --Hectorian 20:58, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Thx. I received your message. I will post my paragraph on the User:Michalis Famelis/Greek and Turkish wikipedians board of cooperation and we can discuss about it there. İzmir happens to be my city (just like Thessaloniki is yours), and I would like to have the article on it put within a determined body to avoid it becoming a plankboard monopolized for any firstcomer's whims. --Cretanforever 21:27, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

OK, although i think the most appropriate place to place it would be talk:Izmir, because we should not look at the issue only from a Graeco-turkish direction. it would be better for all to participate. and something else: i am not from Thessaloniki, i just study here:) --Hectorian 21:58, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

One of the reasons that I won't accept this is because I've seen your editing behaviour in other articles. If it weren't for me and Hectorian to clean-up your edits in the Mazinkert, the article would have said things like "so, dude, you know poor Greek Emperor was ******-up by the Greeks, lucky for him the Turks took him in etc...". I've also tried to contact you in the past and propose you to email me in order to settle out content disputes. I assume you remember your reply. It's in your Talk page. I wanted to leave a record, wasn't that your exact working? You have failed to co-operate when it was gently asked from you, hence I feel no obligation to show understanding to your POV. It's funny how you present the situation as it was "just another war". Maybe we should do that in the WW2 article. I'm sorry, but the "brutal lynching" and the mention in the massacres will stay (it's not as if I asked you to devote the article on the Greco-Turkish war). Hundreds of thousands of Greeks and Armenian civilians were slain during, and a compromise between two editors has no authority in hiding the truth. Miskin 15:57, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

From my talk page: (...) Not a serious user. Frequently applies self-made ruse. See Contributions. --Cretanforever 14:14, 1 April 2006 (UTC) --Cretanforever 16:07, 6 April 2006 (UTC)