Gulf of

İzmit İzmit () is a district and the central district of Kocaeli province, Turkey. It is located at the Gulf of İzmit in the Sea of Marmara, about east of Istanbul, on the northwestern part of Anatolia. As of the last 31/12/2019 estimation, the c ...

( Turkish: ''İzmit Körfezi''), also referred to as Izmit Bay, is a

bay A bay is a recessed, coastal body of water that directly connects to a larger main body of water, such as an ocean, a lake, or another bay. A large bay is usually called a gulf, sea, sound, or bight. A cove is a small, circular bay with a na ...

at the easternmost edge of the

Sea of Marmara The Sea of Marmara,; grc, Προποντίς, Προποντίδα, Propontís, Propontída also known as the Marmara Sea, is an inland sea located entirely within the borders of Turkey. It connects the Black Sea to the Aegean Sea via the B ...

, in

Kocaeli Province Kocaeli Province ( tr, Kocaeli ili, ) is a province of Turkey and one of only three not to have the same official name as its capital, İzmit, which is thus also sometimes called Kocaeli. The province is the successor of the Ottoman-era Sanjak o ...

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in ...

. The gulf takes its name from the city of

. Other cities and towns around the bay are

Gebze Gebze (,) is a district in Kocaeli Province, Turkey. It is situated 65 km (30 mi) southeast of Istanbul, on the Gulf of Izmit, the eastern arm of the Sea of Marmara. Gebze is the largest district per population size in the province as o ...

, Körfez, Gölcük, and Altınova. In the east–west direction, it extends for a length of about , while in the north–south direction its width varies from at the narrowest spots to about at its widest. The İzmit Bay Bridge is a

suspension bridge A suspension bridge is a type of bridge in which the deck is hung below suspension cables on vertical suspenders. The first modern examples of this type of bridge were built in the early 1800s. Simple suspension bridges, which lack vertical ...

that bridges the gulf. The North Anatolian Fault Zone, the most prominent

active fault An active fault is a fault that is likely to become the source of another earthquake sometime in the future. Geologists commonly consider faults to be active if there has been movement observed or evidence of seismic activity during the last 10,0 ...

in Turkey and the source of numerous large

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from ...

s throughout history, passes through the Gulf of İzmit.

Etymology

Iznik’s ancient names were Gulf of Astacus, Sinus Astacenus ( grc, Ἀστακηνὸς κόλπος), Olbianus Sinus ( grc, Ὀλβιανὸς κόλπος, Olbianos kolpos) and Gulf of

Nicomedia Nicomedia (; el, Νικομήδεια, ''Nikomedeia''; modern İzmit) was an ancient Greek city located in what is now Turkey. In 286, Nicomedia became the eastern and most senior capital city of the Roman Empire (chosen by the emperor Diocleti ...

. It took the names Gulf of Astacus and Sinus Astacenus from the city Astacus.Pliny the Elder, Natural History, §5.43.1
/ref>

References

External links

Motorway over the Gulf
Izmit Sea of Marmara {{Turkey-stub

Etymology

See also

References

External links