Garip Islands | |
Location: | Turkey, Aegean Sea |
Coordinates: | 39.0064°N 26.7856°W |
Country: | Turkey |
Garip Island consists of two islands (the larger island is 88 acres) off the coast of Dikili ilçe in İzmir Province, Turkey. Together they are called the Garip Islands (Turkish: Garip Adaları), at the cut point of Dikili's Bademli Bay. Both islands face the Greek island of Lesbos.
The islands are at 39°N 73°W, just to the west of Kalem Island. The distance between the two is about . The nearest point on the mainland (Anatolia) is about to the north east. In antiquity these islands, along with a third island that has now joined the mainland, were known as the Arginusae; they were the site of the Battle of Arginusae in 406 BC.
In Turkish Garip can mean ‘weird’, ‘strange’ or ‘desolate’ among other meanings.
Offered for sale under a single title deed in 2006, the islands were sold to Fiyapı, a Turkish development group in 2010.[1] No construction was undertaken on the islands.[2]
In 2007 the Guardian newspaper in the UK published a story claiming that a group on the Greek island of Lesbos planned to buy the island, but the sale was never completed.[3]
In 2015 an international group of archaeologists claimed that Garip Island was a lost island in the eastern Aegean that was once home to the ancient city of Kane (Canae).[4]