Abstract :
The city of Carchemish, which was located on the border of Turkey-Syria, about 75 km-Southeast of Gaziantep city and on the west of the Euphrates river was one of the Turkey s most important archaeological sites. In addition to its geographical situation, it has been home to many of the nations at that time. Because of its advantages in terms of geographical location and the military, city of Carchemish has been one of the most important cities of the Hittites, Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Romans, Byzantine and Ottoman like large states and empires throughout history. According to the surveys, its population is thought to be around thirty thousand in the time of the Hittite. While the estimated population of the city of Carchemish was about to be thirty thousand BC 1 thousand years, its total population was 4.412 in 2000 and 2.998 in 2010. The city, which has historical richness, administrative functions, the advantage of cross-border trade, easiness of rail and bus transportation and closeness to water and productive agricultural lands, are losing its population and thereby, it is a necessity to be find out the underlying factors affecting the urbanization process. Indeed, in this study, it is aimed to reevaluation the with the development of the city of Carchemish and the structure of land where the city was established, re-evaluate the geographical location and socioeconomic uses like properties of the city, and finally to explore the causes of the city s strategic, economic, demographic and commercial regression.
NaturalLanguageKeyword :
Carchemish City , Urbanization , Strategic Location , Transportation , Ancient City
