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Ongoing excavations have revealed a historical latrina – a toilet or an even simpler facility used as a toilet within a sanitation system – at a historical theater in the ancient city of Smyrna, located within the borders of the western city of Izmir. The latrina is thought to have been used by the artists in the theater. The theater and the commode date back to around the second century B.C. and were used until the fifth century A.D., said Akın Ersoy, an archaeologist at Izmir's Katip Çelebi University and head of the excavation team.Touting "unexpected finds" during the excavations,...

A 7.0-magnitude earthquake hit the Aegean Sea off Greece and Turkey on Friday, according to the United States Geological Survey. At least 4 people were killed in the quake, according to Turkey’s health minister. The city of Izmir in Turkey has been particularly badly hit with reports of at least 20 building destroyed, cars being crushed and people in the streets following the quake. The earthquake has also caused damage on the Greek island of Samos in the Aegean sea.

Tension is running high between Greece and Turkey. The cause? Turkish Chief of the General Staff Gen. Hulusi Akar paid a visit to Imia, a pair of two small, uninhabited Greek islets in the Aegean Sea, on January 29. He was accompanied by the commanders of the Turkish land, naval and air forces.Imia – which Turkey calls “Kardak” – was a subject of yet another crisis in 1996 that brought Greece and Turkey to the brink of war. Although armed conflict was ultimately averted, Turkey still claims that the islands are Turkish, even though the islands in the Aegean are...

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Saint Polycarp was bishop of Smyrna in Asia Minor in the second century AD. A disciple of Saint John the Evangelist, Polycarp died martyr in AD 155 or 156 for refusing to renounce Christianity. His martyrdom was marked by various miraculous prodigies, but foremost among them, perhaps, is the incredible fortitude of the man--who was at least 86 at the time of his trial--and his willingness to speak the truth to power even with the threat of immediate death hanging over his head. Here is an excerpt from the account of his martyrdom, recorded by Saint Irenaeus, in which Polycarp...

Archaeologists have discovered ashes from one of the biggest ever volcanic eruptions in recorded history. Excavations in Turkey’s ancient city of Smyrna, now located in Izmir, have revealed details from a Minoan eruption that took place some 3,600 years ago. Smyrna was established about 5,000 years ago by the Greek tribe of Aeolians and later inhabited by Ionians. It was mostly abandoned after it was captured by the Anatolian kingdom of Lydia in the 6th century B.C. Archaeologists say the ashes will tell them a lot about the history. “Now that we have identified those ashes with a more extensive...

The pilot has been identified in the crash.

SMYRNA, Tenn. (WKRN) – A U.S. Navy Blue Angels jet crashed Thursday afternoon in Smyrna ahead of their weekend air show at the city’s airport. A La Vergne official confirmed the accident happened around 3 p.m. near Weakly Lane, not far from the bowling alley. LifeFlight helicopters from Vanderbilt University Medical Center were called to the scene. Further details have yet to be released.

SMYRNA, TN (WSMV) - A Blue Angels airplane has crashed at or near the Smyrna-Rutherford County Airport, airport authority confirmed. According to Rutherford County Emergency Medical Service, one person was killed in the crash. The Blue Angels had been practicing on Thursday ahead of this weekend’s Great Tennessee Airshow in Smyrna. They flew over downtown Nashville on Thursday morning.

Afieroma - Dedication or Reminiscence - A Greek Word that Never Made It Into English Afieroma sten Smyrne - Reminiscence of Smyrna - Videos of old Greek-Asia-Minor music Don't pry into things a people don't discuss with outsiders. That said, Greek music is fascinating from Turkish-dominated lands before the Armenian incident. Other Greek music shows a pronounced Arabic sense, why is this? I'm not a musicologist, however, it seems indisputable that a certain vocal tendency in women's singing among the descendants of the former Asia-Minor, Greek lands, centered perhaps around Smyrna, uses a kind of high, warbling, expressive vocal sound,...

For the first time since the Asia Minor Catastrophe of 1922, a Greek Orthodox Epiphany celebration is set to take place in Izmir on January 6, 2016. The Greek Orthodox community has received permission from the Turkish authorities to perform the Diving for the Holy Cross ceremony on the local pier. "For the first year we will be performing the Blessing of the Waters at the port of Izmir. Officially, this is the first year. We had also done it around 10 years ago, but not officially. This time we have received a license from the Turkish government, the Ministry...

For the rest of the semester, a Rutherford County elementary student has to eat lunch at the "silent table" for allegedly waving around a slice of pizza some say resembled a gun. Nicholas Taylor attends David Youree Elementary School in Smyrna, about 30 miles southeast of Nashville. School leaders say the 10-year-old threatened other students at his lunch table with a piece of pizza with bites out of it so it looked like a gun and when asked about it was initially not truthful. Nicholas' mother LeAnn calls her son's punishment "absolutely ridiculous" saying he was just playing around and...

"A greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one's life for his friends".

VOLUSIA COUNTY, Fla. (WOFL FOX 35) - An AWOL U-S soldier was arrested in New Smyrna Beach and the FBI is on the case because they say he is actually in the country illegally The 28-year old is a citizen of Iraq. U-S Immigration revoked his visa after he went AWOL from the military in Kansas.

New excavations have revealed that Izmir, once believe to be 5,000 years old, may be as old as 8,500 years. Associate professor Zafer Derin of the Ege University archeology department, the head of the excavation team, said in a written statement his team had removed 150 artifacts discovered at the Yeflilova Tumulus excavation site, reported the Anatolia news agency. Saying the findings discovered in the excavation played an important role in identifying those who lived in the area 8,500 years ago, Derin said: "Findings obtained from the excavation determined that those who lived in this area 8,500 years ago had...

For centuries, the great city of Smyrna was a European foothold on the Anatolian coast. The British Levantine Company had had a factory there since 1667, trading in raisins and carpets, and even then the place was renowned for its lively social life. Francesco Lupazzoli, the priapic Venetian consul, lived on a diet of fruit, bread and water and a few slices of unseasoned meat, yet survived until the age of 114, and fathered 126 children on his five wives and innumerable Smyrniot mistresses. By the end of the 19th century, Smyrna had grown into one of the largest, richest...

IZMIR, Turkey – Choking the highways and crammed onto ferries, hundreds of thousands of Turks streamed into this port city on Sunday in an enormous show of opposition to the pro-Islamic ruling party, increasing pressure on the government ahead of early elections. Some 1.5 million protesters carried anti-government banners, red-and-white Turkish flags and pictures of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, who founded the secular republic in 1923. Turkish flags hung from balconies and windows, as well as buses and fishing boats and yachts bobbing in Izmir's bay. “I am here to defend my country,” said Yuksel Uysal, a teacher. “I am here...

Members of All Saints' Church in Smyrna remaining after the rest of the congregation split to form St. Patrick's Anglican Church will cross paths with their former brethren Sunday. Both congregations are claiming rights to the same church facility at 1401 Lee Victory Parkway. The Rev. Ray Kasch of St. Patrick's and former head of All Saints', said he got a call from the Rt. Rev. Bertram Nelson Herlong, the Bishop of Tennessee, telling him that Herlong would be holding an 11 a.m. service for members of All Saints' at the Smyrna church. "I said, 'Bishop, there is nobody left...

MARIETTA - Cobb police have arrested six Hispanic men for manufacturing identification documents at Twelve Oaks Apartments on Austell Road in an undercover sting that authorities expect will lead to more arrests. Because the investigation is ongoing and additional arrests are pending, police did not release information about the Oct. 25 arrests until Tuesday. Agents from the Marietta-Cobb-Smyrna Organized Crime and Intelligence Unit executed a search warrant for an apartment at 8 p.m. Oct. 25 and walked in on a "large operation," Cobb Police Department spokesman Officer Wayne Delk said. Officers seized about 1,300 photographs, 217 completed identification cards, various...

Al-Qaeda's Long March to War (Full Story) In recent weeks, media reports from both Iraq and Afghanistan have suggested the appearance of a slow evolution of the Islamist insurgents' tactics in the direction of the battlefield deployment of larger mujahideen units that attack "harder" facilities.These attacks are not replacing small-unit attacks, ambushes, kidnappings, assassinations and suicide bombings in either country, but rather seem to be initial and tentative forays toward another stage of fighting. Karzai Condemns U.S. Troops Using Gunfire Taliban Kill, Kidnap Dozens of Afghan Police US Sends More Troops into Iraq Where does Karzai go from here?...