Feke

Feke

Feke has been a settlement area for many tribes and states from ancient times to the present day. It is rumored that Feke was founded in the 16th century BC in a federation region dominated by the Hittites. In recent years, as understood from the tablets and inscriptions of Kayseri Kültepe and Osmaniye Karatepe, merchants consisting of citizens of the Assyrian State, whose place of administration was the Assyrian city in Mesopotamia, established trade colonies in Kültepe and its surroundings and in various parts of Anatolia in the 19th and 18th centuries BC and established a well-organized market network. They have developed. In the market network formed by Assyrian trade colonies in the 19th century BC, police stations were established at dominant points in order to be a passage providing the connection between the high plateaus of the Central Anatolia Region and the Cilician Plain and to ensure the security and control of the trade caravans passing through this route. Feke was captured by the Persians in the 6th century BC, and by Alexander the Great, who defeated the Persians in 333 BC. After Alexander, it fell to the Roman Empire towards the end of the 1st century BC, and later to the Byzantines. Armenian rule ended with the invasion of the Egyptian Mamluks in 1375. Vahka (Feke) was captured by the Ottoman Empire during Yavuz Sultan Selim's Egyptian expedition in 1517. In the following years, it came under the rule of the Ramazanoğlu family, one of the Yüreğir Turkmen Beys. In the following years, Turkmen tribes such as Avshars, Varsaks and Kınık tribes such as Sirkıntı, Bozdoğan and Berber used this region as a plateau. After the Ottomans captured Cilicia at the end of the 15th century, some feudal lords such as Kozanoğulları, Sırkıntıoğulları, Menemencioğulları, Küçükalioğulları emerged. Among them, Kozanoğulları was in Kozan and their soldiers were in the Feke region. Haçin and Feke Armenians, who took advantage of the French occupation of Maraş-Antep and Adana during World War I, started to torture the Turks there with unimaginable torture, with the provocation of the French. The year 1919, the date of occupation of Kozan by the French, also means the occupation of Feke. Although a French military force did not directly come to Feke for the purpose of occupation, the Armenians, gaining strength from the French soldiers, started to torture the Turks and invade. In order to prevent these movements of the Armenians, District Governor Şeref Bey armed the city's elders and the people and started the fight against them. Armenian brutality soon caused a national uprising. Feke's rescue from this brutality occurred in March 1920. The liberation of Feke was achieved when the forces under the command of Arap Ali entered Feke. Feke people celebrate Liberation Day on March 22 every year.