Travel Guide Galatia - Mehmetçik

Located in the central part of the Karpas peninsula, Galatia is the main wine-producing village in the northern zone. It is also one of the few places in the region to have been populated by Turkish Cypriots prior to 1974. It produces wine, zivania (brandy) and "grape sausage" (cevizli sucuk), a traditional Cypriot sweet. Also renowned for its snails and sulu kebap (melting lamb), since 1960 the village has organized the Grape Festival (Mehmetçik Üzüm Festivali) in early August, with meals, tastings, song and dance. In 2016, Galatia joined the international Cittaslow network, a label of the Italian Slow Food movement, for preserving its culinary traditions. As such, the town organizes small "gourmet" events throughout the year. A hotbed of Turkish Cypriot resistance before independence, the village took the Turkish name of "little soldier" (Mehmetçik) in 1958. The more commonly used name Galatia/Galatya may derive from the Greek gallos meaning "French", as the village was inhabited by Frankish settlers in the Middle Ages.