Gemiler is a small island near Fethiye in south-western Turkey. From 1991 to 2002 the “Research Group for Byzantine Lycia” carried out a survey in Gemiler and the neighboring area and excavated “Church No. 3” of the island, located near the top of the mountain. It was proved that this island had prospered in late antiquity and declined afterward, and that this church had a certain relationship with devotion to St. Nicholas. At the present Gemiler is also called “St. Nicholas Island” in this area.
This article researches the origin of the name of “St. Nicholas Island” on the basis of information in medieval and early modern portolano texts. A Greek portolano of the 16th century states that this island was called “Perdikonisi” (Partridge Island) and that St. Nicholas Church on the top of the mountain was the landmark of the island. In 1490 the Venetian Bernardino Rizo wrote that “Pernixe” Island was called “St. Nicholas Island”. Thus it is obvious that Gemiler island was called St. Nicholas Island in the 15th century.
Some Italian portolani refer to a port near Macri (Fethiye) called Perdiciae, or similar names. As one of them reported it as “portum habentem insulam ante se” (a port having an island in front of it) and there are no islands except Gemiler and Karacaören between Macri and Patara, the “Perdiciae” in these portolani must have been a port near Gemiler Island. I think this port is the later “Port of Levisi, ” or the present Gemiler Beach, which is located on the mainland to the north-west of Gemiler Island. Thus it seems that Perdiciae originally was the name of the port on the mainland but that in the 14th century the name came to refer instead to Gemiler Island, which came to be called “Partridge Island” as well as “St. Nicholas Island” because it was the landmark of the entrance to the port of Perdiciae.
Another Venetian, Marino Sanudo Torsello (c. 1300), provides other important information about the Lycian coast near Macri. As his description clearly contradicts other portolano texts and geographical facts, we should not rely on him too much. But his expression “S. Nicholaus de Leuixo” seems to indicate that in his time Gemiler Island was famous for the St. Nicholas Church on the top of it.

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