Giresun Province (Turkish: Giresun ili) is a province of Turkey on the Black Sea coast. Its adjacent provinces are Trabzon to the east, Gümüşhane to the southeast, Erzincan to the south, Sivas to the southwest, and Ordu to the west. The provincial capital is Giresun.
Giresun is an agricultural region of great natural beauty, especially in the highlands. The lower areas near the Black Sea coast are Turkey's largest producer of hazelnuts; a Giresun folk song tells "I will not eat a single hazelnut, unless you are by my side", while another tells of a lover shot dead under a hazelnut tree.
Forests and pasture cover the high mountainous regions, and in places there is mining of copper, zinc, iron and other metals. The mountain villages are remote, with poor roads and little else in the way of infrastructure. The hillsides are too steep for most forms of agriculture, and as a result, cornbread is the traditional meal, as wheat cannot be grown.
The climate is typical of this stretch of the Black Sea coast, i.e. very wet. Local flora includes bilberries (Turkish "taflan").
Giresun province is divided into 16 districts (capital district in bold):
Handcrafts
Due to the dense forestry in Giresun, woodwork is among the common handcrafts in the region. Some small wooden handcrafts peculiar to the city are churns, külek (a storing pot for cheese), and spoons. One of the oldest handcrafts in the city is weaving. Wool, linen threads and similar raw marerials are spun in hand looms to produce various local clothes, heybe (shoulder bags) and bags. Strong threads and knitted threads are also produced in hand looms.
Some of the dishes peculiar to the city are corn soup (Mısır çorbası), cabbage soup (lahana çorbası), cabbage leaves stuffed with a meat filling (etli lahana sarması), black cabbage dish (karalahana yemeği or pancar yemeği), pilaf with anchovy (hamsili pilav), pilaf with cabbage (dible), kaygana, kuymak (made of cheese, cornmeal and butter)
Kümbet, Karagöl and Bektaş are areas of attractive mountain pasture in the district of Dereli, where people can enjoy walks and picnics. Annual folklore festivals are held here in summer.
Rahşan Ecevit (1923, Bursa - ), wife of former Turkish Prime Minister, Bülent Ecevit, born to a Şebinkarahisar family
Hayrettin Erkmen (b Tirebolu - ), former foreign minister
Harun Karadeniz (1942, Alucra - 1975), writer and student activist leader of the 1968 generation
İdris Küçükömer (1925, Giresun - 1987), economist and thinker
Topal Osman (1883, Giresun - 2 Nisan 1923, Ankara), soldier and commander in the Turkish War of Independence
Mustafa Suphi (1883, Giresun - 1921), founder of the Communist Party of Turkey
Naim Tirali (1925, Giresun - ), journalist and politician
Hasan Âli Yücel (1897, İstanbul – 1961), poet, thinker and politician, former minister of education, born to a Görele family
Writers and artists
Kadir Çelik (b Görele ), TV producer and presenter
Hulki Cevizoğlu (b 1958, Giresun - ), journalist, TV presenter and producer, specialises in political debate
Bedri Rahmi Eyüboğlu (1913, Görele - 1975, Istanbul), painter and poet
Hamit Görele (1903, Görele - 1980, Istanbul), painter
Ergin Günçe (1938, Giresun - 1983), poet
İlyas İlbey, actor, husband of Yasemin Yalçın
Şafak Karaman (b 1967, Trabzon - ), minor celebrity and TV presenter, born to a Tirebolu family
Fatih Kırtorun (1985, Görele - ), writer and poet
Salih Memecan (1952, Giresun - ), cartoonist of Sabah newspaper
Fethi Naci (1927, Giresun - ), writer and critic
Aziz Nesin (1915, Şebinkarahisar - 1995), writer and journalist
Yaman Okay (b 1951, Giresun -), actor and film director
Öztürk Serengil, well-known film actor, father of Seren Serengil, grew up in Giresun
Ahmet Yalçınkaya (b 1963, Giresun ), poet
İlker Yasin, Kanal Ds football commentator
Furkan ÇELİK, Develispor is Footballer.
Giresun province shares the folk music of the Black Sea region and is the birthplace of:
Picoğlu Osman (b. 1901, Görele - d. 1946 Amasra), folk musician, considered to be one of the best kemençe players
Katip Şadi (b 1932, Görele -), folk musician, kemençe player
Other musicians include:
Ozan Arif (1949, Alucra - ), poet, lyricist, balladeer of the extreme right MHP
Bahadır Aydoğan, Arabesk style singer
Mustafa Küçük, folk-arabesk musician
Gökhan Semiz (1968, Istanbul - 1998 İstanbul), member of the pop music group Group Vitamin; family from Giresun
Teoman (1967, Alucra - ), rock singer
Şenes Erzik (1942, Giresun -), businessman and vice president of UEFA
Hasan Gemici, 1952 Olympic gold medalist in freestyle wrestling
Giresunspor, a 2nd (Bank Asya 1.Lig)league football team
Tolga Seyhan (b 1977 -) and Gökdeniz Karadeniz (b 1980 Giresun, currently with Rubin Kazan), footballers
The TV series Uy Başuma Gelenler was filmed in the village of Düzköy. It is the story of a young man from Istanbul who inherits a hazelnut grove in Giresun (a Turkish twist on Monarch of the Glen).
The folk song "Giresun üstünde vapur bağrıyor" ("Eşref Bey Ağıtı") has been recorded by a number of artists including Ismail Hakkı Demircioğlu, and tells of a wounded soldier dying in Giresun.
"Giresun'un içinde" has been sung by Musa Eroğlu, Selda Bağcan and Fuat Saka, who also sang "Lazutlar," which means corn in the local dialect and is a kind of Cider with Rosie rural idyll in verse.
Ahmet Kaya sang "Mican," a ballad about a local bandit in the mountains.
