The Gallipoli peninsula is located in the southern part of East Thrace, the European part of Turkey, with the Aegean Sea to the west and the Dardanelles strait to the east.
Gallipoli is the Italian form of the Greek name Καλλίπολις, meaning 'beautiful city', the original name of the modern town of Gelibolu. In antiquity, the peninsula was known as the Thracian Chersonese.
The peninsula runs in a south-westerly direction into the Aegean Sea, between the Dardanelles, and the Gulf of Saros. In antiquity, it was protected by the Long Wall, a defensive structure built across the narrowest part of the peninsula near the ancient city of Agora. The isthmus traversed by the wall was only 36 stadia in breadth or about 6.5 km, but the length of the peninsula from this wall to its southern extremity, Cape Mastusia, was 420 stadia or about 77.5 km.