Aegeansea is located between Turkey on the east and Greece on the west. The Aegean Sea is 600 km (400 mi) long and 300 km (200 mi) wide, it has a total area of some 83,000 square miles (214,000 square km).

The name is variously explained in writings of antiquity as derived from Aegeus, king of Athens and father of Theseus, or from Aegea, a queen of the Amazons who drowned in the sea, or from an ancient Greek town named Aegae.

The Aegean Sea is also an important natural feature. It is connected with the Sea of Marmara to the northeast by the Dardanelles Strait and the Bosporus with the Black Sea.

The maximum depth of the Aegean reaches 11,627 feet (3,543 m) in the east of Crete. The rocks making up the floor of the Aegean are mainly limestone, though often greatly altered by volcanic activity that has convulsed the region in relatively recent geologic times.

The Aegean Sea winds usually appear during the warm season from May to September, blow to the north and are called etisies or meltemia. The meltemia season begins around the end of May and ends around the end of October. They are the strongest during the months of July and August, and their average duration is from 2 to 4 days, although they do not have the same frequency of appearance every year. These winds mostly blow during the day, from 8 in the morning to 8 in the evening, and are at their strongest.