Coconuts to Crampons: Ancient City

Friday, 11 December 2015

Ancient Turkey

There is so much history in Turkey! We travelled down the west coast to visit Galipoli, site of a WW1 battle, and the ancient cities of Troy and Ephesus.

The Galipoli Peninsula was where a very important battle happened during WW1, specifically for the ANZAC (Australian New Zealand Army Corp.) and Turkey. Turkey had sided with Germany in the war. They blocked transport via the Bosphorus straight therefore isolating Russia from the Allies. So in order to take control of the straight, in April 1915 ANZAC troups landed on the west coast of the peninsula with the objective of going over land and destroy the fortifications along the straight. Unfortunately, the battle did not go well for the Allies. They battled for 9 months and in December of 1915 they withdrew after only gaining a few kilometers from their original landing point. The Turks had won. This battle however is what gave Australia and New Zealand, relatively new countries at the time, an identity. We took a tour with Crowded House Tours and our guide was amazing; we learned so much about the military strategies, the obstacles and the battles.

Letter from Turkey's first President to the Allies who fought here.

Site where up to 15 000 Australians and New Zealanders have their annual memorial ceremony. This is the beach where the ANZACs landed.

Australian memorial.

ANZAC bunker.

Turkish memorial.

New Zealand memorial.

Turkish trench.

Everyone, of course, has heard of Troy. This ancient city is believed to have first been established in 3000 BC and eventually was abandoned in around 500 AD. What's left is really just a pile of rubble but with some imagination, and a really good audio guide, the city can come to life. The city was rebuilt nine times because of fires, earthquakes or wars. The most famous war is that described in Homer's Iliad where the Achaeans, who were unable to penetrate the walls of Troy, left a large wooden horse at the gate. The Trojans then brought the horse inside the city walls thinking it was a sign from the Achaeans that they have finally given up. After partying it up, the Achaean warriors jumped out of the horse and killed everyone, taking over the city. During our visit however we found out that this may not have actually happened and it was a fictional entertaining story imagined by Homer. Either way, its hard to dismiss the fact that this was a rich and significant city in its time.

City wall.

Ramp up to aristocrats part of the city.

Terracota water pipes. They were joined together with a mixture of lime and oil.

The bouleuterion (senate house).

Ephesus was a large city established in the 10th century BC and finally abandoned in the 15th century AD; at its peak it had up to 200 000 people! The site here is partially restored so as you walk through the city it is so easy to imagine what it must have looked like. It must have been spectacular! All the roads and buildings were all built of white marble and there is so much carved detail in everything.

Harbour Street; the road leading from the harbour into the city. How visitors normally arrived.

25,000 person odeon.

View of Harbour Street from the top of the odeon.

Gates into the 110m2 market.

Library.

Detail on the library all marble facade.

Library (left) and gate to market (right).

Temple.

Walking down Curates Way.

Uncovered aristocrat homes. Wall are all painted and floors are mosaic.

The living area. Kitchen on the left.

Here was the first time where I felt religion and history collide. I know that the Virgin Mary, Jesus and the Apostles were all real people but I've only ever thought of them in the context of stories in the New Testament. It turns out however that the Virgin Mary and St. John the Apostle came to Ephesus to live and spread Christianity. It was interesting for me to all of a sudden think of them in a historical context. They lived in the city, they had a home, they ate, they probably went to the local market.

The Church of Mary.

In Selcuk, 3km from Ephesus, there is a church dedicated St. John the Apostle built by Emperor Justinian in 6th century AD.

Basilica of St. John.

The coast itself was beautiful and the people wonderfully friendly. It really had a Mediterranean feel.

A wonderful ending to our Turkey trip!

Click here for more photos.

Saturday, 5 December 2015

Straddling two continents in Istanbul

As we head into December our year of travels is slowly coming to an end. We have our flights booked back to Canada, have started to think about going back to our desks and looking at MLS listings for a new home. For the last eight months we have been in Asia and it's time to start heading back to the West! So as we travel from India to Canada we stopped in Turkey for a few weeks. We landed at the Sabiha International airport in Istanbul on the continent of Asia and drove over the Bosphorus bridge that took us to the continent of Europe.

We spent one week in Istanbul and loved every minute of it! It's a wonderful modern city filled with history at every corner. Here's a list of all the different civilizations that Istanbul has seen:

13th century BC: First tribes known to have settled here.
7th century BC: Greeks.
196 AD: Roman Empire at which time it was known as Byzantium. The Emperor Constantine renamed it to Constantinople in 330 AD and was the new capital of the Eastern Roman Empire.
1453: The Muslim Conquest by the Ottoman Empire. Constantinople became the capital.
1923: The Republic of Turkey was founded and then the capital moved to Ankara.
1928: Turkey requested that all International countries use the Turkish names for Turkish cities. Since the Turks had been calling Constantinople Istanbul (meaning "the city") for centuries it naturally became its official name! Here is a song to help you remember this: https://youtu.be/rNUsOaB5V2c

With all this history you can imagine the layers of ancient cities that are below the streets! We've learned a lot about Greek, Roman and Ottoman Empires but have only scratched the surface. We did our best and visited the most iconic and historically significant sites.

Hagia Sofia was first built in 453 as a Greek Orthodox cathedral, then converted to a Catholic Church in 1204, then converted into a mosque in 1453 and then finally a museum in 1935. It is a massive structure with a massive dome in the center which is at an elevation of 56m from the floor and is completely decorated with mosaic tiles on the inside. What a spectacular structure!

Man selling roasted chestnuts outside of the Hagia Sofia at night.

Large slabs of marble for the flooring.

Various colourful stones used as wall decorations.

Beautiful mosaic scenes fill the building.

View from the top balcony.

Directly across from the Hagia Sofia is the famous Sultan Ahmet Mosque built in 1616. It is known as the "Blue Mosque" because of its predominantly blue ceramic tiles that adorn its inside. It was our first visit to a mosque too!

The inside of the large dome.

The blue tiles.

Topkapi Palace was built for the Ottoman Empires' Sultans, court and many wives.

Entrance gate.

The chimneys from the palace kitchen cooking fires.

All the different types of stone used to decorate the buildings are amazing!

Intricately hand painted ceramic tiles cover many of the buildings inside and out.

The Sultans' mothers' room

The view of the Bosphorus straight with Europe on the left and Asia on the right.

Suleymaniye mosque built in 1550.

Door to the inner courtyard. I love the use of different coloured stones!

Inside the mosque

View of Istanbul.

Or course we had to visit one of the worlds first malls! The Grand Bazaar was built as a covered market which held up to 3000 shops and spanned 61 streets! The shops now sell a wide range of copper ware, leathers, jewelry and all kinds of touristy souvenirs. There are still signs of its original artwork and architectural details. It must have looked spectacular when it was first opened in 1455.

In any good city part of the Roman Empire you will find aqueducts and some good mechanical engineering. The Romans had built up to 500 cisterns to hold water for the citizens of Constantinople.

Aqueduct.

Inside the Basilica Cistern. It once held 80 000m3 of water and has 336 marble columns.

Base of a column inside the cistern - Medusa protects the cistern from evil.

Where there are Romans, there are chariot races! Now the old Hippodrome is a large square with a few obelisks that were erected to honour significant events. One of which is the obelisk of Theodosius which was transported from Egypt by Theodosius in the 4th century AD. It is believed that it was "accidentally" broken in transit (to make it easier for transport!) and its bottom portion lost.

And we found a Catholic church: The Church of St. Anthony of Padua.

We stayed in the old part of Istanbul in the neighbour called Sultanahmet, which turned out to be a good base to visit all the sites but to also just wander the small streets around the city.