Mysterious places in Turkey
Nemrut Dag - The Mountain of the Gods
In the southeast of Turkey, in the middle of the Taurus massif, there is the holy mountain of Kommagene, the 2,150 meter high Nemrud Dag. The King of Commagene, Antiochus I, who died in the 1st century BC, is buried here. Antiochus had the largest burial mound in the world! In order to build this burial mound on the top of the mountain, around 200,000 cubic meters of rock had to be removed. Without modern technology or dynamite! A 50 m high pyramid made of gravel was created and three terraces with 10-meter-high figures of gods were built at the foot of the pyramid. Each of the figures weighs around 10 tons and is made from a different material than that of the rock. Each figure had to be transported up the mountain.
Archaeologists are conducting research on Nemrut Dag. Somewhere under the pyramid lies the tomb of King Antiochus I, in which treasures similar to those in the tomb of Tutankhamen are expected. The geniusof the builders made it very difficult for potential grave robbers to find it. To date, no one has penetrated to the burial chamber - which has now been located.
Various inscriptions on the Nemrut Dag speak of a good relationship between Antiochus I and "the gods" to whom he was grateful for their services. Another inscription reports that he entrusted the mountain with "immortal messages" for eternity. What kind of messages are these? Will archaeologists one day find writings in the tomb of Antiochus that say more about the relationship between the king and "the gods"?
The underground cities of Cappadocia
Cappadocia is teeming with underground cities. More and more are now becoming accessible to visitors. The largest so far is Derinkuyu, which, with at least 16 underground floors, offered space for around 20,000 people. The town of Özkonak has recently been opened and can accommodate up to 60,000 people.
The city of Kaymakli has over 5,000 rooms arranged like bubbles in a sponge. All underground cities were connected to each other with a tunnel system. Everywhere you come across air shafts that ensured that the air was still pleasant to breathe even tens of meters underground.
The question of who laid out and built the cities remains open to this day. It is known that Christians sought refuge here at the time of the persecution of Christians (around 250 AD). But they were not the actual builders. The cities already existed. Who built it? And when? This is where the speculation begins. In some cities, objects from the Hittite period were found. The Hittites lived between 1,800 and 1,300 BC east of today's Ankara. Do the cities come from them? Or are they even older? And the most important question: Why all this effort? I read in the travel guide that people sought protection from enemies here. From what kind of enemies? It would have been easy for them to smoke out the refugees by throwing burning and smoking materials into the air shafts and then covering the shaft with a plate. The cave dwellers would be trapped and smoked out.
Questions and more questions! What remains is the fact that these cities exist and are definitely worth a visit.
Representations of hybrid creatures in the museum in Ankara
They can be found in the Museum of Central Anatolian Advanced Cultures in Ankara, but all the museums in the world are full of different representations of hybrid creatures, sphinxes, centaurs and so on.
Were these all just imaginary figures or were based on real models? In the 4th century lived the church prince and historian Eusebius, who reported from older texts that the gods created hybrid creatures:
"And there were certain other monsters there, some of which were self-generated (...) and they had produced double-winged people; also others with four wings and two faces (...) further still other people, with thighs of goats and horns on their heads; still others, horse-footed; and others with the shape of a horse on the back and human-shaped on the front (... ) and reptiles and serpents and a multitude of miraculous creatures, of many different types and shapes, whose images they keep represented one next to the other in the temple of Belos."
Is it all just nonsense? Why then do the figures, representations and reliefs of sphinxes exist all over the world?
