Cappadocia: No end of magic

Mostly located in the province of Nevşehir, Cappadocia is a tourist genre in itself. For the initiated, one visit is never enough. Every season has its own speciality. And on the occasion of the International Local Authorities Peace Conference, one more review will not go amiss…

The scenery enthralls; the fairy chimneys cast a spell. The visitor to Cappadocia longs to return. To feel the brown and yellow embrace of dry volcanic valleys. To slip inside the earth and watch golden frescoes appear amid the thick black air of hidden churches. To see how what caverns have caved in, and what new ruins have been uncovered. To explore the sites left unexplored before. To seek out a bargain rug, or replenish the domestic stocks of hand-made earthenware, rag-dolls, lace and onyx ornaments. To breathe the same old hospitality in another new hotel or monastery-turned-guest-house. And to share the delight of the thousands who are still discovering the region for the first time.

Visitors arrive from near and far and for many reasons. They come to paint, to take photographs, to hike, fly in balloons or ride the beautiful horses which gave the region its name. They are eager to see where Star Wars was shot or the Turkish TV soap opera Asmalı Konak was filmed. Few go away without the basic scientific explanation for Cappadocia’s magic: ten million years of geology, as volcanic tuff and rocks scattered by Erciyes, Hasan and Göllüdağ were moulded by wind and water into a stunning and liveable landscape; and ten thousand years of art as human hands carved dwellings and farmed the fertile spaces where civilisations took refuge, and prospered, and developed their religions, arts and crafts.

Chimneys and columns

The region has no clear boundaries. Most of the best-known vistas fall within the province of Nevşehir, but Cappadocia tumbles over into Aksaray to the West and extends wherever the rocks see fit and historical sites turn up. Besides the trade-mark “chimneys” with their protective hats of dark, resistant rock - waiting to topple in the centuries ahead – the region is rich in vertical cones, mushrooms and columns, often in lines or clusters, and tree-like multiple chimneys. Some are as small as a human being; others large enough to hew many chambers from. They are most intensive in the valleys between Ürgüp, Uçhisar and Avanos, between Ürgüp and Şahinefendi, near Çat (Nevşehir) and Selime (Aksaray), and in the Soğanlı valley (Kayseri). Here and there, rows of them march imperceptibly out of the crimped and folded curtains of valley sides.

Layers of harmonious colour line the lava walls of canyons. At Uçhisar and Ortahisar,.giant perforated outcrops form natural castles, a challenge to scale amid the flat-roofed villages. Cave settlements come in many forms, ancient and recent, monastic and secular. The oldest, most astonishing and least well-known stretch deep underground in kilometres of tunnels. Dozens of these underground cities still wait to be explored.

Famous Collection

The Göreme Open-Air Museum encompasses the most famous collection of Cappadocia’s 6th to 11th century rock churches. Reputedly there are as many as one for every day in the year but only about 30 are open to the public. Between the sculpted columns, capitals, arches, domes, altars and tombs, detailed though damaged frescos pass on the central and apocryphal narratives of Christianity - and bear witness to the ebb and flow of art and iconaclasm. More, and in some cases larger, rock churches can be found at numerous other sites including Açıksaray, Çavuşin, Pancarlık and the extensive if crumbling Zelve Valley – another museum - where orthodox Christians  lived until 1924, and Muslim Turks until 1952.

Surprises are the norm: a Roman remain, a caravanserai, a minaret, a steeple, a dove-cote, a treeful of apricots, a natural cold-store cave-full of cool Mediterranean oranges. Not even the most fanciful and inaccurate maps - and there are many - can fully capture it all. But local folk have long taken the toil out of touring and exploring. Picturesque Ürgüp, at the foot of a winding terrace of cliff-hotels and guest-houses, was perhaps the first settlement to offer bus tickets, taxis, postcards, local currency and bed and breakfast. Pavement cafés and hotels with swimming pools followed quickly – though the local fruit and vegetable market still convenes.

Shopping Centre

Stretched out along the red clay banks of the Kızılırmak River, Avanos has developed from the home of the pottery trade to the handicrafts and shopping centre of the region. Villages come in assorted styles but are invariably attractive. Nevşehir, the provincial centre, nestles in the shadow of a twelfth-century Seljuk castle. Although it traces its descent over 3,000 years from the Hittites, it took on its present name – meaning New City - and location in the early eighteenth century thanks to the efforts of its most famous son, “Nevşehirli Damat” İbrahim Paşa. The peace-making, modernising and ill-fated prime minister and son-in-law of Sultan Ahmet III restored the castle (unfortunately only temporarily) and left for posterity a külliye of buildings – school, soup-kitchen, library, inn – centring around the so-called Lead Mosque.

As those bewitched by Cappadocia know, there is no close season. The freshness of spring, with its rash of wild flowers, has passed, followed by the camaraderie of the summer holiday season. But the colours – and wines – of the Autumn are with us now, and those photogenic snowscapes lie in wait.

(DIPLOMAT  -  September 2005  -  Ankara)