The highlight of this week was a walking/bus tour of Roman Ankara (then called Ancyra), led by an excellent, enthusiastic tour guide, an archaeologist from Middle East Technical University here in Ankara. And it was in English, so I actually understood what she said.
For more photos, please see: http://anatolianphotos.shutterfly.com/ (Turkey, eighth week - Roman Ankara).
First stop—the Hisar, or citadel in Ulus again. Although the inner fortress on the tallest hill in Ankara was built by the Romans, the outer wall is Byzantine and dates from the 9th century. Our intent in visiting the outer wall was to view the various pieces of Roman architecture that were incorporated into the building of the later wall. Although most of the wall, with its 20 towers, is constructed of a pinkish stone found in the vicinity of Ankara (some day we’ll figure out what that stone is), everywhere one can see white marble fragments of Roman building blocks, elaborate key stones, mantels, inscribed plaques, and so on. I’m not sure why we did not visit the inner Roman wall on this trip; perhaps because there is not much of it left. But Larry and I (and Anna) visited many years ago; I hope to do so again. It is in the center of a fascinating city-within-a-city, with narrow, winding alleys, if I am remembering correctly.
While visiting mostly the wall, Professor Guven also explained a little of the history of the town within the wall—at least the later, Turkish Republic, history. Not far from the outside of the wall were the early Republic government buildings. So inside the wall, the governing class built their substantial houses, with gorgeous views of the rest of Ankara and the countryside around the city, with its many hills. Over time, and with the construction of government buildings and residences elsewhere in the city, the citadel houses became run down, and the entire section became the “poor” area of the 20th century city. These days, it is once again slowly being gentrified, with restaurants and tourist shops everywhere, and some of the houses themselves are being renovated.
The view from the wall tells another story: there are still gece condular! In one of my first posts, I mention that these “night houses” had been destroyed and replaced with high rise apartment houses. Not so the ones on the hill across from the citadel. I suspect that these gece condos may still be around because they are older and somewhat more substantial than those that had been built and subsequently destroyed near the airport. The remaining condos (in reality, houses hugging the hillside) also lend a picturesque view from the touristy citadel, although this may be somewhat cynical of me to say so.
Another view from the citadel is an overview of what was once Roman Ankara, which takes me back to the subject of this post.The next stop down the hill from the citadel is the newly excavated Roman Theater. Currently surrounded by a chain link fence, under which we had to stoop to enter the site, this is a work in progress. It was found fairly recently, but, as it sits in the middle of a section of housing, excavations have been slow. After some buildings were cleared, the site was neglected for a time, only to become a favorite nightly hangout of unsavory characters in addition to a local dump for the nearby residents. Eventually the authorities constructed the fence and cleaned up the site; I believe the excavations are ongoing. The statues found at this site have been moved to the Museum of Anatolian Civilizations, just up the hill within the outer wall of the Citadel. Our guide is in hopes that the excavations of the Theater will continue and the site becomes an important historical park in the city.
Our third stop was the spectacular Monumentum Ancyranum, or Temple of Augustus and Rome, the walls of which contain the only extant contemporary copy of the Res Gestae Divi Augusti, or Acts of Augustus, the first Roman Emperor. Fifteen years ago, we stumbled on this site, which was covered in scaffolding and sat in the middle of a residential/commercial area. After many years of work, and many delays I understand, the site is now an official historical center and is open to the public. It is quite amazing to see on the remaining walls an account of Augustus’s accomplishments, in both Latin and Greek, knowing that this is the only contemporary copy remaining. There is reference on the wall to the “original” in Rome, but that original has never been found by recent historians or archaeologists. Attached to the remaining walls of the temple is a mosque that is several hundred years old and still in use; in fact, there was a funeral about to be held there during our visit to the Roman site.
Continuing down the hill toward the center of Roman Ankara, we passed by the column of Julian, which reputedly was constructed in honor of Emperor Julian, the Apostate. (I am currently reading Gore Vidal's fictionalized version of this emperor's life, appropriately titled, Julian.) The column is topped with a large stork's nest; fifteen years ago, we actually saw the stork land on its nest! I'm not sure there is still a stork living there, but I believe there is. The column apparently had been moved several hundred feet when the early Turkish Republic's first parliament building and administrative offices were built around the circle where the column now resides. These early Republic buildings are quite beautiful, in my opinion.
Not far from Julian's column, we had a brief view of a recently uncovered section of a Roman road, still partially obscured by an outdoor cafe. The width of the road is such that it is believed to have been a pedestrian road, perhaps the central pavement of the agora. There is no evidence of wheel ruts, so it was likely not used by vehicles.
Next stop: The Roman Baths (or Roman Hamam). First we took an elevator to the ninth floor of a government building, to look down and across a busy street to the excavated site of the huge Roman bath complex. This is in a part of the Ulus neighborhood we have seldom visited, if ever. We had no idea this was here! Of course, from the ground level, it is behind a fence. But still . . . . Once on the ground and in the museum site, we had another excellent introduction to the concept of Roman baths by our super tour guide, Ms. Guven.
First walking through hundreds of marble Roman artifacts stored on site for the Museum of Anatolian Civilizations, which doesn’t have room for all these additional treasures, we reached the site of the foundation of the baths. It represents one of the larger combined gymnasium/bath complexes in the Roman Empire, this one built in the 3rd century to honor Asclepius, the God of Medicine. With an open area, called the palaestra, surrounded by additional exercise and massage rooms, this was a central part of the bath complex.
The attached baths, with the typical caldarium (hot room), tepidarium (warm room) and frigidarium (cold room), also had a large, oval wading pool, perhaps three feet deep, where people hung out to socialize (or conspire according to 20th century Roman epics). The caldarium was larger than normal to accommodate Ankara’s harsh winters. (Rome was warmer). When I look around the outskirts of the city, where there are few trees for hundreds of miles in either direction, I have some sense of where some of the ancient forests may have gone.
At the end of our trip, we were bussed to what is by reputation the best “kebab” restaurant in town. A beautiful restaurant, alas, it served nothing but two types of kebab: Uladag doner, and Iskender doner, both mostly sliced beef. Larry and I each had a miniscule salad, a piece of bread, and some dessert. My krem caramel turned out to be very tasty “flan.” Then we went home and raided our refrigerator.
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