March 31: Gordion: Today was a great day!

We had Anatolya to ourselves as we took both highways and back roads and saw Gordion, some Hittite sites of worship, and amazing countryside.

Today we left Ankara at 6:00 a.m. and drove 1.5 hours to the little village of Yassıhöyük.  We arrived even before the Gordian “Museum” was open, and spent an hour or so looking around, met by some none-too-friendly geese. 

We went to see the famous tumulus tomb originally thought to be that of King Midas of the "golden touch" (it isn't!), and then the so-called Midas City mound with its ongoing archaeological dig suspended for the winter.  The tomb chamber was constructed from Cedar and Yew logs that are in such a state of preservation that you can still smell the cedar resin.  You would swear the trees had been cut only a few months ago!  The Midas tumulus is only one of about 80 tumuli that are scattered across the area.

Each of the mounds in this picture is a tumulus, where a Phrygian king was once buried.  Until we came to this valley, we thought that the area looked a lot like the prairies.

This is called "Tumulus MM" for Midas Mound, but the king buried inside it ( a man in his 60's standing at a lordly 5'2") was more likely to have been King Gordion than King Midas.  Apparently, Gordion ruled BEFORE Midas!

Before going in to the tomb itself, we spent quite a bit of time in the museum, which has both traditional displays inside, and an outdoor display.  The inside of the museum was like walking around inside a refrigerator.   However, the displays were very well presented.  Highlights included a marvelous coin collection from all over the ancient world, a scale model of the tomb inside the tumulus, Phrygian iron tools, looking surprisingly modern, and some very ancient pottery.  

I'm going to say 'cow'.	fragmentary relief of Matar (Mother Goddess)in doorway from vicinity of Gordion
Alexander the Great	Ancient Phrygian Iron tools.  I think I have a pick like the top one rusting in my backyard.

This is over 3000 years old!

 The outside area has many archeological finds that were moved from locations around the area.  

This mosaic floor was damaged when a well was drilled right through it as it lay hidden beneath the earth.

This is a Galatian tomb.  It was almost intact when it was discovered in 1955, but since that time it was heavily damaged, and local villagers had removed all of the top stones.  It was moved to the Gordion museum in 1999 and restored.

 Of course, the main attraction was the tomb of King Midas.

The approach to Tumulus MM.	The passageway cut through the side of the tumulus.  Of course, there was no "easy access" provided, and the tomb was not able to be opened until the 1950's.
The cedar of the tomb itself.  Thouseands of years later, one can still smell the resin.	Another shot.  Unfortunately, the viewing area is quite small.  We were really glad we were not there with a tour group, but sorry we couldn't walk around.

This, again, is the inside of the tumulus.  The "blocks" closest to us are actually squared cedar logs, and you can see the smooth lining boards on the far wall. 

We followed directions given to us at the museum, and attempted to find Midas City.  We weren't quite sure we were in the right place, as there are no signs on the road and it at first appears to be no more than an irregular shaped mound.  But if you have faith, get out and climb the bank: the dig site opens up to view from the top of the mound.  There is no parking lot, or marker on the road to tell you where to go.  The site is unguided, and we ended up caked with sticky mud.  Still, it remains one of the most amazing places I have ever seen.  We were the only people there to listen to the bird song.

We are looking across at the gate to the city.  A huge building with centres for textiles and storage of foodstuffs is in the foreground.

Gordion city

From Gordian we drove to a couple of different monumental Hittite sites that we reached in the early afternoon: Midas Sehri and Aslantash.   These can only be reached through small country roads, many of which pass through farms, so we got a chance to be up close and personal with many animals.

We saw many shepherds and their dogs moving herds of sheep, and many goats like these.  This one is eating the TOP of a tree!

Ian's ironic turkeys.  Of course, they all looked right at him right after he put the camera away.

It looked like Alberta, except with chunks of jagged rock studding the landscape.  It reminded me of the plains of Rohan, with hints of Mordor.  My favourite part of the drive was where dozwns of little springs ran down a hill and across the road.  The sun was shining and it was like driving through miles of liquid silver -- although perhaps Ian enjoyed it somewhat less than I (the passenger) did.

A bit confusingly, Midas Sehri, located in Yazılıkaya, Eskişehir, also has a monument called the Midas Monument, which was formerly known as the Tomb of King Midas.  It is located in the mountains, and we got to wade in the snow. 

Unfortunately, this is the best picture we have of the actual "tomb".  Ian really took this picture of me slipping in goat poop and landing in snow.  Better than the other way around, I guess.  The picture below was taken through the slats.

These badly eroded stairs once led down to a cistern.  The entire area is a sanctuary of Mata.

 Midas Seheri is also popularly reputed to be the tomb monument of King Midas, but it is, as I mentioned, of Hittite origin, so is much earlier in date.  The Hittites were around from about 1800 -1200 BC, while Midas was a Phrygian and lived around 850 BC.

Midas Seheri is accessed by driving into the village of Yazilikaya.  There is signage to get you into the village, but nothing to tell you where to go in the narrow winding lanes.  Nevertheless, the monument was obvious from a fair distance due to its position on a ridge above the village.  It was made even more visible by the scaffolding that surrounded it.  The scaffolding baffled any attempt to take pictures of, or understand the composition of the monument, but the site has a beautiful view of the valley below.  We found a set of stairs on the site that marked a spring sacred to the mother goddess Cybele.  This was appreciated more, as we did not know it was supposed to be there.

There were also what appeared to be habitations carved in the rock, and two square holes in the ground, which I hope were for storage, in spite of their resemblance to graves.

Yazilikaya	These carvings are Hellenistic and Roman -- much much later than the Hittite carvings.

Aslantash is a monument composed of two lions rearing over a centre niche that once housed a statue of Cybele.  The lions are carved in relief on a huge slab of a cliff face.  Only a few meters down the road was as similar lion monument, but an earthquake toppled it and the massive head of the lion now lies upside down beside the narrow road.  Margaret posed for the obligatory picture of “head in lions jaw” made possible by the monuments collapse. 

This is the famous Aslantas, where two lions protect a niche.  C.S. Lewis would love this!

By the time we finished viewing Aslantash it was late afternoon, so with a couple of hours drive left to get us to our hotel in Kutahaya, we left this region, although there were several more Hittite sites left to explore.  Well, actually, we did attempt to find one of the other sites, but our maps, GPS and Turkish road signage combined to defeat the effort.

As you can see in the picture of Midas Seheri, the region we were exploring today is fairly high up -snow drifts prevented us from exploring all of this particular site.  The scenery was absolutely gorgeous, with craggy ridges, flat and farmed valley bottoms and numerous small villages with friendly dogs, indifferent chickens, ironic turkeys and hostile geese, all running lose.  We are clearly here before the start of the tourist season.  On the road from the Midas tomb to Aslantash we saw very few cars.  We had the Midas tumulus and Midas City to ourselves for over two hours and there were only 4 other people ate each of the two Hittite sites.

We are staying at the Hilton Garden Inn in Kutahaya, which is luxurious compared to our Ankara hotel of last night.  They have Guest laundry, so tonight is laundry night – yay!

When we got to our hotel, we had a reservation for the car, but there were no spaces left.  This is where the parking attendant, who spoke no English, asked Ian to park.  Who cares if the guy can't insert picturesin the blog or do laundry if he can park between a column and a wall.  Don't try this at home!

We agree that the combination of history and natural beauty encompassed in and around the sites we visited today made this the best day of the trip, so far. 

Tomorrow we visit a Greek temple to Zeus and then leave the interior of Turkey for Pamukkale which is much closer to the Coast, with any luck, considerably warmer.