Siirt is a city and province in Southeast Turkey where legend and fact are mingled in the colorful story of its past. According to a legend told about the founding of the city, a local lord had a beautiful daughter whom he had decided to give in marriage to someone from another clan. The girl […]
A member of a noble family on his mother’s side, Strabo was born in 64 or 63 BC in the city of Amaseia (now called Amasya) capital of Pontus, a region in northeastern Anatolia that was an independent kingdom from the 4th century BC until overcome by Pompey in 66 BC. Pontus became a province […]
Life An Athenian, the son of Gryllus, Xenophon was born about 444 BC. In his early life, he was a pupil of Socrates; but the turning point in his career came when he decided to serve in the Greek contingent raised by Cyrus against Artaxerxes in 401. Xenophon himself mentions the circumstances of which he […]
As you approach Sereflikochisar southeast of Ankara, glinting light to the west tells you that the Tuz Golu (Lake Salt) is approaching. The intense whiteness and sparkle of the salt crystals look deceptively like snow and ice. Even when you reach the edge, you still brace yourself for a freezing sensation as you take off […]
Milas lies on the lower slopes of Mount Sodra, from whose quarries came to the marble which adorns so many ancient cities in southwest Turkey. This region between the Buyuk Menderes (the ancient Meander) and the Dalaman rivers was controlled by the Carians. They were succeeded by the Persians, Macedonians, and Seleucids before becoming part […]
On the beautiful photogenic peaks of the Turkish Black Sea, at Kackar Mountains or Ayder, heliskiing has been a great alternative activity for more than 10 years now. WHAT The idea is simple. The helicopter takes the skiers up to the peak like taxi and till the evening, you will be able to explore some […]
Paul was a 1st century Jew who, after being the bitterest enemy of the Christian Church, became its leading missionary and possibly its greatest theologian. His letters, the earliest extant Christian documents, antedate the Gospels of the New Testament. More than half of the Acts of the Apostles deals with his career, and this, together […]
It was Cevat Sakir Karaagacli, known as the Fisherman of Halicarnassus, who introduced Bodrum to Turkey and the world. Born in 1886 in Istanbul, Cevat Sakir worked as a journalist in his hometown during World War 1 and was sentenced to internal exile in Bodrum for a story that he wrote. Exiled to Bodrum, of […]
We do not exactly know the date of his birth, but we presume it to be between 1465-1470. Piri Reis was born at Gelibolu or Gallipoli as the Anglo-American world calls it, a lovely coastal town on the Marmara Sea, which was then used as a naval base. He was named Muhiddin Piri. His father […]
Silk, the yarns, and textiles made with filaments of the cocoons of several species of moth (especially the Bombyx mori, which feeds on white mulberry leaves and was cultivated in ancient China). Silk cloths from the Far East reached the Mediterranean already in Roman times, and raw silk and silk yarns imported from China, Central […]
