Little Gidding and Gospel Harmonies

I keep a separate blog for family and friends who might have an interest in our little UK adventures, but I decided that my posts on our recent drive around the countryside have enough to do with the general biblical studies / academic nature of this blog to justify including them here. This is the first installment:

Unless you come on pilgrimage "to kneel where prayer has been valid," following the "broken king" Charles I or drawn by the famous lines in T. S. Eliot's poem, there is not much to see or do in Little Gidding beyond inspecting the tiny church, parts of which may go back to the building that was standing when Charles visited in the 1640's (see the links here and here).

I didn't notice a pig-sty, but in other respects T. S. Eliot's description of Little Gidding can't be matched:


If you came this way,
Taking the route you would be likely to take
From the place you would be likely to come from,
...
It would be the same at the end of the journey,
If you came at night like a broken king,
If you came by day not knowing what you came for,
It would be the same, when you leave the rough road
And turn behind the pig-sty to the dull façade
And the tombstone. And what you thought you came for
Is only a shell, a husk of meaning
From which the purpose breaks only when it is fulfilled
If at all. Either you had no purpose
Or the purpose is beyond the end you figured
And is altered in fulfilment. There are other places
Which also are the world's end, ...
But this is the nearest, in place and time,
Now and in England.

If you came this way,
Taking any route, starting from anywhere,
At any time or at any season,
It would always be the same: you would have to put off
Sense and notion. You are not here to verify,
Instruct yourself, or inform curiosity
Or carry report. You are here to kneel
Where prayer has been valid.
- From T. S. Eliot's "Little Gidding"

To be honest, we came to inform curiosity not to kneel, but out of respect for those who were already there when we barged in, I didn't get many pictures of the inside of the church:

The "Four Quartets," of which "Little Gidding" is the final part, has long been one of my favourite poems, and it was neat to be able to pick up a copy and skim through "Little Gidding" on location. Perhaps I will find that "the purpose is beyond the end [I] figured, and is altered in fulfilment."

At any rate, I am also fascinated by the story of the religious community that drew King Charles to Little Gidding in the first place.

The property was purchased in 1625 by Mary Ferrar, the widow of one of the founding members of the Virginia Company, and her son Nicholas. They were joined by her other son John, her daughter Susanna, and their extended families. Nicholas was ordained as a deacon by the future Archbishop Laud in 1626 and soon established a devotional routine based on the Book of Common Prayer that included daily services for the whole family--matins at 6:30 a.m., the litany at 10 a.m. and evensong at 4 p.m.--as well as hourly prayers and a night vigil with readings from the Gospels and Psalms. According to the Little Gidding Church website,

"To instruct the younger members of the extended family in the gospel story and to develop their manual dexterity, Nicholas devised a Harmony of the four gospels. This Harmony provided the narrative for the hourly gospel readings. To create it, individual lines were cut from the four gospel narratives and pasted together on the page to make one continuous text. The pages were also illustrated with engravings, some of which Nicholas may have brought back from his continental travels many years earlier. When King Charles heard of the Harmony’s existence, he sent to borrow it, returning it only when the family agreed to make another for him."

I like telling my students this story to show that studying a synopsis of the Gospels--with parallel passages laid side-by-side--can be a devotional practice.

The best information we located about Little Gidding is in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography entries on Little Gidding, Nicholas Ferrar, and John Ferrar. Less authoritative, but free alternatives may be found here, here and here.

Our next destination, via back roads and rolling hills, was Bedford.

The Turkey Travel Bug

I've noticed a pattern developing over the last few years: By the time April comes around and courses are done for the year, leaving a mountain of marking in their wake, I come down with the travel bug.

Two years ago, we responded by taking a two-week trip to Turkey with our friends D&D. The trip fulfilled one of my long-standing dreams, and the resulting Turkey Travelogue jump-started this blog. Next year I will be going with a team from Briercrest on a tour of Israel. This spring--when I conceived this post--I found myself dreaming about returning to Turkey and the Middle East for a more extensive, more rugged, Greco-Roman/Early Christian archaeological extravaganza.

One can, of course, go on a guided tour. These handle a lot of the logistical details and minimize down-time between sites. Assuming you like the itinerary, they take you where you want to go. But they are expensive, they tend to restrict the amount of time you can spend at any given site, and most tours "In the footsteps of Saint Paul"--including this one that looks decent--don't actually follow Paul's itinerary through what is now Eastern Turkey. Instead, they focus on the popular sites along the Aegean that we visited, plus a dip down to Antalya on the Mediterranean. (These two tour options look more promising.)

If you are fortunate enough to travel with someone who knows how to get around in Turkey (as we were), you can do a trip on your own time for a lot less money, replacing the guide with a guidebook or two, such as the excellent Blue Guide, or one more focused on early Christianity such as Every Pilgrim's Guide to the Journeys of the Apostles or A Guide to Biblical Sites in Greece and Turkey. (I haven't seen the latter two.) For those interested in hiking, there is actually a 500km St. Paul Trail that follows parts of Paul's first missionary journey, and another 509km hiking trail that ends near ancient Perga in Pamphylia (modern day Antalya). The only down-side to this option is that you are limited by public transport, and end up spending many hours waiting for bus connections to major centers.

A more efficient alternative would be to rent a vehicle (and probably hire a Turkish driver). My dream itinerary would follow Paul's travels fairly closely, with stops at other ancient Greco-Roman sites, some of which are more valuable for understanding the ancient context of early Christianity. Since I'm dreaming, I'll include ancient Damascus and Antioch in Syria, as well as sites in Lebanon.

My dream tour would include a small group of people who share my enthusiasm for ancient ruins...and a good source of funding.

Want to come along?

(Pre)Views of Israel and Palestine

Since I am organizing a study tour of Israel for next year, I was delighted by Dr. Michael Pahl's wonderful collection of pictures and comments from his recent trip. Michael visited many of the same sites we will be seeing at almost the same time of year, so his posts make a great preview.

Bruce Fisk's May and June posts on Crossings offer a very different perspective on life in the land--one that we will unfortunately have little opportunity to observe because our itinerary is almost entirely restricted to Israel. Bruce and his daughter spent the first part of their summer in the West Bank city of Nablus volunteering with Project Hope. I trust the sudden silence on the blog after the tear gas episode is because they returned safely to the States, not because they are mouldering in a Middle Eastern prison somewhere.

Latest favourite blog

Over the past several months, the "blog" I have watched with the greatest anticipation and read even when I should be preparing for class is by Jeremy Kroeker, a former high school class mate of mine, who set out on a motorcycle trip from Germany to Iran in October. He eventually made it to Iran (without the motorcycle). After wandering through Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and Israel--all places I would love to visit in the middle of a Saskatchewan winter--Jeremy is now planning a return trip through North Africa. As well as being a motorcyclist, Jeremy is an exceptional photographer, and a fine (and funny!) writer. Here's a sampling:

I survived the Intifada and all I got was this lousy t-shirt

Secret police, camel meat, and unrelated photos (from Iran)

Riding with Hisbullah (from Lebanon)

Jeremy's book, Motorcycle Therapy, is also very good.

Turkey Travelogue - The End.

Five months, 40+ blog posts, and more hours than I care to admit later, I am finally finished the Turkey Travelogue. As I worked on this series, I kept thinking of the saying I read on a t-shirt in Topkapi Palace--"it's not the hours you put in, it's what you put into the hours." I tried to convince myself that what I was learning made it all worthwhile. At any rate, it is done. Here is the final "Index":

Turkey Travelogue 1 (June 4-5) - Culture Shock

Turkey Travelogue 2 (June 6) - To Bergama

Turkey Travelogue 3a (June 7) - Bergama/Pergamum
Turkey Travelogue 3b - Pergamum's Acropolis
Turkey Travelogue 3c - Locating "Satan's Throne" (Rev 2:13)
Update: More on Satan's Throne
Turkey Travelogue 3d - Why are there trees on ancient cultic sites?
Turkey Travelogue 4 - Kuşadasi (June 7-10)

Turkey Travelogue Maps - From Istanbul to Bergama, to Kusadasi

Turkey Travelogue 5a - Classical Views of Ephesus (June 8)
Turkey Travelogue 5b - St. Paul's Ephesus (ca. 55-57 CE)
Turkey Travelogue 5c - The Road Less Traveled in Ephesus
Turkey Travelogue 5d - The Harbour of Ephesus
Turkey Travelogue 5e - The Great Artemis of the Ephesians
Turkey Travelogue 5f - Sacrifice in the Greco-Roman World
Turkey Travelogue 5g - Selçuk Archaeological Museum
Turkey Travelogue 5h - St. John's Basilica

Turkey Travelogue - Regaining Momentum

Turkey Travelogue 6a - Paul the Traveler (June 9)
Turkey Travelogue 6b - From Ephesus to Miletus
Turkey Travelogue 6c - Priene
Update: Ephesus, Miletus, and the Ancient Aegean Coastline
Turkey Travelogue 6d - Didyma

Turkey Travelogue 7a - Pamukkale (June 10)
Turkey Travelogue 7b - Hierapolis Highlights

Turkey Travelogue 8a - Aphrodisias, but not Laodicea or Colossae (June 11)
Turkey Travelogue 8b - Aphrodisias: Under Construction
Turkey Travelogue 8c - Finding Our Way in Aphrodisias
Turkey Travelogue 8d - Public Life in Ancient Aphrodisias

Turkey Travelogue 9a - On to Cappadocia
Turkey Travelogue 9b - Göreme Open-Air Museum (June 12)
Turkey Travelogue 10a - Hiking the Cappadocian Valleys 1 (June 13)
Turkey Travelogue 10b - Hiking the Cappadocian Valleys 2
Turkey Travelogue 10c - Hiking the Cappadocian Valleys 3

Turkey Travelogue 11a - Istanbul, Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia (June 14)
Turkey Travelogue 11b - A Few More Hagia Sophia Pictures
Turkey Travelogue 11c - What does Istanbul have to do with Jerusalem?
Turkey Travelogue 11d - The Siloam Inscription
Turkey Travelogue 11e - Temple Warning Inscription, etc.
Turkey Travelogue 11f - The Instanbul Archaeological Museum (Cont'd)

Turkey Travelogue 12 - Herod the Great in Topkapi Palace (June 15)

Turkey Travelogue 13 - Welcome to Saskatchewan . . . (June 16)

Every good thing ends with a bibliography (main printed sources):

The Lonely Planet Guide - Pat Yale, Jean-Bernard Carillet, Virginia Maxwell, Miriam Raphael, Turkey (9th ed.; Lonely Planet, 2005).

The Blue Guide - Bernard Mc Donagh, Turkey (Blue Guide; 3rd ed.; London: A&C Black, 2001).

ABD - David Noel Freedman, ed., The Anchor Bible Dictionary (6 vols.; New York: Doubleday, 1992).

OCD - Simon Hornblower and Antony Spawforth, eds., The Oxford Classical Dictionary (3rd ed.; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003).

Turkey Travelogue 13 - Welcome to Saskatchewan . . . (June 16)

After we were finished with Topkapi Palace and a nap in nearby Gülhane Park, we wandered toward the Spice Bazaar in search of food and souvenirs. Eventually satisfied with both, we made the long trek uphill back to the Apricot hotel, where we enjoyed a final evening listening to mosques from around the city competing with the Blue Mosque for the evening call to prayer.
(The evening would have been more enjoyable if I hadn't insisted on a late evening walk in search of "pide," the one Turkish food I hadn't sampled on our trip.)

At 3 a.m. the next morning we were waiting at the door of the hotel for an airport shuttle. 29 hours later it was 11 p.m. (on the same day), and we were descending an elevator at the Regina International Airport. Above the customs booths I noticed this ominous message:

Welcome to Saskatchewan . . .

"What does the ellipsis mean?" I wondered.

Turkey Travelogue 12 - Herod the Great in Topkapi Palace (June 15)

Click here for the Turkey Travelogue Index.
We reserved a final day in Istanbul to see more of the city. First on our list was Topkapi palace, home to the Ottoman sultans from 1453 until 1839. The guide books play to their reader's Orientalist assumptions, highlighting all that was exotic and extravagant in Ottoman rule. The palace, they say, is a tourist must see. Evidently the tourists believe them, because the site was overrun. For the record, the guidebooks have a point--especially if you admire intricate tile decorations:

I didn't take a lot of pictures as there were not many Greco-Roman antiquities to be seen, but as we wandered through the royal Harem, which was restored to look like it did in the 17th century, I couldn't help being struck by similarities to court life under king Herod the Great. I overheard a guide commenting that the Ottoman's ruled from between their belly and their knees. Only too happy to illustrate, the guidebooks tell of "Selim the Sot, who drowned in the bath after drinking too much champagne" (Lonely Guide), of Sultan Murat III (1574-95) who sired 326 children, of younger princes who spent their lives in the Harem "where nothing was denied them but their freedom", and of one such prince, Crazy Ibrahim, who was raised in the Harem by powerful women and eunuchs, and eventually elevated to the throne. Crazy Ibrahim, so the story goes, drowned all 280 of his concubines in response to a "slight to his honour" (Blue Guide).

Book 17 of Josephus's Jewish Antiquities, which I was reading at the time, tells of the court intrigue among Herod the Great's rather extensive family. (He had 10 wives.) Given to jealousy and paranoia, Herod murdered his beloved wife Mariamme. He eventually executed her two sons, Alexander and Aristobulus, along with another son, Antipater. Shortly before his own death, Herod had the leading men of Judaea imprisoned in the hippodrome, and instructed his sister Salome to have them executed when he died so that "he would...have a grand funeral such as no other king had ever had, and there would be mourning throughout the entire nation, which would be lamenting from its very soul instead of mocking and ridiculing him" (Ant. 17.177). Fortunately, his sister didn't follow his instructions.
I was also impressed by the royal kitchens, where "cooks prepared food for more than 4000 people each day" (Blue Guide). Western visitors at the Sultan's court were impressed too, when they were invited to banquets where 40 different kinds of meat were served.

Stunning. Extravagant...And apparently typical, though you won't find this in the guide books: t. pointed out that what I reacted to was actually typical of the contemporary ruling courts of Europe. The Ottoman's were different in that they were more successful in their opulence. Unlike their Western European counterparts, they also believed in bathing regularly. (It helps to have an early modernist as your traveling companion.)
Just outside the Harem is the Tower of Justice, which adjoins the Ministry of Truth:

Turkey Travelogue 11f - The Istanbul Archaeological Museum (Cont'd)

The museum complex also has a large collection of treasures from the Ancient Near East. I took pictures of a few highlights.

These are reliefs from the Ishtar gate in Babylon, which was constructed by Nebuchadnezzar II in 575 BC and excavated between 1902-1914 (according to Wikipedia):


Other reliefs from the same gate are apparently scattered in museums around the world including Detroit, Sweden and the Louvre.

According to the write-up beside this picture, this "winged genie" was taken from the northwest palace of King Assurnasirhpal II (ca. 883-859 B.C.):
And this is Shalmaneser II (858-824 BC), king of Assyria:
(In case you are wondering, the Shalmaneser mentioned in 2 Kings 17:3 and 18:9 is Shalmaneser V who ruled between 727-722 BC.)

The tile museum is housed in a building constructed in 1472. Lots of pretty things here. This looks like one of t's home-made Christmas decorations:
Wall decorations:

Click here for the Turkey Travelogue Index.

Turkey Travelogue 11e - Temple Warning Inscription, etc.

Another treasure just down the hall from the Siloam inscription is the "Balustrade" or "Temple Warning" inscription:
According to Josephus and the Mishnah, signs were posted in Greek and Latin along the boundary separating the court of the Gentiles from the Jerusalem Temple sanctuary, warning Gentiles not to enter on pain of death. The complete Greek inscription (pictured above) was discovered in 1871 and is--you guessed it--on display in the Istanbul Archaeological Museum. A second fragmentary Greek inscription, discovered in 1935, is now in the Israel Museum in Jerusalem. Here's another photo of the inscription (taken with a flash):
The warning reads as follows: "No foreigner is to enter within the forecourt and the balustrade around the sanctuary. Whoever is caught will have himself to blame for his subsequent death" (ABD 2.963; a transcription of the Greek text may be found here).

Evidently, the warning was taken seriously:

27 When the seven days were almost completed, the Jews from Asia, who had seen him in the temple, stirred up the whole crowd. They seized him, 28 shouting, "Fellow Israelites, help! This is the man who is teaching everyone everywhere against our people, our law, and this place; more than that, he has actually brought Greeks into the temple and has defiled this holy place." 29 For they had previously seen Trophimus the Ephesian with him in the city, and they supposed that Paul had brought him into the temple. 30 Then all the city was aroused, and the people rushed together. They seized Paul and dragged him out of the temple, and immediately the doors were shut. (Acts 21:27-30; NRSV)

The warning was taken seriously, no doubt, but Shaye Cohen has pointed out how difficult it would be to enforce, since he argues most Jews were indistinguishable from Gentiles in the first century. (See Cohen's excellent book, The Beginnings of Jewishness, for the details.)

I also took a picture of this Greek inscription because I thought I might use it at some point to illustrate the development of Greek writing styles over the centuries (for other Turkey Travelogue inscriptions see here and here):
The inscription commemorates the rebuilding of the land walls around Constantinople in 1433. It's a nice inscription. Too bad the walls didn't last. Just 20 years later, the city fell to the Ottoman turks.

Click here for the Turkey Travelogue Index.

Turkey Travelogue 11d - The Siloam Inscription

Note: I will keep adding to the bottom of this post links to the ongoing saga of Israel's request for the return of the Siloam inscription.

Sometimes, it is more exciting not to read the guide books before visiting a site--or at least that's the excuse I make for not doing my research in advance. This time, however, the guide books would not have prepared me for what we stumbled upon as we made our way through the exhibits on the tomb-like third floor of the Istanbul Archaeological Museum. Neither the Blue Guide nor the Lonely Planet Guide, nor the brochure we picked up at the front gate mention what in Israel would be considered a national treasure--the Siloam inscription: The Siloam inscription was discovered in 1880 by a youth who was wading up from the pool of Siloam in Jerusalem toward the Gihon spring. The six line inscription is in the Paleo-Hebrew script and dated to the 8th century BCE. It describes how two construction crews, working from opposite ends, dug a tunnel through 500 meters of bedrock to channel water from the Gihon spring into the city of David. The inscription is famous not only because it is one of the oldest Paleo-Hebrew inscriptions ever discovered and because it describes an ancient engineering marvel, but also because of its connection to 2 Kings 20:20:

The rest of the deeds of Hezekiah, all his power, how he made the pool and the conduit and brought water into the city, are they not written in the Book of the Annals of the Kings of Judah?

According to R.B. Coote in the Anchor Bible Dictionary, "It is the nearly unanimous view of historians that the Siloam tunnel is Hezekiah's conduit, and that the inscription in it was written shortly before 701 B.C.E." The conduit is also mentioned in 2 Chr 32:30; Isa 22:11 and Sir 48:17. Isaiah's perspective is a salutary reminder: "You made a reservoir between the two walls for the water of the old pool. But you did not look to him who did it, or have regard for him who planned it long ago."

Here's the text of the inscription (following Coote's translation):

1 [ ] the tunneling, and this was how the tunneling was completed: as [the stonecutters wielded] 2 their picks, each crew toward the other, and while there were still three cubits to g[o], the voices of the men calling 3 each other [could be hear]d, since there was an increase (in sound) on the right [and lef]t. The day the 4 breach was made, the stonecutters hacked toward each other, pick against pick, and the water 5 flowed from the source to the pool [twel]ve hundred cubits, even though the 6 height of the rock above the heads of the stonecutte[rs] was a hundred cubits! (Click here for a transcription of the original Hebrew text.)

As Jerusalem was still under the control of the Ottoman empire at the time, the inscription was moved to Constantinople (now Istanbul) around 1890 and added to the collection of the Istanbul Archaeological Museum, which opened in 1891.

The inscription is behind a protective covering, but unlike the statue of Artemis at the Selçuk Archaeological Museum, where no-flash signs are prominently displayed, the nearest museum guard was happy to let me photograph the inscription however I liked.
I hoped the guard was bemused rather than offended at my delight in photographing a non-Turkish artifact.

Obviously, we remarked as we walked away, Israel would like to have the inscription back. But it seemed hopeless. If you have to go to Berlin to see the great altar of Pergamum or to the Ephesus Museum in Vienna to see many of the artifacts from Ephesus, what hope does Israel have of acquiring the Siloam inscription? Everyone wants their own antiquities returned to the country where they were excavated, but beginning the process would set a dangerous precedent, because it would mean that the country requesting the antiquities would have to consider returning the antiquities in their possession that originate in other countries. In the case of popular exhibits, they would also run the risk of losing revenue--though that doesn't seem to be an issue in Istanbul.

My ears perked up this summer when I heard that Israel has been negotiating with Turkey for the return of the Siloam inscription. Various media reports made it sound as though negotiations are moving ahead. Back in September, in fact, Jim Davila noted a Washington Times article that announced a deal had been reached. Since I have heard nothing further since then, Todd Bolen's response--"Don't believe it"--seems correct. Negotiations to return the inscription have been underway for the last 20 years.

The saga continues:

• The Nov 15, 2007 edition of the Turkish newspaper, Today's Zaman, reports on Shimon Perez's request for the temporary loan of the inscription (HT: Jim Davila).
  

Click here for the Turkey Travelogue Index.

Turkey Travelogue 11c - What does Istanbul have to do with Jerusalem?

From the Aya Sofya, we wandered downhill in the general direction of the Istanbul Archaeological Museum, hoping to find some cheap eats along the way. We eventually gave up, fortified ourselves with the remaining snacks in our backpacks, and ventured into the main museum building. Hungry and exhausted as we were from the previous night's journey, we still managed to stay until the staff asked us to leave.

The prize display in the museum is a collection of magnificent sarcophagi "excavated" from Sidon by the great Ottoman archaeologist and tomb raider, Osman Hamdi Bey. (I note that Hamdi Bey was by all accounts a model archaeologist of the 19th century variety, and that Sidon was part of the Ottoman empire at the time; his Western European contemporaries had the unfortunate habit of retrieving artifacts from outside their respective empires.) There are some excellent pictures of the Sidon sarcophagi, as well as artifacts in the rest of the museum here. Update (28 June 2009): There is a nice article about the "Alexander" sarcophagus here.

The bear (?) in this picture is part of a hunting scene on one of the less prominent sarcophagi:
Though there was still too much for us to absorb in one visit, large sections of the main building were undergoing needed renovations. This was a relief in a way, because it put limits on my compulsion to see everything. Still, I took a few pictures of items that seemed more relevant to my research interests. This is a fine statue of the emperor Hadrian:

And here's a bust of the emperor Tiberius:I was disappointed not to see signs that they were installing air-conditioners. Even with open windows the air was hot, humid and stuffy--especially on the third floor, where we noticed several displays related to Syria-Palestine...

Click here for the Turkey Travelogue Index.

Turkey Travelogue 11b - A few more Hagia Sophia pictures

When the Aya Sofya was transformed into a mosque after the Ottoman conquest in 1453, most of its wall decorations were plastered over and replaced by geometric patterns. (Thankfully, the building itself was not destroyed.) Several of the Byzantine mosaics have been restored since its conversion into a museum. The "wise men" on either side of this 12th century madonna and child are the emperor "John II Commenus (1118-43) and his wife Eirene." John, it seems, was a good emperor (Blue Guide):
We know this mosaic was completed in the 11th century because it depicts the Empress Zoe and her third husband, Constantine IX who reigned between 1042-55 CE:
The mosaic was actually completed earlier during the lifetime of Zoe's first husband. It underwent repeated head upgrades when she remarried (in dubious circumstances).

Finally, this is a beautiful 13th century mosaic of the "Deisis"--Christ at the judgement with Mary petitioning for the world's salvation on his right, and John the Baptist on his left:

Click here for the Turkey Travelogue Index.

Briercrest Israel Tour 2009

Plans are going ahead for a two-week tour of Israel in May 2009. The tour will be open to current students as well as alumni. I get to go along.

(A little) more information is posted on the tour's blog here: http://briercrestisraeltour.blogspot.com/




...As I am responsible to promote the trip, I hope people catch on that I can be very excited about something, and still end my sentences in periods.

Turkey Travelogue 11a - Istanbul, Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia (June 14)

Back in Istanbul after a grueling overnight trip from Göreme, I had every intention of trying to find a cheaper place to stay. But when our shuttle finally let us off in Sultan Ahmet, we made a bee-line back to the Apricot Hotel, and with a little negotiation, secured a room for the same rate in time to enjoy their wonderful Turkish breakfast on the rooftop terrace. After a nap to deal with our 'bus lag' we stumbled out to see the sights.

We had already visited the magnificent Blue Mosque (built 1606-1611) on our first evening in town...
...Now it was time to visit its rival, the Hagia Sophia (or Aya Sofya in Turkish), built a thousand years earlier during the reign of the emperor Justinian in 537 AD:
The Lonely Planet guide opines that the "wham-bam effect" of the Blue Mosque's exterior surpasses the Aya Sofya, but that the latter has the goods when it comes to interior design. This judgement is up for debate (I agreed; t. preferred the Blue Mosque's interior too), but even with the scaffolding, the soaring dome is a stunning achievement:

Click here for the Turkey Travelogue Index.

Turkey Travelogue 10c - Hiking the Cappadocian Valleys 3

We took few pictures on the remainder of our hike because, apart from a nice lunch break, we were concentrating on moving our increasingly tired feet, and finding a way out without retracing our steps.
Near the head of Meskendir Valley we found a road that went more-or-less straight up...
We ended up on the plateau way above Göreme and well behind the Open-Air Museum:Six hours after beginning our trek, we arrived back in Göreme hot, sweaty, and more than a little tired. Since we had already moved out of our room, and chances of a shower before our overnight bus ride back to Istanbul were slim, we decided to cool off in one of Göreme's many empty restaurants. What followed was one of the most unusual of our encounters in Turkey: I attempted to order ice cream from a waiter who knew as much English as I knew Turkish. We eventually concluded that whatever the menu might say, there was no ice cream to be had, and settled down to our tea and Turkish coffee as we watched the waiter wander across the street. A few minutes later he returned, bowl full of ice cream in hand! Evidently, service is a big thing in Turkey.

Click here for the Turkey Travelogue Index.

Turkey Travelogue 10b - Hiking the Cappadocian Valleys 2

The views on our hike were spectacular, we encountered very few people, and, as a bonus, I got my own little multi-storey cave-climbing adventure. It all started with a rickety wooden ladder:Despite my fear of heights...
and a slight discomfort with narrow enclosed spaces (are there snakes in Cappadocia?),
this was one experience I couldn't pass up.
There's a white 7$ Superstore hat in each of the following pictures (click to enlarge):
I made it as far as the leftmost dovecote (circled in red):

Click here for the Turkey Travelogue Index.

Turkey Travelogue 10a - Hiking the Cappadocian Valleys 1 (June 13)

A visit to one of Cappadocia's underground cities is standard tourist fare. The Lonely Planet Guide affirms a visit "should be a top priority." For reasons no one can quite fathom, the people of Cappadocia constructed dozens of underground cave cities, only a few of which have been excavated so far. The most popular city, Derinkuyu, originally extended 18-20 floors under the earth and could accommodate around 20,000 people. D. told us before we went to Turkey that the explanation you receive depends on the guide you hire. According to the Blue Guide,

During the holiday months [Derinkuyu's] low, narrow, cramped passageways are filled with sweating tourists pushing and shoving in a desperate attempt to reach yet another rock-cut room or, more often, to escape to the surface and fresh air.

Knowing we would be embarking on another all night bus trip back to Istanbul that evening and more than a little cowed by the Blue Guide's description, t. and I decided to forgo the "must-see" experience and take it easy hiking in the valleys around Göreme. We set out along the road to the open-air museum, and took a turn down "Swords" valley...

I presume these are some of the "swords":

Click here for the Turkey Travelogue Index.