The devastating earthquake of February 2023 which destroyed half the city of Antioch, and led to a large exodus from the city (including the whole of the Jewish population of the city) has left many of the residents who stayed living in container cabins, like the following: So sadly the inaugural Antioch conference had to be held in nearby Iskenderun, because there were no hotels in Antioch available. Here are a couple of shots from the conference…. We did however... Read more
Without question, this dude stopped by here on the way to conquering the Persians and charging all the way to India! But there are not really any material remains to show for his visit. Some of the remains are from eras well before the Hellenistic era, but the coins are from that later period. In a world where the barter system was still in place, coins only really come to the fore in the Hellenistic and Roman period. The... Read more
The city of Gordion, which was the capital of the Phrygian region, was considerable and is the subject of an ongoing excavation. In ancient Anatolia, there were all sorts of regional small kingdoms, and then there were kingdoms which basically swallowed up these smaller kingdoms, or dominated them, like the Hittite kingdom (of which, much more in later posts). Here are some shots and sign posts from the ongoing dig. Notice on the map the numerous red mounds that are... Read more
West of Ankara, and on a major trade and military route was Gordion (and perhaps you already know the famous Gordion knot story about Alexander the Great who in about 333 B.C. was challenged to undo the Gordion knot, and instead of wrestling with it, he took out his sword and hacked the knot in too. Our exploration of Gordion however predates that legendary tale, and involves two major rulers of this realm– Gordias, and his son Meidas, whose name... Read more
There are lots of fascinating items in the Adana museum, like this perfectly preserved canteen which one has a handle for carrying, and guess what, though it looks it was made this year, it is from the 7th century B.C.! They knew how to make things that last back then. Or consider these drinking flagons…. Or how about these vases from the 5th century B.C.? Below is beautiful blown glass vials of various sight. Here are a couple of ornate... Read more
There are a nunber of excellent mosaic floor remains found in the Adana Museum mainly up on the top floor of this converted warehouse, including a floor from a synagogue which depicts the Isaianic scene of Isaiah’s vision of animal paradise and one about Noah’s ark and his animals. Here are some samples. I’ll let you guess which is from Isaiah and which is from Genesis. There is also considerable funerary art, including the so-called sarcophagus of Achilles, which is... Read more
Before this trip, I had never been to Adana, and so never to the considerable Adana museum. This city may ring a bell since we have an airbase there, Incerlik and that Turkey is a member of NATO. The holdings of the Adana museum are considerable, so multiple blog posts are in order, My one complaint is this museum should be air conditioned! It was brutally hot both outside and inside this museum, with the visitors dripping on the antiquities! ... Read more
There is a debate amongst Biblical scholars about which Ur Abraham came from— Ur of the Chaldees in Mesopotamia, or Urfa in Turkey. I am unconvinced that it is Urfa, but it is true that Urfa is not a long way from Haran, which Abraham certainly came through. Haran today is right on the Syrian border and remains a very small town, which once had a major Islamic University, in the late middle ages. More recently, it has had numerous... Read more
On the edge of the eastern part of the Empire, Roman emperors were still expanding or shoring up their territory, and one example is this splendid bridge over a major river, which until very recently was still taking regular car traffic. This bridge is on the edge of the Commagene kingdom (more about that in subsequent posts). Here’s the bridge…. Severus ruled from 193-211 A.D. Thus this is one of the last construction projects in the east, before the Empire... Read more
Tarsus today is a small town. The first time I visited it 20 years ago, it had a Christian school. Today that is a public school. There is a St. Paul Church in Tarsus, but it only dates to 1862. There is no historical evidence that Paul ever started a church here, and none of his letters suggest that he did. But there are some... Read more
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