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The writing on the walls

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There has been little international reporting on Istanbul this week. No news not good news. The assault on Turkey’s heritage is unrelenting. One report that did come out concerned the city’s famous Theodosian land walls, which we reported on last week. The article, by the New Yorker writer Elif Batuman, is sadly typical of a thousand other stories not aired outside Turkey.

‘Turning a corner, we came upon an intact stretch of bostans – lush, green rectangles spreading out to the horizon,’ writes Batuman in Istanbul's Troubled Gardens.

‘The bostans (market gardens) of Yedikule line the southern edge of the fifth-century walls that enclosed Byzantine Constantinople. The gardens may be as old as the walls. An edict in the Theodosian Code (422 A.D.) designates space in the walls’ towers for storing produce and farming implements; a sixth-century Byzantine text mentions the cultivation there of “a large variety of green salads, endive, carrots, onions, and cabbage”. To this day, the Yedikule bostans are known for their salad greens, particularly a special lettuce.’

The land walls have always exerted a fascination, and not merely because they go on for mile after mile – at this time of year it is the emerald-green beds of purslane that catch the eye in the warm evening sun. Against a backcloth of late Roman walls, the lovingly tended parterres, divided by orchards of mulberry and fig, are completely bewitching. The fact that the green is edible makes it even more intoxicating. This week the photographer Fritz von der Schulenburg visited Istanbul to lend his magic to Cornucopia's forthcoming Istanbul issue (out in October), The walls were his first port of call as we drove into town from the airport. Alas the first garden we parked by had been vandalised last week. Where the previous week there had been a carpet of freshly emerging parsley, there was now a scrubland of dust.

As Batuman explains, ‘Just over a week ago, bulldozers started burying the bostans – located in the rich, fertile soil of a former moat – under several feet of rubble. The rubble will then be covered by a layer of “low-quality soil” and turned into a ninety-thousand-square-metre park with cafés and an artificial river. (The style seems consistent with a nearby luxury housing development of recent construction.)’ Is worse to follow?

This photograph by Fritz von der Schulenburg shows the bostans outside the walls as they still look today. Every square foot in immaculate order, a paradise of organic gardening in the very heart of the largest metropolis in Europe. It is every modern town-planner's dream.

And this is what the Fatih Municipality want. A supermarket-style makeover. Not only will any sense of history have been eradicated inside the walls, but the gardens outside will levelled andpaved over. The city council is unaware that it is destroying a place of unique beauty, a way of life that has seen the city through 1600 years of turbulent history, and a site of incomparable archaelogical significance.

This is not the first assault on these ancient walls in recent times. Dreadfully hasty and misguided restoration by the mayor Berdrettin Dalan, involved copious tons of concrete. It was condemned by John Julius Norwich and others in Cornucopia 7 (1995). That kind of restoration is fortunately rarely seen today, yet historic Istanbul and a sense of genus locii is clearly anathema to our civic rulers.

Two factors lie behind the latest attack. For the 2020 Olympics, assuming Istanbul wins the vote of certain contract-hungry countries, vast giant swimming pool complexes are to be thrown up alongside the walls. And more pressingly, a large station is being built inside the walls at Yedikule to serve the Marmaray rail project, linking the Asian to the European shores of Istanbul. This utterly charming backwater is about to become highly desirable real estate. The speculators are in a frenzy.

But does an increase in real estate value necessitate the destruction of the historic fabric? Are London, Rome, Paris and the beautiful cities of Tuscany, Provence or Andalusia any poorer for retaining their sense of age? Istanbul is wonderfully old and mighty city. Must we be ashamed of its past and its wonderful produce?

Much has been learnt from Gezi Park. Conservations determined to establish a coherent resistance to the plans have been feverishly holding meetings and forums. The legality of the new project is clearly suspect – it goes against the council's stated policy, which promised to retain bostans, so a courtcase is likley. On Monday a petition will be handed in to the mayor of Fatih, the man responsible for guarding the heritage of Istanbul's historic peninsula, asking him to conserve the most historically important gardens in Europe.

It is too late to save them all – the damage inflicted by the bulldozers is irreversible – but at least the survivors should be saved. We wish the valiant protesters luck. May the gardeners of Yedikule continue to put their green fingers to good use. it is too early for the Yedikule lettuce, but lets hope they are still around in September.


The art of protest

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The Cornucopia Blog has been following the Gezi resistance from a cultural perspective, and we have shown examples of how the movement has added meaning and beauty to some of the art, music and writing being created in the city. Elsewhere on this blog I have posted information about which cultural events were affected by the protests and the perspectives of various cultural institutions in relation to this. However, the resistance has also inspired exhibitions dealing directly with the protests. Last week I visited two such events showing artists’ representations of some of the many powerful images that will undoubtedly be etched into Turkey’s collective consciousness for years to come.

Galatea Art’s Free Gezi/Özgür Gezi exhibition opened on July 2 and has been extended until July 26, showing works by 28 of Istanbul’s most renowned photographers. The Aesthetics of Resistance/ Direnişin Estetiği at Gallery Park Art in Kadıköy is in a different mood, with pieces by amateur and some more well-known artists using a variety of media. Originally scheduled for one month from July 5, this exhibition, too, has been extended, until August 31.

What struck me at the Free Gezi exhibition was the sheer intimacy of many of the photographs. Perhaps, having witnessed the protests myself and been involved in a few of the processions and forums, that sense of intimacy came from inside me. Whatever it was, the photos stirred up all the emotions I'd felt in the midst of the action. Some of the pictures are beautiful to look at (despite the subject matter), some are humorous and others distressing, but all capture the atmosphere of the resistance which started in Istanbul on May 31, pretty soon spread to many corners of the country and still doesn't seem to be letting go.

Timurtaş Onan, one of Istanbul's best-known photographers, continues his love affair with the city in these interesting times with his arresting image (above) of a man standing inside the Atatürk Cultural Center, arms spread, holding a Turkish flag and looking at the thousands gathered in Taksim Square in front of him. Of course nationalism, love for one’s country and standing up for what you believe in are all themes that spring to mind, but that solitary figure of a man – an almost mythical representation of Atatürk – on the other side of the protesters also reminds us that every individual counts. As does every tree.

Emin Özmen

Yasin Akgül

Veysel Çolak

As well as artworks, the Gezi resistance inspired many slogans, a few of which alluded to the unnecessary amounts of tear gas that police were diffusing onto protesters (or anyone else in their way). ‘Welcome to the Gas Festival’ was one such slogan, and the above photos by Emin Özmen, Yasin Akgül and Veysel Çolak certainly encapsulate what was meant by that. Çolak’s image is particularly salient and could easily be a still from a film about a nuclear apocalypse. After all, art does imitate life.

Other symbols of the resistance – the banging of pots and pans, for instance – were among favourite subjects, such as in the above photo by Sema Köseoğlu Karlıova.

 

Some photographers took a more humorous, lighter approach, as in the above series by Ahmet Hadrovic, showing more unlikely characters of the resistance – a man holding a rainbow pride flag and a couple’s wedding day interrupted by tear gas.

Whereas the Free Gezi exhibition brought back the emotions of my experience in the protests, The Aesthetics of Resistance reminded me of the community involvement and many acts of kindness spawned by the resistance. There is something almost 'art-classy' about this exhibition. The idea came from the protesters meeting at the Yoğurtçu Park forums, and volunteers helped determine how the exhibition would be set up. Over 3,000 submissions were received from amateur and better-known artists. A diversity of artistic styles is represented and all pieces have been freely donated. In addition, people attending the exhibition are encouraged to add their own comments on coloured sticky notes, making an already dynamic exhibition even livelier. All this adds to the feeling akin to walking around an exhibition of your classmates' views of a subject you have all studied and care about passionately.

The works of 62 artists were chosen for the exhibition, representing every type of medium from painting to photography, installation, digital art, illustration and sculpture. The artists chose to say their bit about the resistance in a myriad ways – whether through decorated gas masks as in the case of Ali Mirzaiee (above, top) or through a grand painting calling to mind great painters of the past, as in the case of Ağıt Uğur Uludağ (above, bottom).

Deniz Dokgöz

Zeycan Alkış

The works focus on a number of different aspects of the resistance. Deniz Dokgöz and Zeycan Alkış, for example, tackle it from an environmental perspective with their representations of trees and their deeper significance for communities. Alkış’s set of icon illustrations drawn together to portray a bigger picture is particularly effective.

Some artists approached the movement from a more political-social point of view. In his piece (above top), Kaan Bağcı uses graffiti to paint one of the prime symbols of the resistance – a tear gas can – which in this instance is being used for good rather than evil and is shown painting a symbol of peace. Ethem Bağırsakçı’s piece (above bottom) comments on the power of social media throughout the protests. While most of the local media failed to cover the events sufficiently – or even not at all (I’m looking at you, NTV) – people took to Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to get their messages across. One slogan of the resistance, ‘The revolution will not be televised, it will be tweeted’, is rather fitting to Bağırsakçı’s piece.

Humour, of course, also plays a part. There are a number of cartoons, such as the above offering from Yasin Halaç (above top) in which a mother goes to visit her son, who is policing Gezi Park. When he asks her what she is doing there, she tells him the governor has instructed people to take control of their children, so she has come to take him home. Selman Hoşgör’s series (above bottom) uses animals, looking rather absurd in gas masks, to drive home the point about the ridiculousness of the tear gas attacks.

If time permits, I strongly recommend visiting both exhibitions. Out of the rubble, away from the chaos, the exhibiting galleries provide the opportunity to learn about the movement, and to be inspired by it, in an open, calm and friendly environment.

Oh no

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You'd think sensitivity might be in order this holy month of Ramazan. A hint of compromise, a stepping back. But when interests are at stake, nothing, but nothing, matters in Istanbul.

Last month's ruling on Taksim's Gezi Park has been reversed. The bulldozers can roll in tomorrow, like the tanks in Prague in 1968.

Forget the lives lost, the young people blinded, the passions expressed in art and honest protest. Forget the money poured by the city council into the park to put things right. It was all for nothing.

Be warned. Reports in Zaman Today (English) and Hurriyet (Turkish) make depressing reading.

Up close and personal with Sinan Tuncay

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‘Just like the childhood fairy tales that haunt us our whole lives, the imaginary worlds [painted by] those discoloured films – based on the good guys versus the bad guys – stuck in my memory,’ says Sinan Tuncay of the Yeşilçam melodramas that dominated Turkish screens in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and which led Turkey into a golden age of cinema. It is precisely these melodramas that form the basis of Tuncay’s latest work, one of 18 displayed at Istanbul Modern Photography Gallery’s Close Quarters exhibition. The exhibition endeavours to trace the personal experiences and narratives of the exhibiting artists themselves, and it was interesting to meet up for a little virtual tête-à-tête with one whose work particularly resonates with my own nostalgic memories.

Tuncay's work (centre) at the Close Quarters exhibition

Close Quarters (which opened on May 9 and continues until October 27), allows the exhibiting artists to step from behind the camera and candidly reveal his or her own feelings, emotions and memories. Like a minutely kept diary, the lives of the artists and their close circles are materialised in photography, as well as other mediums which go beyond static visuals. The opportunity for Tuncay to be part of the exhibition came about quite organically. It was the photographer and academic Murat Germen who recommended him for the Close Quarters group show. Coincidentally, Tuncay was already working on his piece Mommy’s Not Home and the theme fitted with the exhibition’s overall idea surprisingly well. Tuncay spent a couple of months working on details with the curator Sena Cakirkaya, who gave him an opportunity to express himself completely – which, he says he found very exciting, especially for a young artist.

Mommy's Not Home – Jale

Mommy's Not Home – Sabiha

Mommy's Not Home – Belma

Tuncay’s work is a series of ten videos in which he shows how a child who watched Turkish melodramas (Yeşilçam) defined his own relationship and understanding of the figure of his own mother. The pastel-coloured stills (in which the woman’s clothes often match the wallpaper) recall the look of films of this genre perfectly. I remember watching similar soaps and films on cable in the 1960s and 1970s – melodramatic storylines that attempted to reflect the melodrama of growing up in Soviet Russia. The characters Tuncay portrays – the young innocent, the playful flirt, the conservative, the peasant worker, the saucy minx – I can relate to them all, whether from on-screen portrayals or real-life guests at the dinner parties my mum hosted.

Mommy's Not Home – Lale

Most of Tuncay’s works reflect his own personal experiences, so he would seem a perfect choice for Close Quarters. He has an obsession with indoor spaces, and with objects and their relations to humans. ‘As an artist who comes from a culture in which two-dimensional miniature drawings have a significant role in artistic tradition, I am highly influenced by their illustrative qualities, painstaking details and theatrical approaches,’ he says. But, in contrast, he usually builds three-dimensional small-scale dioramas that allow him to refer to ‘various psychological layers’. He often chooses to insert images of real people into his miniature environments to ‘compose more surprising spaces’.

Mommy's Not Home – Ayse

In terms of themes, he is very interested in gender issues and says that most of his previous works were unconsciously about them. ‘Interestingly, as a man who comes from a patriarchal society, I have tried many times to explore women’s identities in my work, but never attempted to ask questions about men. I’ve come to realise that the absence of men in my work was not by chance, but because male figures and masculinity have become great taboos for me to define and confront,’ he says.

Mommy's Not Home – Selma

Mommy’s Not Home encapsulates Tuncay’s main themes, both contextually and stylistically. The video installation is a tribute, in a way, to the generation who spent hours watching the Yeşilçam melodramas that were aired over and over again on daytime television in the 1990s. Watching these films every afternoon while his parents were at work was instrumental in shaping his perceptions of the outside world, and defined many concepts pertaining to identity and gender for him.

Mommy's Not Home – Kezban

The work aims to convey the fantasy of this boy who is trying to keep his own mother figure at home, just as is the case in the melodrama. This way, Tuncay comments on the position of women within the home and within society, and ‘alludes to the continuity of the family as an institution and its domination over women’. Through the female figure, 'The Yeşilçam melodramas reflected the Turkish modernisation process that began in the late 19th century and the perpetual tension caused by the desire for Westernisation,’ he says.

Mommy's Not Home – Leyla

The work uses detailed 1:10 models of the Yeşilçam film sets. ‘The common element in all of them is the staircase leading to an unknown destination – rather than a mere architectural form, it becomes a vehicle for the women’s unavoidable transformation,’ Tuncay tells me.

In order to emphasise his own personal experiences with the films, the videos are displayed using CRT monitors placed side by side, allowing the viewer to see the individual videos as an integrated whole.

But what of Tuncay’s personal experiences now that he is an adult? Despite currently being based in New York he still feels like he is living in Turkey, ‘at least, mentally’. The Gezi resistance movement has, for him, highlighted the strong sense of belonging that remains deep inside Turks whether they live in the country or abroad. ‘Like many people who live abroad,’ he told me ‘I don’t think that I can be away from Turkey for the rest of my life.’.But the idea of spending the next ten years in New York to develop his art is certainly appealing, and living between New York and Istanbul would be the ideal situation. 

The motivation for Tuncay to move to New York was his belief that the city is one of the most significant multicultural centres in the world – a city that ‘not only avoids the idea of right and wrong but also provides a much more objective approach… and makes you think that everything has a strong potential to become art’. The city’s photography and art scene in general opens up opportunities to see completely ‘different works and perspectives that can be viewed as invalid or even sinful in your own culture’. In New York, photography is mostly defined as lens-based art, Tuncay tells me, which he believes gives more freedom to artists. On the other hand, Turkey – and specifically Istanbul – has its own unique cultural dynamics and therefore a very high potential in contemporary arts. Unfortunately, Tuncay points out, many talented Turkish art photographers are still not well known internationally. However, he believes that things like the on-going massive civil movement will make Istanbul become a ‘crucial art centre in ten years’. With the help of programmes such as those run by the Istanbul Modern Photography Gallery, hopefully that time will come even sooner.

The Olympic flame

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Would the Olympic Games not be a wonderful thing for Turkish sport? Or would it just be a wonderful thing for the developers? 

What do Istanbulites themselves say?

According to many people we talk to, the answer is 'not on your nelly'. After the Gezi Park incidents, campaigners are now calling for the IOC not even to consider their city, and to remove it immediately from the list of candidate cities for the 2020 Olympics. The 'five' attacks on Gezi Park protesters 'between May 28 and June 15… terrified the whole city' and suffocated it 'under a mass of gas'. That would be a mere meze in the bunfight if the green light is given for a thousand highly controversial pet projects lined up for the Olympics. 

On June 21, the two human rights organisations Urban Movements Istanbul / HIC and People’s Houses set out some of the arguments in an article in the Habitat International Coalition website. 'If Istanbul becomes the host city,' they say, it is evident from the Gezi Park experience 'how any protest during the Games will be approached by the government. Even the smallest, the most minute, the most peaceful protest, demonstration or rally bears the potential of igniting an explosion.'

'The Gezi protests spread nationwide not because of the Gezi Park demolition alone,' they say, but because thousands were furious about projects that amount to 'urbanicide' and 'ecocide' and a much-feted 'urban transformation project' that has 'engendered demolitions' and 'forced evictions'. 'Four million trees on the Black Sea coast are being cut down to open space for the 3rd Bosphorus Bridge', and the environmental impacts of a plan to build a new canal from the Black Sea to the Sea of Marmara to bypass the Bosphorus 'might lead to a natural disaster not only for Istanbul and Turkey, but for neighbouring countries as well'.

The destruction of the historic market gardens along the ancient city walls mentioned in this blog is just one of the many projects that historians and environmentalists find so deeply saddening. The entire Golden Horn is also to be turned into a marina, and the historic districts of Fener and Balat along its banks bulldozed to make way for a fake old housing scheme worth billions – Ayvansaray has already been flattened. The raising of loans for Istanbul's third airport will also no doubt be facilitated by Olympic approval.

It would seem that what makes people really angry is the 'sudden top-down decision-making process of the present government'. Projects are being 'implemented without any consultation with the local communities'.

So sad, really. With sensitive handling, the Olympics should have been a complete win-win situation, a wonderful crowning of a beautiful city's return to the limelight, and a great unifyer and tonic, as they were in London last year. If things continue as they do, and if Istanbul does get the prize, many Istanbulites fear it will be its death knell.

'The ideals of Olympic Games rest on excellence, respect and friendship, with respect for development, peace and the environment… keeping Istanbul on the list of Olympic host-city applicants would be tantamount to pepper-gassing these ideals.'

Worth pondering? We will be assessing some of the projects in detail in future blogs.

New kid on the block

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Champagne corks will be popping in Clerkenwell. Last week, Arch Daily announced that the English architect Sir Nicholas Grimshaw has bagged Istanbul's most prestigous-ever museum project: the Vehbi Koç Foundation has selected the international architects Grimshaw to design their long-awaited contemporary art museum in Istanbul. Expected to open in 2016, it will occupy the once far-from-salubrious Dolapdere valley, below the back streets of Beyoğlu, an area better known until recently for its tripe soup shop and Roma quarters, it is the Fondation's latest attempt to develop Turkey's contemporary art world – something which they have been vigorously involved in since 2007. 

Using the mosaic tiled forms of traditional Ottoman architecture as inspiration for the design (shades of Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris which was completed in 1987), the shining new block will house the ever-growing Koç collection of modern art which the Foundation also began constituting in 2007. With its old(er) siblings, TANAS which opened in 2008 in Berlin and Arter which opened in 2010 in Istanbul (also in Beyoğlu), this new project will dwarf anything attempted so far and is indeed very exciting news for modern art – and artists – in Turkey. 

Photo: Grimshaw

Not so sacred gardens

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The Yedikule saga continues. Although there has hardly been a peep out of Turkish media this week, some international proponents are expressing their concerns – good, they need to be heard. I went to check out what has been happening to the Yedikule bostans since the construction trucks rolled in and the sight truly chocked me up. The smells emanating from the patches of fresh herbs, the farmer ladies collecting lettuces, the young men and teenagers selling the bostans’ goods all remind of their status as an agricultural treasure and their importance in the community. Now, placards showing the future development are proudly displayed with some green areas already replaced with piles of rubble.

‘Last month, at the peak of the standoff between demonstrators and the police over the fate of Gezi Park, the mayor of Istanbul, Kadir Topbas, assured a TV interviewer that the municipal authorities had already learned their lesson. Future urban development would only take place after wide consultation. “We won’t even change a bus stop without asking local people first,” he declared,’ writes Andrew Finkel in his latest Latitude blog.

Yes, it would be nice if the mayor consulted with people in the know. As has been said elsewhere on this blog, if only the council made informed decisions based on opinions of both academics and those responsible for the practical side of urban planning, then maybe things would be different. But, the mayor’s words turned out to be just ‘empty promises…Just a few days later Topbas warned that his words shouldn’t be taken too literally. The governing Justice and Development Party, or A.K.P., reserved the right to do what it pleased,’ continues Finkel.

As I walked around, construction workers asked me what I was doing there. ‘Just walking,’ I replied. They looked at me strangely, as if to say that there is nothing to see here. After reading Finkel’s blog, I realised there might be another explanation for their suspicious eyes. ‘The people who are being evicted from their land, along with about a hundred historians and activists, tried to arrange a protest just after the bulldozers appeared. But according to Gunhan Borekci, a historian at Sehir University, this may have only encouraged the municipality to speed up destruction. “I imagine they were afraid of a Gezi-style backlash,” he told me last week,’ Finkel writes.

Even though the council says that it wants to ‘convert the land into a park’, some groups and individuals are not convinced such as the newly formed Initiative for the Protection of Yedikule Vegetable Orchards. ‘Any new park, it argues, would be much richer if it encompassed the ancient gardens; these could be a laboratory of biodiversity for schoolchildren and an attraction for tourists,’ Finkel goes on to say.

And what about the question of archaeological preservation? Well, there have been reports that ‘the Istanbul branch of the Association of Archaeologists has warned that excavations within the historical Yedikule gardens are destroying the remains of Istanbul’s old town’. The Association’s report said the following: ‘This area lies in a protected strip of land walls that are on UNESCO’s World Heritage List and is also a part of the historical peninsula, which is protected. The excavations within the historical peninsula should be conducted under the guidance of the museum in accordance with the science of archaeology’.

As ‘various statutes require archaeologists to supervise construction on Istanbul’s peninsula, while others protect historical orchards and market gardens’, will the Archaeological Association or their report have any stead? ‘Even if they are right, there is always the danger, of course, that the municipality will dig first and suffer the legal consequences later. Getting a court to issue an injunction in favour of conservation is a race against time,’ argues Finkel. Wise words.

What a sad, sad state of events. Something that is such a sacred part of the city not only to today’s communities but to the last 1,600 years of the city’s history is facing extinction.  Maybe it is time UNESCO got properly involved.

The Galata Tower joins the provisionals

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Turkey's Ministry of Culture and Tourism proudly announced this week that another group of landmarks has been added to the UNESCO temporary World Heritage list. Most prominently – the Galata Tower, seen here in a photograph by Fritz von der Schulenburg for the next Cornucopia.

Originally built in 1348 to mark the uppermost corner of a walled city built by the Genoese colony (they called it Christea Turris, Tower of Christ) it was the tallest building in Constantinople until the late 1960s, the fad for dreary skyscrapers took over. Down the centuries the tower has had many usages, including acting as a lookout for city fires – unfortunately it was ravaged by fire a few times itself, notably in 1794 and 1831, and even lost its conical top at one point (restored between 1965 and 1967). More recently it has served as a sleazy gazino. It is, however, a good place to plan a tour of Istanbul, with the Old City, the Bosphorus and the Golden Horn spread out below you. And now it has picked up a little UNESCO recognition to celebrate its 665th birthday. 

Trading Posts and Fortifications on Genoese Trade Routes from the Mediterranean to the Black Sea is the theme of the latest additions to the UNESCO 'tentative list'. Among the other six 'provisionals' are the romantic ruins of Yoros Castle at the top of the Bosphorus. Take the boat to the village of Anadolu Kavağı and start walking. Nowhere better to clear the cobwebs before ending up in one of the village's many fish restaurants. Given to the Genoese colony in 1275, the fortress had, until this summer, a gorgeous view out to the Black Sea, across which the Geonoese once had a profitable business shipping Eurasian slaves down from the Crimea into the Mediterranean – when Renaissance princes stopped buying them, the Eyptians took over and used them to build the Mamluk empire. The downside was the fleas – and, with, them, the Black Death.

The view from Yoros is now to be marred by the insane new motorway bridge – it is a puzzle how UNESCO, who deleted Dresden from its World Heritage list for a much more modest affair, failed to comment on this new addition to the PM's bulging portfolio. We may suffer from cynicism on the Cornucopia Blog, but we cannot resist spotting another fly in the ointment. A UNESCO-listing in Turkey these days appears only to matter when you can boast about it. It does little to prevent listed sites actually being vandalised – only last month the mayor of Fatih's bulldozers charged into the 1500-year-old gardens of Yedikule ripping up the archaeologically-rich area surrounding the UNESCO-listed city walls. This was, as Alessanra Ricci, the Harvard Byzantine art historian, told us, 'in sharp contrast… to the Historic Peninsula Site Management Plan approved in 2011 by the greater Istanbul municipality and, of course by the Fatih municipality'. 'UNESCO demanded the city of Istanbul to urgently design a Site Management Plan for its cultural heritage in order to prevent the city from being inserted into the "endangered list".' Design away... (Turkish speakers should listen to the excellent Acık Radyo programme.)

There is also no doubt glee in the construction community. The Galata Tower was always in danger of doing the splits. It will make a nice little earner putting that right. As for Yoros, well, that is just the most fragile (and pointless) of rarities in Istanbul – a completely unreconstituted, unreconstructed, utterly romantic ruin with a breathtaking 360-degree view of forest, Bosphorus and Black Sea (albeit obscured by builders' dust) – but just think of the cute little Juliet balconies that will no doubt grace those hills one day.

Of course, this is not the fault of all the people who worked so hard to get the sites listed. To them we can only offer our unreserved congratulations and hope that they are able to get the funds to conserve them properly and scientifically. Ultimately we can only pray this kadir gecesi that a climate kinder to the heritage will once again prevail in Turkey. There are heroes out there – and goodness they know their stuff – but they need real encouragement and support, not just vague titles. UNESCO needs to start stamping its feet. Istanbul is endangered.

Photo: Wikimedia Commons


Just a few trees…

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… is how Turkey's rulers brush off criticism of plans to destroy the untouched Belgrade Forest. This amateur video (unfortunately the calm narration is without subtitles) illustrates both what an incredible area it is that the PM would like to destroy, and the scale of felling he has already ordered.

Bear in mind that a mere 20 minutes' drive away is a city with a population of over 17 million people desperately in need of greenery and fresh air. These are that city's lungs.

 

The video begins with a view over the threatened Black Sea village of Gümüşdere, home of some of the most fertile market gardens in Turkey. The population includes hundreds of Bulgarian Turks who fled oppression under Communism and have a passion for the land. They supply weekly markets across the city – incidentally also threatened with closure by municipalities.

The video ends up with the neat stacks of 'just a few trees'. Mile after mile. Nothing spared.

Rainfall is exceptionally high in this part of Istanbul province, as the clouds sweep off the Black Sea and brush against the low hills. A point well taken both by the Ottomans in the 15th century and by Istanbul's city fathers in the 20th. These forests were sacrosanct before the current regime came to absolute power. For them development is the be-all and end-all of politics – analysts blame the system of political patronage.

All in all, seven magnificent reservoirs were built and maintained in these forests by the Ottomans to collect rainwater, and they still supply the city with 25 million cubic metres of silky soft water. Some of the dams date back to Sinan's time – he spent more time and money struggling to build reliable aqueducts than mosques. The most recent dam is 18th-century, built at a time when historians like to talk about the decline of the Ottoman Empire. Ironically, given the Gezi Park protests, was linked directly to Taksim Square (literally water-distribution square). There are still lakeside walks to be enjoyed a short bus-ride from the city.

Looking at this film you begin to understand why the province's flora exceeds in variety the flora of the entire British Isles. But for how long? 

Meyhane madhouse

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'The demonstrators you are looking for are not answering, please try again later,' one Turkish tweeter wrote sardonically this evening in a message to the authorities. The police were out in force on Turkey's most famous street – but where were the protestors?

Saturday-night demonstrations have been a regular feature of Taksim Square this summer, but this weekend the Taksim Solidarity Platform announced on Twitter that there would be no demonstration tonight in response to requests from shopkeepers not to ruin their Saturday evening sales (a complaint that has figured prominently in the government's messages).

Fo some reason, though, the security forces were bristling for business, perhaps connected to the fact that a useful morning had been spent sealing off the fashionable Çukurcuma antiques district (can you imagine the impact on business if riot police started sealing off Portobello Road of a Saturday morning?) and rounding up the usual suspects (journalists, youth leaders etc, including the charismatic Turkish youth spokesman Cağdaş Cengiz).

Despite a wave of apparently bogus Facebook messages inviting Cengiz's young friends to gather at 9pm in Taksim, no one showed up – except, that is, to make merry in the cheerful meyhanes and ocakbaşıs of Beyoğlu.

Probably the most provocative thing these canny masters of passive resistance could do.

Protesters or no protesters, it was business as usual for the men in dark blue. In this stampede of strollers and tourists, note the poor woman tripped up by a charging office. It was clearly an accident, but when did it become normal in Turkey, one of the most civilised countries on earth, for a young officer to take a swipe at an innocent women on the ground?

And when did it become a crime to sit outside in a meyhane?

Güre beating to the sound of drums

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The areas of Edremit and Mt Ida (Kaz Dağı) in northwest Turkey are famous for their beaches, fountains (they got Homer’s seal of approval), game and especially flora (read Cornucopia 26 for an account by botanist Martyn Rix on the forests and alpine flowers that are unique to these parts). But this charming region – a village in Edremit called Güre, to be precise – is also getting a dose of rhythm this summer.

It was reported last week that the master of the ‘darbuka’ drum Mısırlı Ahmet (above) has brought his Rhythm Dance Camp to Güre for a two-week workshop (it started on July 27 and will end on August 12). Seventeen participants from Japan, Colombia, Azerbaijan, Russia, Germany, Belgium, Austria and Lebanon will get classes on rhythm, darbuka/deholla, the ney (a Middle Eastern flute), drama, Anatolian dance, Azeri dance, Latin dance, flamenco, Oriental dance and…yoga. Ahmet has spent time in Spain working with flamenco artists so that is the explanation for the deviation away from the rest of the styles but not sure what yoga is doing there. It is a wilderness camp after all so I guess it comes with the territory.

The darbuka drum, called the goblet drum in English, is a traditional Middle Eastern instrument dating back to 1100BC, and played under the arm or resting on the leg, with a much lighter touch and significantly different strokes (sometimes including rolls or quick rhythms articulated with the fingertips) than other hand drums, such as the bendir. Mısırlı Ahmet is a renowned as a virtuoso ‘darbuka’ player – he has lived in a desert-locked village in Cairo and been taught by the Egyptian masters. His belief in the ‘rediscovery of rhythm’ has propelled him to open the Galata Rhythm School in 2007 and every summer since then, he organises rhythm/art camps in different regions of Turkey.

Mongolians on the marches

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The Mongolian Military Band had a day trip to Hawick today to see where their cashmere ends up. With them came their splendid camp followers.

Among them were throat singers and acrobats – one immediately sprun on to the broad shoulders of William of Rule, ancestor of the Turnbull clan.

Seen here in front of the Cornucopia offices, the band is in Scotland as guests of the Edinburgh Tattoo, which ends on August 24. Cornucopia presented the band-master with a copy of one of our rarest issues, Cornucopia 37, featuring the Glories of Genghis, the lords of the steppes.

Photographs Julie Witford

Seeds of discontent

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Last Sunday, I was invited to do iftar (the evening breakfast during Ramazan) with a very special community. A symbolic solidarity event for the farmers of Gümüşdere was held in their village on the Black Sea (beyond Sarıyer, on the European side of the Bosphorus, at the very most northern point of Istanbul) on August 4. You see, the village’s agricultural livelihood is under threat. ISKI, the city’s water supply and sanitation administrator, plans to pass a water pipeline through the lands, something which Cihan Baysal, the spokesperson for the Istanbul Urban Movements group describes as ‘indirect land grabbing’.

ISKI plans to build yet another water treatment plant (there are already 33 in Istanbul) that could potentially wipe out the village. On my way there on the bus, I got a glimpse of the sweeping farmlands and the surrounding villages just on the periphery of the Belgrade Forest – that is also possibly facing extinction if the PM’s plan for a third airport eventuates – green lands where the air is cleaner and the smells are unique. Lands that should not only be preserved, but treasured.

  

A group of local farmers, their family and friends, the event’s organisers and environmental activists gathered in the village’s bahçeler (gardens) to enjoy a lovely vegetarian meal prepared using the village’s crops. The overflowing baskets of tomatoes and cucumbers are a reminder of just what the villagers stand to lose. The main meal, made from beans, tomatoes and other vegetables, was truly delicious. You cannot get produce like this just anywhere in the city. 

The ancestors of the current population were settled in the region during the 1920s, mostly coming from the Balkans and composed mainly of Muslims from Albania and Macedonians. More recently, Bulgarians, fleeing Communism, started arriving.

Agriculture has always been the major means of livelihood as the lands of the village are some of the most fertile in the country due to the large amount of rainfall in these parts. From the very beginning, selling their crops to surrounding villages was how the local population made a living. Today, an area encompassing 89,650 m2 of indoor greenhouses; 205, 277m2 of fields growing various vegetables, plants and flowers; and 13,069 different fruit trees meet the needs of not only the local community, but of the Sarıyer district in general. And, ISKI’s project will not only affect farmers. Manufacturers of dairy and meat products, landscapers, greengrocers who supply wholesalers – all these groups will be severely affected. These are not even the right words – their whole lives will more or less collapse if the farmlands are gone. As for the wild animals in the area (snakes, types of foxes, ferrets and turtles), well, these will be wiped out as well.

After the meal, a short prayer took place and after that, the event’s boisterous organiser (and Cihan’s sister-in-law) Beyhan Uzunçarşılı presented a PowerPoint presentation that outlined the riches of the village and summarised what exactly was under threat. The overall message was simple: Yok edelim mi? Koruyalım mı? (Should we get rid of it? Should we protect it?)

Another water plant...

The saddest thing is that all the locals want is to be consulted. They want the state’s bodies, such as ISKI, to ask them questions – to find out what they think, to find out how to proceed with these projects with everyone accounted for. But as we have seen and documented on the Cornucopia Blog in recent months, the government is desperate to press the construction button wherever possible without realising (or more like caring about) the repercussions. The third bridge, the project to build a third airport and more recently, the destruction of Yedikule's 1600-year old bostans (community vegetable gardens) which line the city’s ancient walls for a new development all have catastrophic environmental, social and economic consequences. Thankfully, the Turkish Chamber of Environmental Engineers has taken the airport project tender to court on grounds that it violates the existing legislation for the preparation of the environmental impact assessment report. And, the Yedikule Bostans group has been very active in campaigning for the preservation of the gardens.

After Beyhan’s presentation, she invited local farmers to speak. Although, unfortunately, my Turkish is still very bad and I couldn’t understand much in terms of the words being spoken, I understood exactly what was being communicated. One woman especially resonated with me. She came to Gümüşdere as a young bride 40–50 odd years ago from Macedonia and doesn't know anything else besides her life in the village. Her eyes were teary and her voice shook, and not only her emotion, but the emotion of the entire community regarding their land became clear.

The village women dancing

The evening wrapped up with dessert of baklava and cake. Children were running around and playing. People were drinking tea on large cushions placed on the fertile ground and chatting. The local farmer women danced and sung. I had a quick chat with Cihan Baysal whose Istanbul Urban Movements group is committed to stopping urban planning that might have negative environmental and other impacts – with the airport, bridge and the Yedikule bostans their major concerns at the moment. As Cihan told me, ‘Once it (gentrification) starts in one part of the city, others parts follow’. Wise words, but actions to stop this domino effect (as can be seen by groups such as Cihan’s and the Yedikule Bostans, and these events) should be taken as much as possible.

Oasis

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‘Everything about Nejla Yatkin’s newest dance is bold: It addresses challenging subject matter through movement that is daring in construction and assured in its execution,’ writes Sarah Halzack in the Washington Post.

Oasis was conceived and choreographed by the Berlin-trained Turkish-American dancer as a full-length multi-media dance theatre work for seven dancers. After performances in Peru in June, and at the Bates Dance Festival in Maine and New York’s Ailey Citigroup Theater in July, Yatkın’s NY2Dance group will be bring it to the Kennedy Center, Washington DC, on August 19 (buy tickets here), and Chicago in November.

The music for Oasis is by the legendary Iranian-American percussionist Shamou, who began his career with the Iranian National Ballet. Video design is by Patrick Lovejoy. The inspiration is ‘mystical realism in literature’. A cosmopolitan backcloth for work described as exploring ‘the beauty as well as complexity of memory, migration, transformation, identity and multiculturalism through movement’. Jennifer Dunning of the New York Times hailed her as ‘a magician, telling tales and creating worlds with understated images and movement’.

As one historian put it, Turkey abroad is often more interesting than Turkey at home. If the Gezi spirit is successfully snuffed out at home, this will probably be the story of the next chapter of Turkish culture.

Turning

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The Beshara School at Chisholme House in the Scottish Borders hosted its first International Rumi Festival last weekend (Aug 2–4)

The artists, musicians, performers and guests numbered well over 300. Yurts, geodesic domes, and a circular pavilion transformed the lawns of this beautiful Georgian estate into a fantastical encampment.

Hal Wynne-Jones brought his vast multi-bay wedding yurt as a venue for theatre and music. See Cornucopia 10, 1996, for an early article on Hal’s yurts which he now teaches other enthusiasts to construct.

Chisholme’s own twelve-post pavilion served as tea tent, and Cornucopia food writer Christopher Ryan, had his own Damascus Drum yurt, wildly decorated with rugs and textiles, where he served Turkish coffee, signed copies of The Story of the Damascus Drum and even slept in overnight.

Cornucopia was set up in the Books Tent, a splendid canvassed geodesic dome. How interesting it was to arrange books and magazines in a circular space, when we are so used to four walls.

In fact circles and circling emerged naturally as a theme for the Festival. There were domed clay ovens for cooking pide, built and attended to by Crimea Guide contributor Robin Thomson, Diane Cilento’s 1973 film Turning tracing the evolution of devotion from the mother goddesses of Çatalhöyük through to the Mevlevi sema.

Kudsi Erguner’s solo ney concert on the opening night reached sublime heights and depths and the final concert with Arthur Brown performing his iconic Fire took on fresh nuance, reminding us of Rumi’s fire of love and indeed the fire needed to open the ney reed before it can be played.

Bahar Aykaç from Gallery Park Art Istanbul presented paintings by Colin Looker, and Ismail Acar produced a back-drop of exquisite paper-cut veined leaves. Alan Williams spoke eloquently on his work translating Rumi’s Masnawi published by Penguin as Spiritual Verses and Muriel Maufroy described the writing of her love story Rumi's Daughter.

Thanks to the Beshara School for hosting this event, fully in the spirit of Rumi’s invitation: ‘Come, come, whoever you are...’


The caravan moves on

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The Beshara School at Chisholme House in the Scottish Borders hosted its first International Rumi Festival last weekend (Aug 2–4)

The artists, musicians, performers and guests numbered well over 300. Yurts, geodesic domes, and a circular pavilion transformed the lawns of this beautiful Georgian estate high in the Border hills into a fantastical encampment.

Hal Wynne-Jones brought his vast multi-bay wedding yurt as a venue for theatre and music. See Cornucopia 10, 1996, for an early article on Hal’s yurts which he now teaches other enthusiasts to construct. Chisholme’s own twelve-post pavilion served as tea tent, and Cornucopia food-writer Christopher Ryan had his own Damascus Drum yurt, wildly decorated with rugs and textiles, where he served Turkish coffee, signed copies of The Story of the Damascus Drum and even slept in overnight.

Cornucopia was set up in the Books Tent, a splendid canvassed geodesic dome. How interesting it was to arrange books and magazines in a circular space, when we are so used to four walls. In fact circles and circling emerged naturally as a theme for the Festival.

There were domed clay ovens for cooking pide, built and attended to by Crimea Guide-contributor Robin Thomson, and showings of Diane Cilento’s 1973 film Turning tracing the evolution of devotion from the mother goddesses of Çatalhöyük through to the Mevlevi sema.

Kudsi Erguner’s solo ney concert on the opening night reached sublime heights and depths and the final concert with Arthur Brown performing his iconic Fire took on fresh nuance, reminding us of Rumi’s fire of love and indeed the fire needed to open the ney reed before it can be played.

Bahar Aykaç from Gallery Park Art Istanbul presented paintings by Colin Looker, and Ismail Acar produced a back-drop of exquisite paper-cut veined leaves. Alan Williams spoke eloquently on his work translating Rumi’s Masnawi published by Penguin as Spiritual Verses and Muriel Maufroy described the writing of her love story Rumi's Daughter.

Thanks to the Beshara School for hosting this event, fully in the spirit of Rumi’s invitation: ‘Come, come, whoever you are...’

A Byzantine gentleman

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Thank you to one of our readers, Leyla Argun from Greece, who has sent in this colourful rendition of Thomas Whittemore, an American Byzantinist and Egyptologist who discovered important mosaics at Hagia Sophia and initiated a project to restore it in the early 1940s. 

Robert S Nelson's piece in Cornucopia 49 has more on the enigmatic Mr. Whittemore. 

Beguiling bostans

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At first it seemed it would be impossible to follow Chantel White's softly spoken words as she described the changing fortunes of Yedikule's bostans. Perfectly audible above the rustling leaves that muffled the distant traffic, she was hardly to blame. It was a good talk, not a wasted word – occasionally interspersed with intriguing background information from Aleks Sapov, who had initiated the movement to rescue the bostans a month ago. The distraction was simply the idyllic setting – I had to keep pinching myself to make sure I wasn't dreaming.

It was an unusually hot August day. Outside, the glare was oppressive, but not for us in the Hendek Bostan, the 'Moat Gardens', where we sat, invisible to the outside world, in the shade of a giant fig tree draped with generous swags of vine as if in a 17th-century tapestry.

The Yedikule School of Historical Gardens, newly established last month by Aleks Sapov and his heroic friends, had issued an open invitation through the grapevine, and some 30 of us turned up in the hush of this secret bower outside the Yedikule Gate in Istanbul's fifth-century land walls. This garden was, as Aleks, a Harvard historian of Ottoman agricultural practices, explained, one of two hendek (moat) gardens named in early 18th-century archives (the other was a little closer to the Sea of Marmara).  

Seats were miraculously conjured from crates and planks as more and more of us turned up. On one side, through the trailing vines, we caught glimpses of ancient masonry rising above a carpet of emerald-green purslane in courses of stone and Byzantine brick. On the other, an immaculate grid of newly raked seedbeds stretched across to a main road. Skirting them, a path behind us led to a massive well, which plunged almost 20 metres to an underground river. It was these Ottoman wells, apparently established in the 17th century, when Bayrampaşa was appointed mayor and cultivating his famous globe artichokes, that allowed Ottoman gardeners to grow water-loving vegetables where their Byzantine predecessors had concentrated on more drought-resistant plants.

Our host, bostancı Ahmet, whose family have gardened here for three generations, was there. His eviction will be a near certainty if Istanbul 'wins' the 2020 Olympics – there are ghastly plans for this part of historic Istanbul, swimming stadiums and the like. He recalled the glory days of the Yedikule marul (cos lettuce), which grew waist-high and could weigh 7 or 8 kilos a piece. It was so so succulent – he mimicked the succulence flowing down his cheeks. 'People came from far away just to picnic on them.'

Suna Kafadar (on the left), one of the growing number of friends united in a mission to save the gardens, interpreted for non-English speakers and helped to field questions with Aleks (right) afterwards. Victoria Khroundina will discuss Chantel's observations in detail in another blog.

Historically, the gardens of Yedikule are completely fascinating. For 1600 years, through times of war and famine, the city's population has depended on them. But on Wednesday evening it dawned on me that they are not of merely academic interest.

These gardens are actually downright beautiful. It is a beauty that grows on you the more you get to know them – down to the radishes floating, Monet-like, in the shady pool of the Kilise Bostan inside the Belgrade Gate (also under threat). Here we retreated after our tour of the municipality's 'improvements' – a vast swathe inside the walls that has already been levelled with landfill-rubble, putting the precious fertile soil out of reach once and for all; expensive topsoil will now have to be brought in in order to grow anything at all.

If you are in Istanbul over the next few months, do make sure you visit Yedikule – before it is too late. The extensive surviving gardens, in my opinion, are up there with Ayasofya, and the Topkapı, as one of Istanbul's greatest attractions, and I am hoping that the new school will make it easier for the uninitiated to explore. These gardens combine finesse with logic, the lush with the orderly, charm with pragmatism. Watching an old chap nimbly raking out one perfect square after another, like some ancient mathematician – each box with its outline of raised soil a few centimetres high to contain the water – made me realise that these gardens really are one of Turkey's national treasures.

Only a dunderhead could destroy them, as Istanbul's woefully undereducated administrators apparently intend to do. Such an act would be the equivalent of the mayor of Paris using the Mona Lisa as a skateboard. 'What does a monkey with a hat on do? It bobs about, and bobs about, until it falls off,' goes the old Turkish saying. They seem simply to be unaware, and frankly unworthy, of the city in their care.

But gardeners are gentle people. And so are their defenders. You hear them being interviewed on Açık Radyo. They don't curse and rant – though they have every right to. They simply communicate a winning combination of irreproachable logic and affection. And they are so, so, so much in the right that you cannot help feeling they must win the day.

In a field of mint, Chantel showed us a very special round-leafed variety that she had found only a day after her arrival. It is known to have been growing here for at least 50 years, and has evolved its own unique flavour. Will this, too, become a memory? The field is marked down for the new recreational gardens carpark. But, as Chantel is keen to stress, it is not simply the plants that are important. More vital and irreplaceable is the 'lifeway', the huge reserve of horticultural knowledge linking us to the past that will die out when the gardens are wiped out.

After the talk we walked through a nightmare area bulldozed and levelled last month. It illustrated the opposite of the amazing cooling micro-climate the gardeners had created in our shady bower. Their loss will be a terrible curse on Istanbul, and those responsible will be cursed for generations to come. They should know this.

Why is it all happening? Ostensibly to build an artifical hobi garden and playground. If that is the case, then the Fatih municipality should consider transforming somewhere that needs to be transformed, and preserve this paradise. One particularly distinguished guest on Wednesday had shown the way, triumphing over man-made hell by turning a major motorway intersection into the city's one and only botanical garden.

Of course, a recreational garden is not the real aim. There is another, more typical, goal. The municipality intendes to build yet more ugly concrete blocks of flats here, as can be seen on the latest plans they have produced, which were spread out for us before we left. The first line of five-storey blocks is marked in orange in this picture, but that of course will only be the thin edge of the wedge. Once planning permission is issued, anything can happen – they promised five storeys in the historic centre of Bursa, and cheerfully built a forest of 23-storey blocks which now completely screen the city's most famous landmark, the Yeşil Türbe. There is naturally no mention of this plan on the billboard in the street.

As we were saying our goodbyes, Aleks pointed to a cloud of storks spiralling above the old fortress of Yedikule in readiness for their August migration. Now, the pessimists among us would see the sight as a warning that one day we will all have to turn our backs on this city. For the optimists it was a reminder that every season passes, eventually.

A date for the calendar: On September 8, the Patriarch visits the bostans to give them his annual blessing. He needs to be reminded not to be lured into the trap being laid for him by the developers, who are dying to help him build over these precious gardens. The Virgin Mary, whose birthday it is, will be watching!

And a special request from Aleks and his friends. Experts from all walks are welcome to add their thoughts and opinions. A geologist would be particularly welcome.

Casting an expert eye on the Yedikule bostans

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Cornucopia’s editor John Scott gave his keen observations of last Wednesday’s archaeobotany workshop at Yedikule bostans (gardens) with Dr Chantel White in yesterday’s blog. Today I will take you through Chantel’s own observations.

Aleksandar Sopov introduces Chantel White

A bit of background: the School of Historical Yedikule Gardens organised this special archaeobotany (the study of human-plant interactions of the past) workshop, conducted by Chantel White, an American archaebotanist and postdoctoral research associate at the University of Notre Dame. The very active Yedikule Bostanları group, led by Aleksandar Sopov invited Chantel to Istanbul to conduct an assessment of the area around the Yedikule bostans (gardens) and to produce a report which can hopefully be used to dissuade developers from destroying them. Chantel and Aleks spent the days before the workshop talking to the Yedikule gardeners, identifying and learning about the plants grown there, and finding out about recent changes that have taken place in the gardens (including documenting the many crop types lost over the past 50 years).

Chantel specialises in the study of agriculture and the origins of domesticated plants, generally focusing her research on archaeological sites ranging from 2,000 to 10,000 years old.  Because a large amount of information gets lost over time, Chantel tells me, ‘We are left with just a tiny piece of a much larger archaeological puzzle.' Archaeobotanists rarely hold the key to solving the whole puzzle. After all, ‘They cannot speak directly with ancient farmers and gardeners about the plants they were growing, or about how these plants were used or cooked for food.’ What archaeobotanists can do, Chantel says, is ‘search for preserved bits of plants in the soil of archaeological sites in order to provide an interpretation of past human activities'. 

The Yedikule situation is unique in that archaeobotanists actually do have the opportunity to speak with living gardeners – one of whom, Ahmet, was present at the workshop – and this is what Chantel finds ‘most fascinating and heartbreaking’ about it. ‘Here we have the opportunity to speak with gardeners directly about their crops and to learn about cultivation methods, yet these ways of life are disappearing before our eyes,’ she says. Many generations of gardening families have lived in this area, between them cultivating hundreds of years of experience, including specific knowledge of growing plants along the Yedikule city walls. And this is important, as the crops that are still being cultivated here today can provide extremely valuable information about the past.

Chantel gives us some background on the scientific side of things. The most common way to recover plant remains from archaeological sites, she says, is to extract their ancient remnants from the soil, and then study the tiny fragments of seeds, wood and plant cells under the microscope. Reference books (such as the Flora of Turkey) and region-specific reference collections are also used to help identify plants. When Chantel visits an archaeological site she takes with her a small library of seed specimens to help identify any archaeological seeds she might find and create a new reference collection for the region.

Though the discovery of a single seed will be of little significance, when hundreds or thousands are recovered from an archaeological site, then past human-plant interactions can be reconstructed. Clues about the natural environment and the diet of the local community of the past become apparent. Was the site near a river, open grasslands or a forest? Which plants were used for eating and which for other purposes, such as building materials? Most importantly, a picture of that past community’s daily life can be reconstructed. ‘For example, if we see large amounts of barley or wheat at the site, we can begin to think about an annual cycle of farming activities… If we saw large amounts of barley or wheat, we could begin to think about sowing seeds, weeding fields, harvesting grain, and threshing and processing the grain. We could also think about the pounding, grinding and cooking of the grain for daily meals. In this way, archaeobotany can help us reconstruct the lives of ancient people. The seeds are a direct link to past human activities,’ says Chantel.

Aleks and Chantel at the city walls

On her visit to Yedikule, however, Chantel has been concentrating on living plants rather than ancient seeds. She talks of the historical records that provide ‘exciting information about the long history of gardens within and around the city walls’, such as a document from the 10th century, the Geoponika, which details the gardening calendar for Istanbul. Many garden crops are still recognised today, such as rocket (roka), leek (pırasa), onion (soğan), beet (pancar), dill (dereotu) and red radish (kırmızı turp). Aleks has also discovered a 17th-century Ottoman document that provides the name and location of one of the Yedikule gardens, the Israelpaşa – a large terraced garden located along the city walls.

Workshop attendees being shown some of the crops

In Chantel's and Aleks's interviews with the local gardeners, they were interested in learning why some crops have stopped growing in the past 50 years. Chantel outlines four reasons: 1. Some crops are now produced more cheaply elsewhere, outside the city, so it is no longer lucrative to grow them. 2. Because the gardens have been forcibly downsized by road-building and other construction projects, there is no longer room for crops requiring a lot of space, such as cauliflower. 3. The air quality has deteriorated and pollution has increased in the area, with the result that some crops will no longer grow, or fail to produce viable seeds to store for next year’s crop. 4. There is a changing Istanbul population: gardeners once produced the black radish (kara turp), a vegetable favoured by older generations; as they died out, so did the black radish. Another crop, the endive (hindibaba), a bitter leaf vegetable, was favoured by the Greek population, but since they have left the city over the past decades, gardeners have stopped growing it.

But although the botanical composition of the gardens has changed somewhat over the past 50 years, many great crops are still being cultivated. And what is interesting, Chantel tells us, is that they are being cultivated in ‘very specialised ways’. For example, the purslane (semizotu) beds are carefully spaced and designed for irrigation, and the technology of building soil birms to channel water allows the gardeners to produce multiple purslane crops each year. ‘It is clear that this specialised knowledge will disappear as the gardens disappear, and we will lose important information about how the unique environment of the garden walls and lower moat area were successfully cultivated for centuries. An important part of the city’s history will be lost. It’s the city gardens – urban agriculture – that have sustained the residents of Istanbul during times of famine and food scarcity for at least 1000 years. The Yedikule gardens are some of the last urban garden spaces surviving in the city,’ Chantel says.

‘The loss of these gardens would be a terrible loss for archaeobotany as well,’ Chantel adds. Some unique varieties found in the Yedikule gardens have already been lost, such as the Yedikule lettuce (Yedikule marul). Ahmet, who comes from three generations of Yedikule gardeners, remembers it well. He has memories of the lettuce plants growing a metre high – ‘huge plants that were extremely oily and juicy’. Unfortunately this variety has been lost for good. ‘But even the crop weeds here tell a tale,’ Chantel says. The little purple flowering plant, Malva sp., mallow (ebegümeci), was, according to the Geoponika, cultivated in the gardens of Istanbul as a leafy green vegetable. Now it is just concentrated in one small area and is already a ‘potential reminder of the crops that once grew in these city gardens’.

Other unique well-known varieties live on – but for how long? One is the particularly fragrant, broad-leaved mint (nane), which grows in the Greek Orthodox church garden and has the added advantage of preserving well. ‘The same mint plants have been reproducing in the fields for most of the past century – if not longer – without any introduction of non-local seeds. We can think of this mint field as a unique location of mint production with a long history of cultivation within the church garden. What a shame to lose this field to a parking lot!’ Chantel’s words could not be more true.

For Chantel’s entire presentation, click below to hear the recording done by İlksen Mavituna on the day (in English with Suna Kafadar translating for Turkish speakers).

 

The seaside beckons

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In August, when a blanket of heat covers most of western Turkey, many businesses close and everyone is eager to find some reprieve from the oppressive weather. Undoubtedly the best place for that is the seaside. Even though I have lived in Turkey for over six months, I have still not travelled outside Istanbul. The arrival of visitors in August presented an opportunity to leave the city for a few days, and I happily took it.  

Our first stop was Butterfly Valley (above), a cove accessible only by a half-hour boat ride from Ölüdeniz, the well-known resort near Fethiye. As it has only become a tourist destination in the past 20 or so years, the cove is relatively unspoilt, and its lush green landscape and turquoise waters are certainly impressive. The valley is located at the foot of Babadağ Mountain and its modern name – Kelebek Vadisi in Turkish – comes from the butterfly species which resided in the valley for thousands of years. Unfortunately, as the visitors to the valley increased, the 60 different butterfly species grew more and more scarce. I did spot a couple of really pretty ones, including a rather large black beauty, smaller bright red ones and one particularly elegant flyer coloured navy blue and white. Interestingly, there is no information on any of the species at the site. Referring to Butterflies of Turkey later, I determined that the blue and white one might have been a Silver-studded Blue. 

Besides a small, pebbled beach, there is also a rather underwhelming waterfall some 20 minutes' walk inland. A steep climb over large, slippery rocks takes you right up to the top and allows for a refreshing shower after the walk in the heat. The landscape changes, everything grows quieter and cooler, and it is really quite pretty – at least it was until a rock fell and shattered, showering fragments that scraped my friend’s shoulder. With the landscape suddenly looking distinctly hostile, we came down.

Butterfly Valley is set up like an old hippy commune with a scattering of tents and bungalows providing accommodation, two makeshift bars and a kitchen/dining area where a buffet breakfast and dinner are served for guests. Roosters wake you every morning, and there is a plethora of interesting insect species. The music blaring from the bar is a mixture of old classics, jazz croons and reggae. Everything certainly looks the part, but there is something that doesn’t quite add up to the feeling of a relaxed, anything-goes vibe. We had been told not to expect electricity or internet access, but when we arrived the receptionist was busy on Facebook and a row of plugs could be seen on the table charging everybody’s iPhones. Maybe 10 or 20 years ago there were relaxed hippies here, but now things seem different. Still, the place is gorgeous – that is undeniable.  

Kaş, on the most southerly tip of Turkey’s western Mediterranean coast (about an hour and a half from Fethiye) was a much more attractive stopover. Once a pretty fishing village, the dramatic setting at the foot of a mountain range is stunningly beautiful. There is something almost violent about it, especially in the early evening, when the sea is turbulent and the dimmed sun casts an ethereal glow on the mountains and the water. The lowland areas are planted with flowers in dizzying arrays of pink and magenta. The hillsides produce honey and almonds, and there are pine forests at high altitudes.

Kaş, like many other Turkish coastal towns, has a rich history. It was founded by the Lycians, and the presence of one of the richest Lycian necropolises demonstrated its importance as a member of the Lycian League. Later the ancient Greeks gave it the name Antiphéllos or Antíphilos, as it was the harbour in front of the city of Phellos. During the Roman period it was famous for exporting sponges and timber. After AD395 it became part of the Byzantine Empire and during the early Middle Ages it was a bishop's see. Constantly threatened by Arab raids, it eventually came under the Seljuk sultanate of Rum (who called it Andifli). After the demise of the Seljuks came the Ottomans.

In 1923, as part of the post-war exchange of populations between Greece and Turkey, the majority of the population, which was of Greek origin, left Kaş for their homeland. Abandoned Greek houses still pepper the villages, with their clichéd, but still lovely, blue and white façades. Remnants of a Hellenistic theatre and pensions with names such as Elena’s Villa written in a style reminiscent of the Greek alphabet remind us of the town’s history. 

Today, Kaş is strictly for relaxing and exploring nearby ancient Lycian cities. There are some quiet beaches, a lovely square in the centre featuring small Lycian tombs, and a several good restaurants. Bahçe Balık serves excellent, super-fresh seafood and mezes, while Türkmen Sofrası is great for kebabs and a satisfying home-cooked meal. 

We took a boat trip to some pretty nearby coves for a swim. One of our stops was the nearby Kekova, a small island that – maybe because of its beauty and its location – was fought over by the Italians, who occupied nearby Castelorizo, and the Turks in the early 20th century (it eventually went to Turkey in 1935). On the northern side of the island are the partly sunken ancient ruins of Dolchiste/Dolikisthe, destroyed by an earthquake in the 2nd century. Although it was rebuilt and flourished during Byzantine times, the Arab threat meant that it was eventually abandoned. The Kekova region was declared a Specially Protected Area in 1990 to protect its ‘natural, cultural and geographic richness’.

We could only admire the so-called Sunken City from the boat, for according to the declaration mentioned above it is strictly forbidden to swim in the surrounding waters – although oddly enough special permission can be obtained for canoeing and diving.

Staircases leading down into the sea, empty door-frames, the remains of walls and clear water through which you can make out the shadows of ruins six metres below the surface, are impressive but also somehow leave you with a sense of foreboding.

The village of Kaleköy (ancient Simena) opposite was our next stop. Accessible only by boat, its beauty and charm hit you as you approach. Floating restaurants adorned with brightly coloured flowers, terracotta-roofed houses, stone dwellings and a quaint little harbour paint a most picturesque scene. A well-preserved castle built by the Knights of Rhodes partially upon Lycian foundations dominates the top of the village. To quote Terry Richardson's travel guide to the Turquoise Coast published in the Telegraph: ‘Heading west around the coast towards Kas is the tiny, atmospheric village of Kaleköyü, sitting beneath Simena Crusader castle and looking out over turquoise waters to rocky, uninhabited Kekova Island. Peeping out from a riot of carob, palm, walnut, fig and banana trees, the village is a mere smattering of old Greek houses, three of which are simple pensions.’ 

It is a five-minute climb up there, past villagers selling jewellery, textiles and fresh herbs, the scents of which penetrate your nasal passages enough to persuade you to buy them – the oregano (kekik) is larger in these parts, and the aroma of the mint (nane) is sweeter). Inside the castle, apparently, is the smallest Lycian amphitheatre, but we didn’t have time to see it as the boat only stopped for 20 minutes.

At the eastern end of the village Lycian tombs stand along a rugged coastline, surrounded by ancient olive trees. The scenery here speaks for itself.

Photos: Daniel Salinas Conejeros

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