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<< Text Pages >> Allianoi - Ancient Village or Settlement in Turkey

Submitted by davidmorgan on Saturday, 04 September 2010  Page Views: 6567

Site WatchSite Name: Allianoi
Country: Turkey
NOTE: This site is 25.988 km away from the location you searched for.
Type: Ancient Village or Settlement
Nearest Town: Bergama
Latitude: 39.233101N  Longitude: 27.306132E
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
 Destroyed Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
 no data Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
 4 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
 4

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Ancient Settlement in Turkey. A Roman spa town mostly dating from the 2nd century CE. There is some evidence that it was also used in Hellenistic times.

Note: Roman spa town in Turkey under threat from dam. Environment minister claims it doesn't exist! See comment.
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"Allianoi" | Login/Create an Account | 3 News and Comments
  
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Turkish officials bury ancient city of Allianoi under sand by davidmorgan on Wednesday, 02 February 2011
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The ancient city of Allianoi, near Turkey’s Aegean coast, has been completely covered with sand in preparation for building a dam in the area, despite protests from activists and archaeologists.

Though officials say covering the Roman-era spa settlement with sand is the only way to protect the ruins while they are submerged under the waters of the new dam, experts disagree with that assessment.

“The method is obsolete and it will destroy, rather than protect, the ancient site,” İlker Ertuğrul, a member of the Istanbul Chamber of Architects, told the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review on Monday.

The decision to bury Allianoi was made in August by a local natural and cultural assets preservation board in the Aegean province of İzmir’s Bergama district; it is still pending the outcome of a court challenge by the Allianoi Initiative Group, or AGG.

“Not only is this approach wrong, but it has also been applied in an unlawful way,” Ertuğrul said, adding that officials should have waited for the court’s decision before covering the site with sand.

“[Authorities] could have at least sped up the court proceedings for this decision, which greatly concerns the public,” Necmi Karul, the chair of the Istanbul branch of the Archaeologists’ Association, told the Daily News on Monday.

The Allianoi site will be submerged underwater after the Yortanlı dam is built. Unlike many other dams in Turkey, which are constructed in order to generate energy, the Yortanlı dam will supply water to agricultural settlements in the region.

“The [archaeological] excavations were stopped after it was first announced the site would be covered by sand, while construction work on the dam continued,” Karul said. He added that this indicates authorities did not believe covering the ancient city with sand would protect it from the water.

“Ten thousand square meters [of a historical site] have been covered with sand,” Karul said, adding that such a bad approach had not been used anywhere else in the world.

Civil society organizations, led by the AGG, have long argued that covering the ancient site with sand before submerging it is not a viable method of protection. According to Ertuğrul, the physical, geological and geographical conditions of the region make the approach particularly unsuitable to Allianoi.

“Water in this region has temperatures over 40 degrees, which will cause chemical reactions and destroy the walls, mosaics [and other parts] of the ancient site,” he said, adding that the site was not made only of stone, and that other materials, such as metals, could be oxidized and destroyed by water that penetrates through the sand to the ancient site.

“Water does not penetrate only from above, it can get in from the surrounding soil underneath or beside the ancient site,” Karul said.

Some villages in the Anatolian province of Elazığ that were similarly covered by water with the construction of the Keban dam in 1965-75 became intermingled with each other as the water caused the soil to shift, Karul added.

Ertuğrul said academic studies and research have indicated alternative methods of providing water for agricultural use in the region; experts will discuss them Dec. 25 at a panel.

“Allianoi is waiting silently out there, but we will not wait. Our [struggle] will continue with the same speed,” said İffet Diler, a spokesperson for the AGG, adding that the group will continue organizing awareness-raising activities and protests. The organization expects a court in İzmir to rule on whether or not the method used to protect the site was lawful.

Though it may be too late for Allianoi, a court ruling against the method used there could help battles in other regions, Karul said. “Many responsibilities fall to both people and public authorities, especially the Culture Ministry,” he s

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Re: Ancient city does not actually exist, says Turkish minister by Anonymous on Sunday, 19 September 2010
Allianoi does not fit to the current government's ideology of political islam. For them it is a pagan site and it would make then only happy when that site is deleted. Similar to the Buddha statues in Afghanistan destroyed by the Taliban.
Regarding the dam, it is not used to generate electricity, but simply to provide water to the land. It is an old, out-dated project started in the late 1970s. It is bad for the environment (a lot of water will vaporize from this lake without being used), the dam cannot be removed when it is not efficient anymore (after 1 generation), and only a few healthy land owners will profit from it (who, in turn, are expected to give a lot of money&support to the current AKP government). If farming is not possible, do it somewhere else (there are plenty of locations) instead of destroying history and nature for selfish purposes.
By the way, minister Eroglu should lead a local Koran school instead of doing his current job that is way over his simple standards.
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Ancient city does not actually exist, says Turkish minister by davidmorgan on Saturday, 04 September 2010
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From coldrum:

Controversy over plans to bury an ancient city in western Turkey with sand ahead of a new dam project was overshadowed Wednesday by revelations from Turkey’s environment minister that the site did not, in fact, exist.

“There is no such place as Allianoi. It is just a hot spring that was recently restored called ‘Paşa Ilıcası,’” said Minister Veysel Eroğlu in response to a reporter’s question about the controversial plans to bury the ancient city, which is located near Bergama in the Aegean province of İzmir.

Eroğlu’s belief in the site’s non-existence, however, has been challenged by archaeologists and the Culture and Tourism Ministry, which describes Allianoi on its website as an ancient site that was noted for its health center.

“Veysel Eroğlu is not an archaeologist. What he said is really ridiculous,” Assistant Professor Ahmet Yaraş, head of the excavations, said Wednesday.

“Allianoi is the most protected hot spring in the world. Some 11,000 coins, around 400 metal artifacts, 400 bone artifacts, 800 ceramic artifacts and around 400 glass artifacts have been found during excavations,” said Yaraş, adding that only 20 percent of the city had been successfully excavated so far.

“We have found a sculpture of Asklepios, who was known as the god of health. Alliaoni has 400 surgical instruments, the highest number ever found, proving that the place was a hospital at the time,” he said.

Allianoi is just a fictional name, the minister said, adding that it had been restored by a former governor and constituted no more than an ordinary hot spring little different from other hot springs that can be observed throughout the country.

A total of $7 million has been spent on restoring the site since excavations began, Eroğlu said, adding that the work was conducted under the supervision of the Culture and Tourism Ministry.

“The ministry is aware of the importance of the historical artifacts and we made all the precautions in order to protect them,” said the environment minister.

Despite care from the Environment Ministry to preserve artifacts from the site – including moving sculptures from the hot spring area to the Bergama Museum and by filling the site with sand before the area is submerged by a reservoir – numerous groups have been lodging complaints about the authorities’ work, Eroğlu said.

“Despite winning 16 courts against the operations, the ancient city of Allianoi will be covered with sand before the waters of the Yortanlı Dam flood the region,” said Yaraş, adding that it was meaningless to debate what material will be used to cover the site since it will disappear forever once the area is flooded.

“Turkey has lost its reputation with the latest development,” said Yaraş.

Meanwhile, Professor Murat Güvenç, head of the History Foundation, also objected to the Eroğlu’s remarks, saying the ministry was preparing to bury the location without evaluating alternative options.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/n.php?n=saving-an-ancient-city-that-doesnt-exist-2010-09-01
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