Ancient underground city unearthed in Turkey

Turkey is famous for its underground cities with the city of Derinkuyu in Cappadocia as one of the most well-known. Why those cities were built remains an unresolved mystery with many suggestions floating around.

Central Anatolia (Anatolia comes from the Greek word Anatoli which means East) is the central part of Turkey where recently, works to broaden the road at the province of Corum’s Bogazkale brought to the surface an underground city consisting of 8 rooms.

First estimations of the Turkish authorities show that it may be a settlement from the Byzantine period of time. The largest room spans a 13 meter length and 3 meter wide area. In the findings it includes the remains of a church, making this settlement possibly a refugee for Christians during the first years of Christianity.

This underground city in Anatolia doesn’t match the size and depth of Derinkuyu, however it poses the questions for one more time, why so many underground cities in Turkey? And although Christians and historians believe that those cities were built as a hiding place for Christians during the persecution times, it would have required tremendous work to build such a city and it could have easily have acted as a trap once the entrance of the city was found, especially when in Deinkuyu there are more than 600 entrances to the underground city.

Examination and further exploration of the ruins will continue and further details about the underground city of the Anatolian province will be announced along the way.

By John Black