Ankara, King Midas’ Tomb & Bursa

When leaving Cappadocia in the early, misty morning, we saw several balloons rising in the air to give tourists a balloon’s-eye-view of the area. Although I won’t hesitate to go up in a helicopter or small plane (as long as they are enclosed) I’m not a fan of going up in anything I could possibly fall out of. I won’t do outdoor observation platforms or narrow, swinging bridges across deep gorges either.

On our way to Ankara, the capitol of Turkey, we could see Hasan Mountain off in the distance. This is the second tallest mountain in Turkey, the tallest being Ararat. The photo I captured shows some snow-capped peaks roughly in the center of the photo that seem to be floating as the lower portions of the mountain are hidden by the mist.

Ankara, the second largest city in Turkey after Istanbul, became the capitol in 1923 at the end of the Turkish War of Independence. It is a very old city, however, with its origins dating back to the Bronze Age. A large number of artifacts from the area are housed at the fascinating Museum of Anatolian Civilizations. The country now known as Turkey has also been known as Anatolia throughout most of its history.

There are some stone and bone tools dating back to the Palaeolithic Age (before 8000 BC). From the Neolithic Age (8000 – 5500 BC) is the oldest known cave painting in existence and a mother earth goddess figure. I have included photos of both with this post.

The museum is quite large with several items from pretty much every other period of history from the Chalcolithic Age, Early Bronze Age, Assyrian Trade Colonies, and Hittite Period. From the Phrygian Period they have King Midas’ skull and most of the pieces found in his tomb. There really was a King Midas; in fact there were three. Not sure which one was supposed to have asked Dionysus to give him the ability to turn everything he touched into gold. But the one whose skull and belongings are displayed in the museum in Ankara is considered to be the most important of the three.

They also have items all the way through history up to the modern era. Saw loads of swords, daggers, helmets, etc. There were some really cool looking feathered owl mask-like pieces that turned out to be something that would be placed over a severed head. That took them from cool to creepy.

We went to the Ataturk Memorial. Mustafa Kemal Ataturk was the founder and first president of the Republic of Turkey (from 1923 to his death in 1938). He has an enormous memorial in Ankara. When we arrived there, a private service or viewing of some sort was going on inside of the mausoleum and the attached museum. We needed to wait outside for a while. It was very cold and pretty soon began to rain torrentially.

While waiting to get inside, we took photos and videos of what we could outside, including a changing of the guard ceremony. Once it began to pour, we cowered under a covered arcade (and behind a pillar) until we could get indoors. Once inside, we could take photos within the mausoleum itself, but not the museum. They had a large number of items from his life and even recreated some rooms from his home. They had several of his cars and carriages.

From there we entered the former Kingdom of Phryge to visit Gordion. This was where Alexander the Great “cut (or unraveled) the Gordion knot”, which was the equivalent of Arthur pulling the sword from the stone. There were a large number of burial mounds including the largest of them all for King Midas (this is the Midas from the 8^th century BC). We had lunch near the tomb and then visited it and the museum next to the cafe where we had lunch.

Although it wasn’t raining and wasn’t quite as cold as it had been in Ankara, by this time I was not feeling at all well. However, I behaved myself while in the tomb, unlike King David’s in Jerusalem and King Tut’s in the Valley of the Kings in Egypt. I didn’t lie down on any slabs (although I desperately needed a nap) or trip over anything. To be fair, although I missed seeing the step in David’s tomb and fell headlong against the gate separating women from the coffin, I don’t think it was at all my fault that the electricity went out when I was in Tut’s tomb, leaving me alone in the dark with Tut himself.

Midas was not in his tomb any more since he was in the Museum of Anatolian Civilizations. The tomb was built of wood surrounded by a stone tomb with loose rocks in between the two enclosures. Then a mound of dirt and grass was over the stone tomb. It was different from any other tomb I have seen. I was really glad to be able to see and photograph it.

En route to the former Ottoman capitol of Bursa, we stopped off for a break at a Turkish coffee shop. Not a coffee drinker, I was glad to see they had hot chocolate.

When we arrived in Bursa, our tour director said to meet him in the lobby in 45 minutes (after we received our luggage and got ourselves a little settled in our rooms) to go on a walking tour of the old part of the city. I told him that I was not at all well and needed to go to bed. Bless his heart, he showed up at my door right about the same time as my luggage with some cough syrup with codeine, some antibiotics, some fresh-squeezed orange juice, and a gyro. The drugs could be purchased without a prescription in Turkey.

The room was a large corner room which was rounded with windows all the way around the two exterior walls. There was a large, round column in the middle of the room. It also had a small table and chairs for me to sit and have my dinner. Just outside of my windows was a statue of the founder of the Ottoman Empire, Osman Gazi who lived roughly from 1257 to 1326. Once I had my dinner and took my drugs (including some cold tablets I brought with me) I went to bed and slept soundly.

Next time – back to Istanbul to actually tour the place.