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Show MODERN GAVE DWELLERS IN MJNOR CITY Natives of Cappadocia Are Still, to All Intents and Purposes, Troglodytes. WONDERFUL CONE DWELLINGS There Aro nt Least 50,000, Says a Traveler, and Some Have Slue Stories. J. It. Stllllngton Stcrrctt has written an Instructive article for the Illustrated Illus-trated London News on the cave dwellers of Cappadocia. From an American standpoint the article Is interesting in-teresting because of the fact that there Is an organization lu this country known as the Colorado Cliff Dwellings Association, whose object Is to protect and preserve the historical cliff dwellings dwell-ings in Colorado. jt Is In Cappadocia, Asia Minor, Mr. Stcrrctt says, that the real twentieth century Troglodytes (cavo dwellers) nrc to bo found. Tho whole cave dwelling region of Cappadocia, he says, is of volcnulc formation, composed com-posed of A deep layer of pumice stone, tufn or pepcrlne, overlaid In some places by rugged lava fields. The pumice pum-ice or tufa is of Incredible thickness, but the overlaid layer of lava Is comparatively com-paratively thin, and so soft that it can be dug away with the thumb nail. The caves are formed in cones, extending ex-tending in height from fifty to 300 feet. The tallest cones usually stand In the centre of an eroded valley, Mr. Stcrrctt says. Many of them are lu process of disintegration, and in sonic the exterior exter-ior walls have been worn away to such an extent that the inner chambers are visible from the outside. Such exposed chambers, if they He fairly toward tho sun, are used for drying grapes and other fruits. Mr. Stcrrctt says there are easily BO,-000 BO,-000 of these cone caves In Cappadocia. The caves were bored out with comparatively com-paratively little trouble. One chamber, twenty -five feet long, thirteen feet broad and ten feet high, was excavated exca-vated by a single workman In the short space of thirty days. The -cavo dwellers of Cappadocia have gone to some pains, Mr. Sterrett says, to ornament and give nn architectural archi-tectural and decorutlve effect to tho enves which they make their abode. Especially have they given free play to their architectural imagination in the laying out of their churches, chapels chap-els and temples. Some elaborate effects ef-fects have been produced. Mr. Stcrrctt gives an entertaining de-scrlptio: de-scrlptio: of the manner In which the abodes of the cave dwellers of Cappadocia Cappa-docia have been laid out. On entering the doorway of nny of these cone dwellings, he says, the visitor finds himself within a spacious chamber, about the walls of which shelves and niches for the storage ft small household house-hold effects have been cut Into the stone. The stairways leading to the upper stories are like wells or rounded chimneys nnd the ascent from the lower to tho upper stories is made by means of hiflder holes cut into the' rock. The floors between tho stories arc usually thick enough to sustain nny weight thnt might be put upon them, but occasionally tho excavators miscalculated mis-calculated the. thickness of u stone floor, with the result that they had to cut out one .ofty chamber where they bad Intended to make two. As many ns nine stories are to be found In n single cone, Mr. Sterrett says, but the usual number is two, three or four stories. The number of stories can always be Indicated by the windows. The cave dwellers utilize their windows as dovj cotes for pigeons, hosts of which flock to the places provided for them. The natives eat the eggs nnd llesh of tho birds. Mr. Ste.Tett contributes this comment com-ment on tho habits of life of these modern enve ilwellera: "The natives of this region nrc still, to nil Intents and purposes, Troglodytes, Troglo-dytes, hut If we leave out of consideration considera-tion the fact that their r.welllugs are at !enst partially under ground, 'they differ In liabltx nnd customs lu no whit from the ordinary Turkish villas with ordinary humdrum surroundings," Mr. Sterrett gives this description of some of tho modern cave dwellings: "Sometime tho front of the house Is built of blocks of pumice stone, wlille all the rest of the abode Is subterranean, subterran-ean, the cone of cliff being used as an annex, but In most cases u modern dwelling Is excavated, not In a cone, but in tho face of the bluff, and thus becomes a cliff dwelling, properly so called. This Is tnic of tho busluess street of the town of Urgub, whero the front or facade opening on the street Is the only rooui In tho dwelling into which the light comes. The other rooms arc In midnight darkness nil the vnr round. The owner of turb nn abode can extend his dwelling indefinitely indefi-nitely Into tho bowia? of the earth and no one need know aught of his enlarged en-larged residence, n feature which Is not without Its advantages In a land where the wise man conceals the fact that he is wealthy. Tho Interior chambers cham-bers nrc used chiefly for granaries and storage. Kven their chaff, which is made to take the place of our hoy, Is safely stowed nwny lu these dry nnd dark chambers. In passing along the main wtreet of Urgub tho superficial observer will not detect the slightest Indication that ho is lu the presence of Troglodyte dwellings, though he may quickly convince himself that such li tho fact. The upland or plateau love! of this region abounds lu hummockf, hllli nd lofty plnnaclM and tlwy at oil used fa the background against which modern dwellings are built. It may oven happen, as In the case of the pulnco or castle of UdJ, that the house of the owner of a vineyard Is actually beneath thu vineyard Itself " Tho soil of' the Troglodyte region Is fertile and produces In abundance vegetables veg-etables and fruit. Apricots of superb quality are grown there. Mr. Sterrett says it has been asserted by one of the old travelers that tho Troglodyte region re-gion Is the original home of tho apricot. "Garden and desert," says Mr. Sterrett, Ster-rett, "are often close neighbors, for tho reason thnt the garden flourishes wherever the stone has rotted mi III-clcntly, III-clcntly, wherens the adjacent, but naked nnd uurottcd stone Is the most barren of deserts" Many of the cones Inhabited by the Troglodytes, Mr. Sterrett says, are mere shells honeycombed with chambers. cham-bers. There Is one ancient cnttlc thnt is filled from the base to the pinnacle with chambers. Mr. Sterrett contributes an Interest-1 lng word or two about tlio places of worship of the modern cave dwellers of Cappadocia. In the chapels, he says, aro still many paintings of Greek saints named lu the Inscriptions. In the floors of oine of the chapels graves aro cut and iu some of tbcin human skeletons still may be s6en. In fact, graves have been found frequently frequent-ly In the dwellings, and there are evidences evi-dences that the cave dwellers lived lu the same rooms with their pigeons and their dead. The date 'f the origin of the cave dwellings of Cappadocia is in doubt. They are ancient enough for Cicero to have made mention of them, and it has been asserted thnt the cone cr.vcs of Cappadocia were Inhabited as early nt 1000 B. C.-Ilrooklyn Eagle. |