Sunday, November 15, 2009

So Gazieantep is located at that cosmic junction in world of antiquity, the crossroads of Mesopotamia, Anatolia, northern Syria and Egypt. Back in the day, anybody who was buying or selling, growing, weaving or smithing and going to market, or on the road for other legitimate or illegitimate purposes, sooner or later had to pass through Gazieantep. It is a mother lode of remains and ruins and excavated and non-excavated sites and finds; no small statement in Turkey, where a dog buries a bone and another lost civilization surfaces. This would be in the present day eastern Turkey where the Euphrates River runs north and south. The river has formed a traditional boundary or demarcation since the beginning of the ages, people have been living around here for 600-700 thousand years now, with everything east of the river known as Eastern Anatolia. Gazieantep is the crown jewel of Eastern Anatolia.

And the story goes like this: Eastern Anatolia is arid and desert-like. Poverty has had a familiar and almost timeless presence in the current era. The Turkish government, in a effort to ease suffering, diversify their economy and get people to work, embarks upon the GAP or Southeastern Anatolia Project . Pieces of the initiative include the harnessing and utilization of the power of the Euphrates River through the construction of dams. So about ten years ago, they build the Birecik Dam and a hydro-power plant at a location near Gazieantep. In the process, they stumble across a rather delicious site on the bank of the river and unearth and salvage literally the most extraordinary Roman mosaics the modern world has ever seen. Nothing like these mosaics in all of Italy. Or Europe. More than several years go by and after much debate and discussion scholars determine that it was/is the lost Roman city of Zeugma. You break ground in Turkey and you'll fall through a rabbit hole that whirls you 2000 years back into history. And when you come to, you are face to face with the locals.

These mosaics are electrifying, terrifying and awesome, all at once. The people were hunters, gardeners, fishermen, merchants, scholars, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, elite and refined, hopeful and faithful. They had means to commission exquisite floors, walls and ceilings. And you can see 300 BC and 2009 AD in the same glimpse.

Soon, independent of GAP, they will build a new airport at Gazieantep to accomodate private jets flying in from all over the world. The occupants of the jets will be whisked away to a posh new mosaic museum that will be opening in the next year or two. And little Gazieantep and little-known Zeugma won't be so little noooo more...

JoJo Nihili
The 'Kan EWA

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