Exploring Tyrkey’s World Heritage from İstanbul to Nemrut Dağı

Turkey has been a signatory to the World Heritage Convention since 1985 but rather surprisingly only has nine designated World Heritage sites compared, for example, with the United Kingdom's 28 sites and Germany's 33. A country doesn't gain a great deal from having a site listed since although some advice on how to protect it becomes available the country remains responsible for its upkeep with the threat of delisting hanging over it if it doesn't do this in a way that meets with UN approval. However, every World Heritage site wins the right to display a symbol indicating that it is regarded as of particular significance, so there is a certain amount of prestige attached to the listing.

The World Heritage List is full of surprises. Asked to guess what was on Turkey's list most people would probably plump for Ephesus (Efes). Instead it is Troy that is listed, along with Hierapolis, the ancient city that lives in the shadow of its more upfront sister Pamukkale. Glaring omissions include the ruined Armenian city of Ani, near Kars, and Hasankeyf, near Batman, an incredible site on the banks of the Tigris that is scheduled to vanish in favor of a dam. Still, if you're planning a tour of Turkey it is perhaps worth knowing that these are the sites the UN thinks the world could not do without:

Historic Areas of İstanbul

No prizes for guessing that the old part of İstanbul enclosed within the Walls of Theodosius was one of the first places in Turkey to achieve World-Heritage-site status. Attention focuses on the great monuments of Sultanahmet (Aya Sofya, Topkapı Sarayı, Sultanahmet Camii [Blue Mosque], Yerebatan Sarnıcı [the Underground Cistern]) but also encompasses the magnificent Süleymaniye Camii and even the wooden houses of the back streets in areas such as Vefa. Unfortunately old İstanbul is now seen as in danger from population pressure, industrial pollution and uncontrolled urbanization. In particular the restoration work on some stretches of the ancient walls has come in for serious criticism.

Archeological Site of Troy

Who hasn't heard of Troy, the wondrous walled city made famous by Homer's saga, “The Iliad,” and then brought to light, when many people had assumed it was as fantastical as Atlantis, by the German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann? Some visitors to the site come away disappointed because the ruins can't hope to compete in splendor with those of Ephesus or Aphrodisias. However, the site won its listing not just because of the artistic significance of “The Iliad” but also because it demonstrated one of the earliest contacts between the European world of the Mediterranean and that of Anatolia.

Hierapolis-Pamukkale

Familiar to most people is Pamukkale near Denizli in western Anatolia where calcium-laden water flowing over a cliff-edge has created extraordinary white travertine, petrified waterfalls with pools of warm water collected on top of them. A site as amazing as this attracted attention from the earliest times, and King Eumenes II of Pergamum established a spa resort here in 190 B.C., which was expanded into Hierapolis, a sprawling hillside city, by the Greeks and Romans. Unfortunately, in the rush to get to the travertine, the extensive remains, which include a vast necropolis and a lengthy stretch of original Roman pavement, often get overlooked.

Xanthos-Letoon

These two sites on the south coast between Fethiye and Patara are reminders of a time when the Lycians ruled this part of the coast from their capital at Xanthos, a little inland from Kınık. Originally Xanthos was adorned with wonderful pillar carvings, some of which were removed to the British Museum in 1842. The Letoon lies closer to the sea and was originally a shrine to Leto, a lover of Zeus, and her son Apollo and daughter Artemis. Frequently flooded, it is a serene and peaceful place to escape the summer crowds.

Nemrut Dağı

Routinely dubbed “the Eighth Wonder of the World,” Nemrut Daği, the great burial site of Antiochus I (69-34 B.C.) on top of a mountain between Malatya and Adıyaman in the Southeast, crops up on posters all over the country which depict the giant heads of eagles, lions and men that ringed the mound before they were toppled by an earthquake. It's a great place to visit especially if you opt to visit in the middle of the day to avoid the dawn and sunset crowds. It's also the only one of Turkey's World Heritage sites that requires some physical exertion to appreciate. Bring sturdy shoes.

Göreme National Park and the rock sites of Cappadocia

Göreme National Park was not just one of the first sites to be listed but is also an example of somewhere that is regarded as equally important not just for the natural beauty of a landscape created by the action of wind and rain on soft volcanic tuff, but also for the cultural importance of its endless rock-cut churches, chapels and underground cities. Within the wider site it is Göreme Open Air Museum that has the honor of showing off the World Heritage site symbol, and that's because the small churches contained inside it provide important evidence of the development of provincial Byzantine art in the post-iconoclastic period.

Hattuşa: the Hittite capital

Hidden in the countryside near Çorum, northeast of Ankara, Hattuşa is an enormous site where some recent reconstruction has arguably made it easier for non-experts to appreciate what they're seeing while irritating the purists at the same time. The site dates back to the second millennium B.C. when the Hittites ruled a huge swathe of Central Anatolia. Images of the gods they worshipped line up in a narrow gully at nearby Yazılıkaya.

Great Mosque and Hospital of Divriği

The least known and hardest to visit of all Turkey's World Heritage sites is the elaborate complex built in 1228-29 for Ahmet Şah in Divriği, some three hours' drive east of Sivas in a town that lacks a decent hotel. Sivas itself boasts several fine examples of Selçuk architecture in which almost all the decorative effort is focused on the soaring entrances, but in Divriği that decorative enthusiasm was taken to a whole different level in carving that all but jumps out from the buildings. This is one for die-hard architectural enthusiasts, but it's nonetheless remarkable for that.

City of Safranbolu

Many people traveling between İstanbul and Ankara choose to break their journey in Safranbolu, which contains the most undamaged 19th-century urban landscape in Turkey. Here you cannot just admire the wonderful old Ottoman houses spreading out from the cute little Arasta bazaar but also stay in some of them, too, as some of the finest houses have been turned into hotels complete with all sorts of hidden quirks such as lounges set up in what were once the stone strong rooms in which people stored their wheat and valuables.