The vast majority had abandoned their pagan, shamanistic beliefs for the vibrancy and logic of Islam. Having captured much of Persia and been accepted as rulers of Baghdad by the caliph, they had inevitably absorbed the culture of the sophisticated Persian and Arab civilizations now under their sway. Following the defeat of Romanus IV Diogenes by the redoubtable Selçuk leader Alp Arslan at the Battle of Malazgirt (near Lake Van) in 1071, huge swathes of territory in Anatolia, formerly under the rule of the Christian Byzantine Empire, became both Turkish and Muslim.
Even though they had become a cultured and powerful force, for a people more used to wide oceans of rippling grassland than a real ocean, it must have had a massive impact on the Selçuks to reach a sea as vast and blue as the Mediterranean. Having established their capital at Konya (Central Anatolia) in the late 12th century the Selçuks -- whose empire was known as the Sultanate of Rum -- soon turned their attention to the south. The Mediterranean was not too far away, only some 300 kilometers, albeit across the formidable spine of the Toros (Taurus) Mountains.
So what exactly was it that drew a people used to riding on horseback across steppe, mountain and plain to this new environment? The answer was trade. Like their modern Turkish descendents, the Selçuks were great at buying, selling and facilitating the movement of goods. Anyone who has traveled across Anatolia will have seen the remains of the fortress-like caravanserais (a kind of inn where merchants -- and their goods -- could spend the night in safety whilst traveling) left by the Selçuks. The road that rumbled beneath your bus or car wheels may well have been Selçuk in origin. They controlled (and encouraged) much of the land trade along the various strands of the Silk Road as it passed through Anatolia -- but how could they go one better?
Profit is great motivator to broaden your horizons, and the prosperity offered to those who traded with the wealthy lands bordering the Mediterranean was the carrot, which finally enticed Selçuk Sultan (ruler) Keyhusrev I to annex Antalya from the Byzantines in 1206. In 1221 the greatest Selçuk sultan, Alaeddin Keykubad, added Alanya to the Sultanate of Rum, and made the town his summer residence. The Selçuks now controlled two of the most important ports on the southern Mediterranean coast, and achieved their aim of increasing trade (they even instituted a shipping insurance system to indemnify against losses caused by pirates to encourage merchants to take calculated risks).
Freya Stark, the intrepid British female traveler, visited Alanya (whilst following in the footsteps of Alexander the Great) in the 1950s. A certain Ghalib Bey, then in charge of Alanya's nascent tourism industry, showed her round the then sleepy backwater and she remarked on the very "Selçukness" of the town.
"…but the happy side of Alanya belongs to the beauty of Alaeddin's city, which gives it its stamp and outlives all the other ages -- ancient, Ottoman or Crusading -- that encrust the fortified pyramid on its hill."
She was clearly a fan of the austere simplicity of Selçuk military building, and went on to say
"Beyond all military architectures the early Greek and the Selçuk seem to me to express the delight of their building. Functional as they are -- for they allow no unessential to mislead them -- they refuse to be limited to economic terms: they reach their perfection regardless of expense or effort, and a sort of radiance inevitably follows, as if the axle of immortality ran through them."
But if you visit the bustling, modern tourist centers of Antalya or Alanya today, what can you see of their once glorious Selçuk past? Let's start with Alanya, as it possesses a more complete record of its Selçuk heritage. The Selçuk citadel (a hot 40-minute uphill slog from the lower town) and its outer walls still stand on the prominent hill at the heart of "old" Alanya, but the town's single most impressive piece of military architecture is the Kızıl Kule (Red Tower) dating from 1226, built by a Syrian architect from Aleppo. It has become something of a symbol of the town, and is very striking. Over 30 meters high, octagonal in shape and split into five floors, its purpose was to protect the harbor and lower walls of the citadel fortifications from enemy attack. Inside is a massive cistern, steps to the parapet (from where there are superb views over the harbor and sea beyond) and a rather incongruous ethnographic collection including a nomad tent.
A short walk to the south of the Red Tower will bring you to a unique site -- the only Selçuk dockyard left in Anatolia. The five linked, sizeable (over 43 meters by eight meters vaulted enclosures were once used by the Selçuks to build and repair the galleys used to protect merchant shipping on the high seas. A Briton named Col. Leake, visiting Alanya in 1800, reported seeing boats being built at the dockyard in exactly the same fashion as they had been at the time of Alaeddin Keykubad.
Having explored Alanya, with your own transport it is possible to see a few Selçuk remains en route to Antalya, two-and-a-half hours away to the west. The Şarapsa Hanı, a well-preserved caravanserai, once provided accommodation between the Selçuk capital, Konya, and Alanya. More spectacularly set is the caravanserai at Alarahan, beneath a fortified rocky bluff next to the Alara River. Here it is easy to imagine the merchants on their way over the Toros Mountains heading for Konya, settling their pack animals down for the night, praying in the attached mosque then bedding down themselves in one of the rooms lining the central courtyard.
Antalya has less in the way of Selçuk monuments than Alanya, but its most striking, the 38-meter-high Yıvlı Minare (Fluted Minaret) is the symbol of the city. It has even become the logo of the local football team, Antalyaspor. At its most dramatic towards sunset, with a backdrop of the Gulf of Antalya and the jagged spires of the Lycian mountains beyond, the minaret was constructed in the reign of Alaeddin Keykubad. It is very distinctive, with ribbed sections made from brick, once embellished with dark blue tiles.
The Saat Kulesi (Clock Tower) just to the west of the Yıvlı Minare, was originally a Selçuk tower, part of the walls enclosing the old city (Kaleiçi). The pragmatic Selçuk builders incorporated pieces of earlier, Roman masonry, in the tower (as, indeed, they did when rebuilding huge sections of the extensive Roman city walls). The Selçuks repeated this pragmatism in the construction of the nearby Karatay Medresesi (a medrese is a theological school). The entry portal is beautifully decorated with the flowing geometric patterns so typical of Selçuk art.
Kaleiçi itself has been rebuilt so many times over the centuries since the time of Alaeddin Keykubad that it is hard to know just how much that it is Selçuk lies beneath its old streets and Ottoman mansion houses. But strolling through the recently restored alleys of the old town it is fun to guess. Although outside the Selçuk period proper (the Sultanate of Rum had more or less collapsed by the start of the 14th century) Arab traveler Ibn Battuta portrait of Antalya around 1350 could equally as well have described how the town was under the great Selçuks a hundred years earlier
"…a most beautiful city … it is one of the most attractive towns to be seen anywhere, beside being exceedingly populous and well laid out. The Christian merchants live in a quarter of the town known as the Port, and are surrounded by a wall, the gates of which are shut upon them from without at night and during the Friday service. The Greeks live by themselves in another quarter, the Jews in another, the king and his Mameluks in another, the rest of the Muslims live in the main city."
The Selçuk Turks were, by and large, a tolerant bunch, and their domain had a cosmopolitan make-up (just as Alanya and Antalya do today). By and large we Westerners tend to ignore Turkish and Muslim sites in favor of the more familiar relics of the ancient Greeks and the Romans. So why not give the Sultanate of Rum a chance and see what Selçuk Alanya and Antalya have to offer?
[QUICK TIPS]
How to get there:
Antalya: Turkish Airlines (THY), Onur Air, Atlas Jet and Pegasus all have at least daily flights from İstanbul. Plentiful connections from Ankara. SunExpress connects Antalya directly to İzmir, Diyarbakır, Trabzon, Erzurum, Bodrum and Dalaman.
Alanya: Regular buses from Antalya (two-and-a-half hours) or coaches from most major Turkish cities
Where to stay:
Antalya: Atelya Pansiyon, Kaleiçi
www.atelyahotel.com Tel.: (242) 241 6416
Alanya: The Bedesten Tel.: (242) 512 1234
Guides and maps:
"The Formation of Turkey: The Seljukid Sultanate of Rum" by Claude Cahen; "Rough Guide to Turkey"; "Lonely Planet: Turkey"; Kartographischen Verlag Reinhard Ryborsch map series No. 7
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