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Turkey tours and the history of Anatolia
Turkey is a vast and varied country boasting incredible landscapes and natural wonders bordered by four different seas. Well known as a great destination for relaxing beach holidays, it also offers many sporting activities, some of the world's most important ancient monuments, welcoming Turkish hospitality and a delicious and varied national cuisine. Istanbul is also gearing up to be European Capital of Culture 2010 so it has never been a better time to visit this magical city.
The history of Anatolia is rich and deep. Some of mankind's earliest settlements were established here as early as 10,000 BC. Shortly after this, at Çatalhöyük, near Konya, Man first grew grain. In following millenia, civilizations such as Assyrians, Sumerians and Hittites rose and fell. Invaders from abroad left their mark, whether the Men of the Sea, Cyrus, Darius or Alexander the Great. The town of Troy, near Çanakkale, was scene of the Trojan War around 1250 BC. Midas, the king with the golden touch, and Croesus, the inventor of coinage, were rulers of small but important Anatolian kingdoms in the first millennium BC. Many of the great accomplishments of classical Hellenic civilization in the realms of art, architecture, philosophy, medicine and science, came to light in lonia, the region around present-day lzmir and Bergama. Rome took Anatolia in the last century BC, and called it Asia Minor. The Roman provincial capital of Ephesus was among the largest and finest cities of its time. St. Paul preached there: the Virgin Mary died in a small house on the outskirts of the city. The Seven Churches of Asia, to whom St. Paul addressed Epistles, are all in Anatolia. And St. Nicholas, the original Santa Claus, lived and worked on Anatolia's south coast. In 330 AD, Constantine the Great established the eastern capital of the Roman Empire at Byzantium, renaming it Constantinople. By the time of the Emperor Justinian (527 to 565 AD) Rome had fallen, and Constantinople was the capital of the vast empire. The Prophet Mohammed was born in 570, and within a century the armies of Islam were threatening the mighty walls of Constantinople. For centuries, the Byzantine and Arabic empires struggled for Anatolia, but both were swept aside by the coming of the Turks.
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