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Posted by Jack Campin - bogus address on August 29, 2007, 6:11 pm
>>> At the Syriac monastery of Deir-ul-Zaferan (just outside Mardin,
>>> in Turkish Kurdistan) there is a basement room that was once a
>>> pagan solar temple - there's a small window in one side that
>>> lights up an altar across the other side at dawn in midsummer.
>>> I think it's about 2500 years old.
>>> The mindboggling thing about it is the ceiling. The room is about
>>> 50 by 30 feet, and the ceiling is dead flat *stone blocks*. No
>>> transverse beams, arches or any discernible support. Somehow or
>>> other the interlocking arrangement of those blocks holds hundreds
>>> of tons of rock absolutely stable above your head.
> This it? http://tulpart.com/pic.asp?cmd=6&cid=934
> If so, a little disappointing visually.
The photo doesn't convey the scale and the massive feel of the thing.
It was 45C when I was there but cool and comfortable inside. Enough
thermal mass for interseasonal heat (or cold) storage. You might as
well have been in a cave.
Supposedly they used to do human sacrifices there, from behind the
point where the photo was taken. At some times and places all major
building works had a human sacrifice scheduled in the critical path
analysis. Don't knock it if it works. A few dead virgins buys you
a couple of millenia's-worth of earthquake resistance.
> Check out this architrave:
> http://tulpart.com/pic.asp?cmd=6&cid=937
That's a chapel in one of the upper mediaeval parts. You get to
the former solar temple down a flight of steps. I haven't seen a
reconstruction of what it looked like in pagan times and I doubt
the monastery would encourage archaeologists to find out.
: Ever seen a "flat arch"? E.g.:
: http://www.stratfordhall.org/architect/flatarch.html
Flat dome in this instance, I guess. You can see how to extrapolate
that by a dimension.
+ I'd hardly call the area "Turkish Kurdistan" unless you are incredibly
+ political.
Well, a bit political. The Kurds are the largest ethnic group in the
area, Arabs second and Turks third. (The Syriac Christians who run
the monastery are Arabs, sort of - at least they nearly all use Arabic
as their daily language, though the religious texts are in Aramaic).
Just saying which state owns it doesn't really convey the feel of the
place.
============== j-c ====== @ ====== purr . demon . co . uk ==============
Jack Campin: 11 Third St, Newtongrange EH22 4PU, Scotland | tel 0131 660 4760
<http://www.purr.demon.co.uk/jack/> for CD-ROMs and free | fax 0870 0554 975
stuff: Scottish music, food intolerance, & Mac logic fonts | mob 07800 739 557
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