The Christian Ghost city, once called the City of 1001 Churches.
The following photographs show the ruins of the Christian city of Ani, a city that once was home (some claim) to as many as 200,000 people, but has stood empty and in ruins for centuries. The ruins stand on the Turkish side of the border with Armenia.
The first surviving historical records are from Armenian historians writing in the 5th century CE.
Aside from Turkish-Armenian friction, it’s in the news now because The World Heritage Committee (part of UNESCO) has declared it to be a valuable cultural site that should be preserved.
The city was often attacked by competing political forces, at times by their Christian ‘brothers.’ In the mid 11th century Byzantine armies besieged Ani many times and the city finally surrendered to them in 1046 CE. Then in 1046 CE a Seljuk army laid siege to Ani, captured it and … let Arab historian Sibt ibn al-Jawzi tell the story (he claims to have heard an eye-witness account:
“The army entered the city, massacred its inhabitants, pillaged and burned it, leaving it in ruins and taking prisoner all those who remained alive...The dead bodies were so many that they blocked the streets; one could not go anywhere without stepping over them. And the number of prisoners was not less than 50,000 souls. I was determined to enter city and see the destruction with my own eyes. I tried to find a street in which I would not have to walk over the corpses; but that was impossible.” (Quoted in Norwich, John Julius (1991). Byzantium: The Apogee. New York: Viking. pp. 342–343. ISBN 978-0-394-53779-5.)
A Wikipedia entry has a description of the ruins. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ani
And, a web-site called virtual Ani has a map and a helpful list of the ruins.
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UNESCO file image of the ruins of Ani