The stately Kızılırmak (Red River) is Turkey’s longest river, rising in the foothills
of Mt. Kızıldağ (Red Mountain) in Sivas province and then wending its way north
for over 1,100 kilometers to empty into the Black Sea near Bafra. On the way, it
passes through Cappadocia, bestowing on the small town of Avanos the
priceless gift of copious red clay that lends itself perfectly to pottery
production. As a result, you can hardly move in town for cozy little workshops
turning out pots by the thousand, and ceramics pop up in the most unexpected
places -- houses bear neat ceramic number plates, clay jugs recline against trees
and there are even pots adorning the muddy little island that provides a home
for a multitude of geese as you come into town from Göreme.
In the past, the Kızılırmak held great strategic importance, marking the western
boundary of the Hatti and Hittite kingdoms. Avanos itself has a lengthy history.
Once upon a time it was the Roman city of Venessa in the days when the river
was famed for its salt rather than its clay and was called the Halys (Salty River).
Today there’s not much above ground to remind visitors of that dim and distant
past, although deep below the ground are innumerable small underground cities
(more like underground villages really). There are few records of the early
history of these strange, multilayered Cappadocian features, but it’s believed
that at least the top layer of the better -known model at Derinkuyu dates back to
Hittite times, so those in Avanos are not likely to be a great deal younger (and
indeed there are Hittite references to a settlement thought to be Venessa).
None are officially open to the public as attractions, although you can explore
some of them informally while visiting the pottery workshops. Alternati vely, you
can hop on a local bus to nearby Özkonak, where in 1972 the muezzin was busily
cultivating his garden when suddenly it opened up and he found himself staring
down into an underground city.
According to the historian Strabo, Venessa was the third most important town in
the Kingdom of Cappadocia, which existed from 332 B.C. to A.D. 17. Later it
boasted an enormous temple to Zeus whose priest was supported from the
proceeds of farming the rich volcanic soils beside the river. Like everywhere else
in Cappadocia, Venessa had a large Christian population in Roman and Byzantine
times. Their memorial is the Dereyamanlı Kilisesi (church), believed to date back
to the fifth century, which would make it one of the oldest churches in
Cappadocia. A small structure carved into the rock overlooking a forgotten
valley of glorious rock formations, it’s simply decorated with red geometric
designs, one of them resembling a Star of David, giving rise to the suggestion
that it might once have been used as a synagogue. B e that as it may, this is the
only such structure in Cappadocia that is currently in use as a church.
If there’s not much to show for the remote past, Avanos is still well endowed
with reminders of the 19th and early 20th centuries when it had a large Gree k
and Armenian population. They left many beautiful old stone houses whose
facades are far more elaborately decorated than those of nearby Göreme, with
wonderful carvings around their windows and long bands of deep relief
separating the ground and first floors - - their design vaguely recalls the
diadems worn by the Byzantine emperors.
But the houses are just a side dish to the main meal of the town, which is
pottery production. The Pottery Zone is just a short walk from the Kızılırmak,
where a wobbly pedestrian bridge induces motion-sickness in all but the most
iron-stomached; from the center, it’s possible to appreciate the great width of
the river after the winter snows have melted. Until recently the river was
something of a sideshow, unable to compete w ith the workshops for attention.
Today, though, an energetic young mayor is overseeing the creation of
waterside promenades, which should eventually make it the centerpiece of
Avanos it always deserved to be.