Açıksaray
The Açıksaray ( Turkish for Open Palace ) is a complex of monastery, church and living quarters carved into the rock from the Byzantine era , about three kilometers southeast of Gülşehir in Cappadocia in central Turkey .
The Açıksaray covers an area of about one square kilometer. There are monastery complexes with refectories, bedrooms and living rooms, stables and other utility rooms. The buildings are carved into the soft tufa in the style of cave architecture in Cappadocia . They lie in eight nested, multi-level assemblies around a flat hill. Several of them are provided with impressive facades. The churches, which were probably built in the eleventh century, do not have fresco paintings like most of the Cappadocian cave churches, but are only decorated with simple red ornamental paintings.
One of the complexes is equipped with a three-zone facade structured by blind arcades . Behind it there is a spacious hall with a cross in relief on the ceiling. Above the entrance are the reliefs of two bulls facing each other in fighting stance. Their heads are no longer completely there, in between a window was knocked into the outer wall. The meaning of the bull symbol in early Christianity is not known. Representations of this kind are not found anywhere else in Cappadocia.
Since there are relatively few living spaces and churches on the site of Açıksaray in relation to other monastery collections in the region, there is now also the view that this is not a pure monastery complex, but that the function of the buildings is more that of a Seljuk caravanserai that provided travelers with board and lodging.
Wall painting
Bull reliefs
Ceiling cross
literature
- Peter Daners, Volher Ohl: Cappadocia . Dumont 1996 ISBN 3-7701-3256-4
- Michael Bussmann / Gabriele Tröger: Turkey . Michael Müller Verlag 2004 ISBN 3-89953-125-6
Web links
Coordinates: 38 ° 44 ′ 15 " N , 34 ° 39 ′ 47" E