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DIGGING TO BYZANTIUM: Turkish Tunnel Project Unearths an Ancient Harbor
Der Spiegel ^ | 5/10/2006 | N/A

Posted on 05/10/2006 9:17:53 AM PDT by a_Turk

Workers digging a railway tunnel under the Bosporus Strait have uncovered the remains of a major Byzantine harbor that archaeologists say is a trove of relics dating back to Roman Emperor Constantine the Great.

The deepest underwater rail tunnel in the world will link Istanbul's Asian and European halves and ease bridge traffic across the Bosporus Strait. It may also be delayed by excited archaeologists. The tunnel, when it's finished, will end in a shining new railway station, the largest in Turkey -- a train and subway link surrounded by a 21st-century shopping center. Modern Turkish planners, though, weren't the first people in history to imagine the spot as a transport hub. The $4 billion tunnel project has uncovered a fourth-century harbor under the slums of Yenikapi, on the European side of Istanbul, and archaeologists excavating the area say it's a trove of relics dating back as far as Constantine the Great.

(Excerpt) Read more at service.spiegel.de ...


TOPICS:
KEYWORDS: ancientnavigation; biblicalarcheology; byzantineempire; byzantium; constantinople; godsgravesglyphs; istanbul; nauticalarchaeology; navigation; robertballard; romanempire; seaofmarmara; turkey; yenikapi
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To: FormerLib; kronos77; DTA

PING to a thread on islamic Turkey!


21 posted on 05/10/2006 11:39:08 AM PDT by Lion in Winter (Violent islam is the same as plain islam. No peace at all.... Just mass mayhem.)
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To: aristotleman
Oh, and the Turks will NOT allow Baptists to open a Church there either!

The EU says Turkey needs to clean up its act in regard to FREEDOM OF RELIGION!

22 posted on 05/10/2006 11:40:59 AM PDT by Lion in Winter (Violent islam is the same as plain islam. No peace at all.... Just mass mayhem.)
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To: Lion in Winter; aristotleman

Put the Kool-Aid down, step away from the keyboard and take a deep breath. This thread originally started about a dig that has turned up an ancient harbor in Byzantium. I expressed my pleasure in seeing it because of interest towards my background. At that point you decided to make it a religious war. We have covered orthodoxy and islam. There are plenty of other threads to discuss these topics but this is not one of them. No, I am not an anti-christian apologist and would be more than happy to debate it with you, but not here in this thread as this is not the topic.


23 posted on 05/10/2006 11:50:21 AM PDT by Uddercha0s
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To: Lion in Winter


On paper, Turkey is secular democratic republic. In reality, it is as you have described.


24 posted on 05/10/2006 11:55:27 AM PDT by DTA
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To: Uddercha0s
Of course, YOU are not an anti-Christian muslim apologist!! And the Turks are NO ally to the USA since they refused to help the USA in war against the taliban and saddam.

I hope their tunnel project is a flop!

25 posted on 05/10/2006 12:06:50 PM PDT by Lion in Winter (Violent islam is the same as plain islam. No peace at all.... Just mass mayhem.)
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To: Uddercha0s

Take the place back and remove that rubbish they filled it with.


26 posted on 05/10/2006 12:11:30 PM PDT by thebaron512
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To: aristotleman

Hi there. Fun forum, as usual.


27 posted on 05/10/2006 12:12:08 PM PDT by a_Turk (Temperance, Fortitude, Prudence, Justice, Comitas, Firmitas, Gravitas, Humanitas, Industria..)
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To: thebaron512

In some ways they are doing that.

"Due to its long history as both a church and a mosque, a particular challenge arises in the restoration process. The Christian iconographic mosaics are being gradually uncovered. However, in order to do so, important, historic Islamic art must be destroyed. Restorers have attempted to maintain a balance between both Christian and Islamic cultures. In particular much controversy rests upon whether the Islamic calligraphy on the dome of the cathedral should be removed, in order to permit the underlying Pantocrator mosaic of Christ as Master of the World, to be exhibited (assuming the mosaic still exists).
However, work has reportedly been purposely slow on the Hagia Sophia due to its important position and symbolism within the Eastern Orthodox Church. The Ecumenical Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church has claimed that the Turkish Government has denied offers to provide monetary assistance for the further restoration of Hagia Sophia in order to downplay its importance. Some Orthodox and Catholic Christians have gone so far as to demand the return of Hagia Sophia to the Orthodox Christian religion as a condition of Turkey's entry into the European Union."

Decent write up on wikipedia regarding it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hagia_Sophia


28 posted on 05/10/2006 12:15:02 PM PDT by Uddercha0s
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To: a_Turk

Any mention of Turkey, and attacks come flying.

The pavlovian response of haters is to bark at any stimulus, no matter how irrelevant it is to their agenda.


29 posted on 05/11/2006 7:03:15 PM PDT by aristotleman
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To: Lion in Winter

Idiot


30 posted on 05/15/2006 8:33:35 PM PDT by Sarajevo
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an update:
Dig for metro station uncovers long-lost port in Istanbul
Turkish Daily News
Thursday, June 22, 2006
They're calling the find the "Port of Theodosius," after the emperor of Rome and Byzantium who died in the year 395, and say the items they're digging up here could shed significant light on the commercial life of this ancient city. The excavations are being conducted in the Yenikapi area... So far, the archaeologists have found what they think might be a church, an old gate to the city and eight sunken ships, which archaeologist Cemal Pulak says he believes were all wiped out by a giant storm more than 1,000 years ago... Meanwhile, wall sections that are believed to be part of the Constantine Wall were unearthed in the western part of the excavation site, said Karamut. He added that underground graves dating to the fourth century were also unearthed in the same region.

31 posted on 06/22/2006 8:15:43 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (updated my FR profile on Wednesday, June 21, 2006.)
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· join list or digest · view topics · view or post blog · bookmark · post a topic ·

 
Gods
Graves
Glyphs
Just updating the GGG info, not sending a general distribution.

To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list.
GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother, and Ernest_at_the_Beach
 

· Google · Archaeologica · ArchaeoBlog · Archaeology magazine · Biblical Archaeology Society ·
· Mirabilis · Texas AM Anthropology News · Yahoo Anthro & Archaeo ·
· History or Science & Nature Podcasts · Excerpt, or Link only? · cgk's list of ping lists ·


32 posted on 11/17/2008 9:25:59 AM PST by SunkenCiv (https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/_______Profile finally updated Saturday, October 11, 2008 !!!)
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To: a_Turk
Link.
33 posted on 11/17/2008 9:33:49 AM PST by <1/1,000,000th%
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