Amasya: Fact or Fiction?

I think the Black Sea is my favorite region of Turkey so far. I have not been to the East yet, because I generally fear the snow and cold, but something about the hilly, misty, verdant Black Sea coast really appeals to me.

As that intro may have suggested, Amasya is more or less in the Black Sea region of Turkey. It is one of those places that has been inhabited for years and years, so its local ethnography museum has some great artifacts (and TERRIFYING mostly-exposed mummies of sultans in glass cases, shudder). It also has not one but TWO museums filled with historically informative wax mannequins in two Ottoman-style buildings along the river which are only mildly frightening but overall pretty awesome.

This is what Amasya looks like at night.

The below photo was taken from the bus stop outside of the Education Sciences faculty of Amasya University. Can you spot the reason that I took a picture of the side of a hill?

That's right, our favorite statesman's face is hewn into the living rock...of Amasya.

The below photo is of a statue on the side of the Yeşilırmak river. The river basically anchors the downtown area and makes Amasya seem larger than it really is. As an aside, one of the best breakfasts in recent memory was eaten along the banks of the Yeşilırmak river at a restaurant called Strabon, which I think deserves some kind of plaque for feeding as many Fulbright guests as it has, because if a Fulbrighter visits the Amasya ETA duo, they will probably eat at this restaurant. The gözleme (like a Turkish crepe, usually with cheese inside), which is available only on Sundays, is worth the trip.

So, the legend the statue is based on has uncertain origins, and obviously the Turks claimed it as their own. The nearby mountain Ferhat is named for the hero of the legend, who for love of the princess Şirin tried to win her father's favour and permission to marry her by tunneling through the mountain to bring spring water to his palace. While he was doing this, someone informed him that the princess had died and so he threw himself onto the rocks post-haste. It turns out the princess was not dead, but after hearing the news of her lover's death she also died. Turkish authorities put a fence and a sign by a small channel in the side of the mountain which basically reads "This is definitely the channel from that legend, although historians really don't know if the story is true or where it actually happened." That's how Turkey rolls.