2014 Biking Turkey Daily Snippet

11 September, Ankara
Sevecen Otel 84TL

Another super day during which we travelled west of Ankara to the tiny village of Yassihöyϋk, site of the ancient Phrygian capital of Gordion, to view the Midas Mound. Gordion’s most famous king was Midas, whose touch turned things to gold; and it was in Gordion that Alexander the Great cut the Gordion knot in 333BC. Gordion was settled some 3000 years ago by migrants from the Balkans. The Phrygians buried their elite in large wooden rooms which were then hidden under tons of rubble and earth that formed enormous tumuli or burial mounds, in fact sizeable hills. Around 80 tumuli dot the moonscape around Yassihöyϋk, the largest being the Midas Mound at 53 metres in height and 300 metres in diameter. The intact tomb was discovered and excavated in 1957 and today one can walk a lengthy underground tunnel to view the burial room, the size of a small cottage, constructed of pine and juniper logs. Inside the tomb was the body of a man in his 60s and many burial objects including inlaid wood furniture and bronze containers holding the remnants of a funeral feast. (Modern Midas Touch beer was created by reverse engineering the contents of the funerary containers.) Despite its name, the tomb is unlikely to be that of Midas and may in fact be that of his father Gordius. At the museum across the road is the world’s oldest mosaic pavement.