New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1900-04-08
MODERN CAVE DWELLERS.
PROFESSOR STERRETT ON HIS RECENT
INVESTIGATIONS AMONG THE TROG-
LODYTES OF CAPPADOCIA.

Professor j. r. S. Sterrett. of Amherst College.
who has made interesting Investigations
among the troglodyte dwellings in Cappadocia, re-
Gently lectured upon the subject of these rock
houses before the New-York Society of the Archae-
illogical Institute of America. Much of what ne
said has a basis personal exploration In brief
his remarks
The earliest men We have any knowledge Of dwelt
ing the women and children in common. with the
exception of certain classes, whose wives were in
lilies about them Instead, they drew dead line Line
neighbors to cross. Entrance was made up ladders
Of holes cut in he rock which seem dlfiGnt ior
they lived on serpents. Obadiah's account of
Edam strangely parallels the description of trogo-
dyte regions of Cappadocia to-day.
If you draw line north from Tarsus and east
the land of the modern cave jewellers. Here the
region is entirely volcapic-an Sveriying stratum
Here for area forty miles in diameter there are
and thickly strewn that it is easy to be lost
among them as in great forest. centres OF
The soft stone is easily excavated. for a family
in thirty, days have dug out chamber thirty feet
ings. above the other, sometimes nine stories
three. The egress is often high up, with holes in
the stone for ladders. Many cones have no visible
way to the many dwellings in cliff is long dis
anfe away the 4 rms rs an cb nor N
some OF the cones, trying to carve the large door
ton of Byzantine architectIre, with columns and
arches and saints. nimbi and all. cut in the soft
stone.
stairways to upper stories are like wells, and
inches shelves cut in the side of the walls
the ceiling. These they use for closets or
storeroOms In many cases the externa! walls
have rOtted away. that the interior can be seen
from without. Then the residents make use of the
open chambers dry their fruit in or they turn
them doves. whose eggs form chief article
of diet Many of the windows were bordered with
paint, but no one seems TO know the origin or
purpose of this ornamentation. .
Weird and curious as the country is In general II
has its local variations and contrasts In front or
these residences the inhabitants raise their
vegetables in fertile soil. which, like enough may
be but few feet from desert In one place a
grape grower lived in a house beneath his own
vineyard.
Graves are to be found below the floors Of the
chapelS, and it is clear that the people lived as
the ancient historians said of them, in the same
room with their pigeons and dead.
There is another place in Cappadocta. further TO
the east, where the rock changes into the form or
cliffs. In them the people make their homes.
They build sort of facade in front of the face or
the rock and then excavate far inward as they
please without having to let their neighborS know
how large a residence they own
1t is hard to tell how far back these trogodyte
dwellings, date. But they are doubtless contem-
poraneous with the stone tombs of the Phryglan
kings built 500 b. c. Perhaps they belong to the
DAYS of the Hittites of the Bible thousand
years before the Christian Anyway, they
offer remarkable chance for wonder and thought.