Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1921-08-16
new CAPITAL OF TURKEY
SivaS Has Long Been a City Of i'm
pOftdnCe.
NOTABLE INCIDENTS OF The PAST

Turks Have Been Forced to Retreat
From the Railroads Far Into the
Back Country.
IF the so-called 'Apgora govern
ment' of the Turkish Nationalists has
left Angora and shifted its capital TO
Sivas, as dispatches state, following
the defeat of its armies by the Greeks
in Asia Minor, it has truly moved into
the Turkish back country says bull
letin from the Washington, d. c., head
quarters of the National Geographic
Society. In fact it might also be said
TO have moved from the twentieth GEN.
tury into the thirteenth. Angora is
the rail head of the only steel highway
that peretratcs northern Asia Minor.
Beyond this outpost Of the age of ma
chinery the country is wholly depend
ent for transportation on the camel and
other beasts Of burden, operating over
roads that are far from good Sivas
lies more than 200 miles east Of An
CORA and over 100 miles south of the
Back sea.
THE city exists, however, in a region
that reached a very high state of de-
vclopment long before the smoke of
putting locomotives ever darkened an
Asian landscape and it is no mean city
as cities go in it's part of the world. 1t
is credited with popufation OF $1,000,
and is therefore about the size Of Lit
tie Rock, Ark, and Sacramento, Cai.,
cities with which It has the further
point in common that it is the capital
of state or vi&yet.
May Be Turkish Ruhr.
"Sivas is situated on high plateau
WHICH is bleak and even frigid IN vim
ter when the blasts from the steppcs of
Central Asia swirl around and over
the Caucasus and give the region "a
climate comparable TO the snow-swept
plains Of Russia. But it is by no
means a waste country. The grain Of
the plateaus of the Vilayet of Sivas
and the fruits from its valleys help to
feed the less favor ed sections Of Tur-
key. 1t Is rich in copper, iron, coal and
other valuable minerals, and if an lii.
dustrial Turkey ever rises Sivas may
be it's Silesa or its Ruhr
'.When Rome was the ruling power
of the world, Sivas thcn Sebastcia)
was one of it's chief border cities. Al
menian kings ruled 1T for n while, ana
under the Byzantincs it was. the sec
ond most important city in Asia Minor,
being surpassed only by Caesarea to
the southwest.
IF in a union station for camel
caravans in the Bagdad Of Harun-al-
Rashid's day there was the counterpart
of the train -crier Of today, Sivas must
have been often on his lips, for ii lies
in strategic position between Bagdad
and points west A few years later il
became the metropolis of the Seljuk
Turks empire in Asia before they
moved westward and captured Con-
stantinople.
when Marco Polo visited the city in
the thirteenth century it was one o.
the show places Of the Near East and
had a population of about 100000. At
that time the city was noted for It's
fine rugs and carpets, but now that in
dustry has passed farther west.
One of the Most Heartless Acts in
History.
when the Seljuks had the seat OF
their empire in Sivas their architcctu-
raj arts fourished. The colleges which
they built there in the thirteenth CEN
tury are among the finest remains of
Moslem art to be found in Asia Minor.
Perhaps the most despicable act or
cruelty ever perpetrated on sacked
city, even in part Of the world where
cruel tyrants have been numerous, was
inflicted on Sivas lr 140O by the noto-
riOus Timur- the Lame. He caused
thousands Of children to be trampled TO
death under the hOofS OF his war
horses, and followed this monstrous
proceeding by having 40C0 of the de-
feated Armenian defenders of the city
buried alive. Since it went through
that narrowing experience the city has
never risen to position Of any great