Brownsville herald. [volume] (Brownsville, Tex.) 1910-current, 1928-10-14
TURKEY PLANS
TO DISMANTLE
ANCIENT WALL
1900 Year Old Sur
rounding of Byzan-
tium t. Be Raced
Is Current Report
BY PRISCILLA RING
Associated Press Correspondent

CoNSTANTINoPLE. Oct. 1:.-AI
View Turkey is contemplating an
act of vandalism which history
would o soon forgive her.
The report is abroad that the
mighty walls OF Byzantium which
hvae encircled the seven hills OF
Stamboul for 1900 years. withstood
70 famous sieges and survived "a
dirastrous earthquakes, are to be de-
molished.
With the borrowed western slogan
OF safety first" on his lips, the pre-.
fecs of Constantinople has issued a
statement that the l3-mile chain 81
crumbling majestic stone is a men
ace to the gypsy novels crouching
under its ramparts, that the munich
pality cannot assemble the money
needed for repairs and that the walls
must therefore be pulled down.
The statement says that an effor,
wiki be made 10 save some of the
battlements deemed Of a certain
historic interest" but the latest ad
dition to the Byzantine ramparts
dates from 1850 A. u. and il is diff
ficult 10 understand how the project
VIII find any Of the stones young
enough not TO he "historic."
These are the ramparts which
Schlumberger describes as ''mor1
grandiose than the walls of Rome,
more poetic and more savage than
those Of Ayignon, infinitely more ex-
|, tensive and more important than
those of Ca~rcassone." These are the
ramparts before whose might ever
Attila quailed, and these the wallis
from which the last Of the emperors
OF EASTERN Christendom. Constantine
XII, plunged 10 death when the Otto.
mar Turks Mt last broke through the
mighty barrier in the month of May,
1853.
The traveller 70 modern CONSTANT
ncrla still reaches the city via the
walls whether he comes by land or
sea- From the Simplon Express
which p~ierces the land walls near
the Golden Gate by the Marmora,
the traveller beholds the double line
of battlements thanked by 400 crum-
bling. uncovered towers, stretching
~northward TO the Golden Horn. The
traveller by sea rounds Seraglio Point
where grey fragments of the single
line of Byzantine sea walls still
cling to the shore they once protect
ed from many a hostile fleet, and on
n rare phenomenal occasion from
the crash of icebergs which the swift
Bosphorus hurled down from the
Black Sea.
Beauty, grandeur, mystery, the
history Of mighty centuries. live in
these thirteen miles If stone which
n modern mayor will have no mors
Of. Only one voice in the new Tur-
key has thus far been publicly raised
against this impending outrage. The
Constantinopls Daily "Akscham'
alone among all the Turkish press
attacks the mayor, writing boldly
that the destruction Of the Byzantine
walls will constitute an irreparable
loss which nothing under the sun
can justify, and hazarding the sug-
gestion that il is the imperilled
gypsy novels and not the battle
ments which should com down.
While the dawn of any safety
first" policy in this part of the world
is a healthy indication that the value
Of human life is at last coming into
consideration, the safety method TO
be employed in this case does not
give r%eassuring evidence of the value
now set upon the beauty and the
glory OF the past.