Vardzia cave monastery

A western European travelling in Georgia is again and again struck by the wonders of a cultural heritage which, despite its rich achievement, is almost unknown to the rest of the world. In the middle ages, when the great gothic cathedrals were being built in Europe, marvellous basilicas were also being built in the Caucasus, in their own, distinct style.

On this trip, I travelled for the first time in southern Georgia, visiting the spa town of Borjomi, from where the celebrated mineral water comes. From there I travelled on to the 12th century cave monastery at Vardzia. Founded by the great Georgian Queen Tamar, it is said, in its day, to have had thousands of apartments hewn into the cliff face, as well as a complex irrigation system. Severely damaged by an earthquake a century later, it was ransacked by Persians in the mid-16th century.

So what we see today is an echo of its one-time glory. But it still impresses. Wandering around the caves, neatly carved, with arches, ornate doorways, shelves and alcoves where icons must once have stood. Exploring the tunnels dug deep into the rock brings back the boyish spirit of adventure. The church is well maintained, its frescos vivid and with a liveliness and sense of movement that one often sees in Georgian churches, in marked contrast to the rigid forms of Byzantine religious art that one finds throughout most of the Orthodox world.

A few monks live there now, in a small section of the monastery, their caves fronted by wooden walls, with doors and windows. I watched as a monk rinsed his frying pan, leaning out from the ledge in front of his cave.

Leaving the monastery, I walked down through a long, steep tunnel. At one time, the complex was accessible only by such secret passageways. They did not in the end protect it. But Vardzia is still a marvel to see today.

Travels by dolmuş and marshrutka

Touring in Turkey, travelling between small towns and villages, inevitably meant becoming familiar with the dolmuş, a minivan, or shared taxi. The word means “full”, and originally that meant they left when they were full-up. Nowadays, they mostly go according to a set timetable. If the route is busy, it is wise to turn up a little early to be sure of a place, and to avoid having to sit on a stool between the seats. Generally, they are a bit old and grubby, but I usually found them OK. And they are cheap. Drivers were usually helpful and, despite the language barrier, endeavoured to oblige by dropping me exactly where I wanted, pointing out the next bus I needed to take in case I had to change in order to reach my destination.

A peculiarity of travelling by bus or dolmuş in Turkey, at least in the north-east, is that unacquainted men and women are not allowed to sit next to each other. This adds to the complication of finding a place, as I was obliged to sit in a row of seats with other men. Sometimes, when new passengers were taken on board, people had to be shifted around, to keep the balance of the sexes right.

In more remote places, the dolmuş often transports goods as well as people. Travelling from Yusufeli to the village of Barhal, along a rather rough road, on the roof we had stacks of wooden panels, to line the walls of someone’s house, as well as a mattress. Inside, between the seats, was a television set, as well as sacks of bread and boxes of eggs.

My one really bad dolmuş experience was travelling from Kars to Ardahan. Sometimes, one finds oneself sitting near some rather unwashed people, and one just has to get used to it. But on this journey, there was an individual who was beyond the pale. The pungency of his stench, whose constitutive elements I do not even want to think about, made me retch. I do not believe he had washed either his clothes or himself for months, possibly years. Sitting behind me, he repeatedly murmured to himself in a low, gruff voice. He seemed to be beyond society. I spent most of the journey with a hand tightly clenched over my nose and mouth, in misery. When he finally got out, I thought I sensed a collective sigh of relief.

In Georgia, and around the former Soviet Union, the dolmuş is known as a marshrutka (a Russian word), but it is the same thing. Except that the Georgians have invented added thrills to the business of travel. Georgian driving can be eye-poppingly scary. The disregard for traffic lanes, the habit of swerving from one side to another, of gaily crossing over the central road markings into the line of oncoming traffic, all astonish visitors from countries with more staid driving practices. Then there are the testosterone-charged races I have witnessed down the long boulevards in central Tbilisi. Crossing the road is an adventure in that city. The impatience of Georgian drivers is such that they often cannot bear to wait in the right-hand lane at a road junction, and jump the queue, pulling over into the left lane, scooting ahead when the lights change, just in time to avoid the oncoming traffic. I saw a bizarre example of this in Batumi, when waiting at a railway crossing for a goods train to pass. Impatient drivers on both sides pulled into the left-hand lane, hoping to give themselves an advantage. The result, once the train had passed? Complete blockage, obviously.

I had only one previous experience of riding in a marshrutka, a journey from Tbilisi to Gori and back in 2004, to visit the Stalin museum. Some international organisations ban their staff from travelling by marshrutka, given their drivers’ reputation for extreme recklessness. I learned the reason why during my marshrutka journey from Borjomi to Vardzia, a winding road much of the way, often not metalled, and with steep drops in some places. The driver drove at such a speed that when he was flagged down by would-be passengers he had to slam on the breaks, usually coming to a halt much further down the road, having to back up (also at speed) some way in order to take them on board. He seemed unconcerned for life or limb. How he had made it to middle age driving like that is a mystery. Several times I found myself closing my eyes, unable to watch as he tore into another sharp bend. On two occasions he appeared on the verge of losing control as he hurtled into a bend that was just too tight, slamming on the breaks and struggling with the steering wheel. Once, as we stopped to pick up a party of Ukrainians, I relaxed the grip of my hands on the seat in front of me, and realised that the muscles in my arms were tightly clenched, such was the tension of the journey. Setting off again at the same manic speed, the Ukrainians and I exchanged worried glances. For the Georgian passengers, all was apparently completely normal. What a relief to arrive back in Borjomi in one piece (to change on to another marshrutka for the journey on to Tbilisi).

A visit to Kars

My image of Kars had been formed by Orhan Pamuk’s “Snow”, a dismal novel, in my view, that portrayed it as a bleak and dismal town with almost nothing to tempt one to visit. My reason for visiting was that Kars is the base for trips to nearby Ani. But while I was in Kars, I took the opportunity to wander its streets.

Kümbet Mosque, formerly the Church of the Holy Apostles

Like many places in this region, Kars has multiple influences, handed down from its complicated history. In medieval times, it was for a while the Armenian capital, before it moved to Ani. The tenth-century Church of the Holy Apostles is a lasting monument to the Armenian presence. It has been a church when Kars has been in Christian hands, and a mosque when controlled by Muslims. The building was locked when I was there, but peaking inside, it looked a fine mosque, serene and peaceful.

Although for centuries an Ottoman city, the period in the late-19th and early 20th century when Kars was part of imperial Russia is especially evident in the grid street pattern and the presence of many fine buildings from that era. Or rather, once fine buildings. For while a few of them have been renovated, most are in a dilapidated or completely derelict condition. And that is the picture for most of Kars, the air of decay and abandonment over several decades, the streets crumbling and pitted with potholes, dirt and poverty all around. I was struck by the many little cafes, where, like everywhere in Turkey, men sit and drank tea and play backgammon or card games. Except here many of these cafes have a griminess, a depressing dinginess, I had not seen anywhere else. In some ways they were reminiscent of the state-owned cafes I remember from communist times in Yugoslavia, plain and drab, tables covered with shabby table clothes, and no effort made with the decor. The pictures of Atatürk on the walls remind of the once ubiquitous portraits of Tito. But I never saw anything like the squalor of these places in Yugoslavia. Had these walls ever been repainted? Had the floors ever been cleaned? Had the table clothes ever been washed? These table clothes looked almost fragile, they seemed so old, as if they might fall apart if touched. This is the way some people live in Kars.

The problems of Kars partly stem from the general neglect that most of eastern Turkey has suffered for decades. But there was an extra reason. During the Cold War, Kars was at the end of the road, next to the closed border with the Soviet Union. Cut off from neighbouring Soviet Armenia (its own Armenian population had fled following the Turkish capture of the town in 1920), economic life was stifled. Kars was of no interest, except as a military base facing the Soviet border. And that isolation has not ended, as the border has been closed owing to Turkey’s objection to Armenia’s seizure of Nagorno-Karabakh from Azerbaijan.

There is some evidence of the present Turkish government’s greater interest in investing in the east, its realisation that the country’s Kurdish problem is partly due to the poverty and hopelessness of those regions (Kars also has a Kurdish population). Infrastructure is being improved, new roads built, and even in Kars streets are being dug up and repaired, and some effort is being made to make it look a little bit prettier. And to be fair, Kars does have some better points. There are some nicer cafes and some decent places to eat. It is not altogether bleak. But overall, it is a depressing town, and not a place to linger. Pamuk wrote about Kars during winter, cut off by snow. I was there in summer. But I could recognise the dreariness and decrepitude he described.

Georgian and Armenian remains

The eastern Black Sea region has for centuries been marked by repeated invasions, shattering civilisations and populations, leaving behind ruins. Romans, Byzantines, Persians, Turks, Mongols and Russians vied for control, while the indigenous peoples clung precariously to their patches of land. Yet Georgians and Armenians, as well as the Black Sea Pontic Greeks, all had their periods of ascendency in the middle ages, before their kingdoms were swept away by the next wave of invaders. Those kingdoms and empires left scattered remains that attest to their past glory.

Medieval Georgian church at Barhal

Leaving the Hemshin valleys, I went back to the coast, and then skirted around to the southern side of the mountains, to the little village of Barhal, along a windy, crumbling road from Yusufeli. Barhal is developing as a base for rafting trips along the rapid rivers of these parts, which is the main pull for visitors to the area. The whole region is dotted with medieval Georgian churches, in a greater or lesser state of decay, dating from an era when what is now eastern Turkey was at the centre of Georgian political and cultural life. Many of the churches are in remote places, difficult to access without transport. In Barhal, the 10th century Georgian church is close to the village, and it has survived intact thanks to its longstanding use as a mosque. There is a modern mosque in the village now, so that the old church is used only for Friday prayers. Although still intact, with its roof in place, it is in a sorry state. The conversion for use as a mosque was half-hearted (a cross is still visible on the outside), and it has not been maintained. Along the side aisles, corrugated iron has been placed, presumably to catch falling masonry. Yet it still impresses. The dimensions show that it was once a significant place of worship. Standing at one end of the nave, I find my imagination taking flight, thinking of the civilisation that once thrived here, which has now gone, leaving this magnificent thousand-year old building as its lasting memorial.

From Barhal, I journeyed east to Kars, through a landscape that changed along the way, from lush green mountains and steep valleys, to rolling hills and broader, more open spaces. From Kars, itself an Armenian city as recently as 1920, I visited the medieval Armenian capital of Ani. At its height one of the world’s great cities, with a population of over 100,000, it is now a desolate plain, surrounded by ruined, and partly (crudely) renovated walls, and dotted with ruined churches that have survived the centuries of neglect. It is an eerie place, a ghost city. Some streets have been preserved, with the lower walls of what are thought to have been shops. As at Barhal, walking the streets, or standing inside the churches, I found myself dreaming of the people who were once here, trying to imagine them, listening for their echoes.

Church of the Redeemer, Ani

Apart from Armenians, Ani was at different times in the middle ages taken by Byzantines, Seljuk Turks, Kurds, Georgians, Mongols and Tamarlane, before finally falling to the Ottomans. Falling into decay, it was rediscovered and excavated when the region was incorporated into imperial Russia in the 1870s. In the 20th century, Ani, situated right up against the river that separates Turkey from modern-day Armenia, has become part of the enduring controversy between the two countries. In 1921, the Turkish authorities ordered the military commander to erase all trace of its monuments, an order that was thankfully not carried out.

Church of St Gregory, Ani

Armenia accuses Turkey of chauvinistically neglecting Ani. In fact, it is opening up to tourists now. Some effort is being made to preserve the monuments, and some renovation, notably of the walls and of a Seljuk palace, is taking place, unfortunately in such a way that looks too much like new-build. One of the striking things about visiting Ani is the absence of any reference, in the explanatory notices in Turkish and English, to the Armenian origins of the place. As one enters the site, a potted history refers to Ani as the capital of the Bagratid dynasty, but with no mention of the fact that the Bagratids were Armenian. Walking around the site there is a persistent, exaggerated and distorting emphasis on the, relatively minor, Seljuk Turk heritage of the site (the Seljuks sacked Ani, and slaughtered its population in 1064). A mosque, claimed as the earliest Seljuk mosque in Anatolia, is thought by some originally to have been a palace. The only reference to Armenians that I saw related to a ruined mosque, which, it was noted, had been dynamited by an Armenian priest. So that is the sum of Armenians’ contribution to Ani? Such vulgar nationalist abuse of an important archaeological site demeans Turkey.

By contrast, there appears to be no problem with acknowledging medieval Georgian monuments. Indeed, a ruined Georgian church (in fact just part of one wall) at Ani is acknowledged as such. But Turkey has a peculiar blind spot when it comes to anything Armenian. The earliest monument on the site is the remains of a 2,000 year-old Zoroastrian temple, a group of four columns. Its presence, among the later churches and mosques, further emphasises the layers of civilisations, one replacing another, in this most fought over of regions.

Laz and Hemshins

The allure of north-east Turkey, with its rich Greek, Armenian and Georgian, as well as Turkish heritage, is further enhanced by the region’s ethnic diversity. Its Greeks and Armenians were evicted or massacred nearly a century ago. But the presence of two small minorities, the Laz and the Hemshins, is a reminder of the ancient kingdoms that once held sway in these lands.

This, with western Georgia, was Colchis, the land to which the Argonauts sailed in search of the golden fleece. The land of the Laz, a small people nowadays, inhabiting a stretch of Turkey’s eastern Black sea coast. Their language is part of the same family as Georgian, as well as Megrelian and Svanetian, which are spoken in western Georgia. The Hemshins, who, like most Laz, are Muslim, speak a dialect of Armenian, and inhabit the mountains and valleys just inland from the Black Sea town of Pazar.

The Hemshin valleys

I travelled up to the spa resort of Ayder, in the heart of Hemshin country. Having read that the modern Turkish state, with its insistence on the indivisibility of the Turkish nation, discouraged any manifestation of non-Turkish identities, I was interested to see what evidence of the presence of these two minorities would be apparent. They did not appear shy about their identities. Checking into a hotel in Ayder, I noticed a calendar on the reception desk, with the months and the days of the week in three languages. The first, in big, bold type, I did not recognise. The second, in smaller type, I recognised as Turkish, while the third, in still smaller type, was English. When I asked what the first language was, the receptionist replied proudly, “Lazuri”. It turned out that several of the staff in that hotel were Laz. Trying to communicate with the young receptionist in her limited English, I asked her if she could speak any French or Russian. She answered “no, I speak Lazuri”.

Hemshin women in Ayder

Hemshin women look very fine in their distinctive dress, with a light scarf around their heads, and a second, often brightly coloured, tied around it, with strings of beads hanging under their chins. This appeared to be their day-to-day dress, often even for quite young women, a rare example of folk costumes that have not yet passed into folklore. Hemshins spend a few months each summer in their high mountain villages. Walking in the lush green mountains, swathed in cloud much of the time, with their extraordinary abundance of wild flowers, through our Turkish guide, I asked some of the women we met (and it was mainly elderly women) whether they could speak Hemshin, and in each case they replied that they could, one of them smilingly greeting us with a few phrases, which none of us, including our guide, could understand. Even a young girl who served us tea while we waited for the dolmuş back to Ayder, who was dressed in modern clothes, told us she could speak Hemshin.

So for now the languages and cultures of the Laz and the Hemshin survive, albeit kept alive by a very small number of people. The forces of integration and obliteration threaten. With even small villages in eastern Turkey often having internet access, and with education and media in Turkish, how long can they hold out?

Trabzon, past and present

I had longed to visit Trabzon and Turkey’s eastern Black Sea region since reading Neal Ascherson’s marvellous “Black Sea: the Birthplace of Civilisation and Barbarism”. The historical significance of the Black Sea had barely registered in my education. That crucial trading hub, and the great civilisations that grew up around it. The Greek communities that thrived around the Black Sea for nearly three millennia until the onset of the nation state in the 19th and 20th centuries made their presence an anomaly and finally an impossibility. Medieval Trabzon, renowned for its wealth and splendour, derived from its position on the Silk Road, seemed impossibly enticing.

Today, the city and its surroundings are mainly remarkable for monuments from better days. Most notably, the cliff-hugging Sumela monastery, in the hills about an hour’s drive away from the town. Hastily abandoned by the monks following Greece’s defeat at the hands of the emerging Turkish republic after the First World War, the monastery, which had been left to decay for decades, is now being carefully restored as a museum. Seen from across the valley, it is a magnificent sight, nestled into the verdant cliff face. Inside the grotto where, in the fourth century AD, a Greek monk is said to have found an icon allegedly painted by St. Luke, following a revelation by the mother of God, the frescoes, many in good condition, appear to float on the cave walls and ceiling.

Sumela Monastery

When I was there, almost all the other visitors were Muslim Turks, most of the women wrapped in head scarves. I wondered what they made of this magnificent example of the Greek, Christian heritage of the region? Like me, they marvelled at the frescoes. They took their photos. Perhaps for them, visiting the remains of a vanished civilisation in their country is akin to us admiring Roman remains in Western Europe; too far removed by time to be worrying today. While I was in Trabzon, there was a visiting party of Greek clergymen and nuns. Their visit must have been heavily tinged by regret for their loss. But their presence seemed uncontroversial, as Turkish waiters smilingly served them tea at a cafe next to Aya Sofia, a medieval Greek church in the outskirts of Trabzon.

Aya Sofia, Trabzon

Close to the sea, Aya Sofia has survived intact, thanks to having been for centuries a mosque, and despite having been for a while an ammunition depot. Now a museum, its frescoes uncovered, many of them still in good condition, Aya Sofia is a very beautiful example of a medieval Byzantine church. Less inspiring is the former cathedral in the centre of the old town, where Trebizond emperors were once crowned. Squat and unimpressive from the outside, the addition of a minaret did nothing for its harmony. Inside, its transformation into a mosque was hardly accompanied by any serious attempt at conversion, and it lacks the cool serenity one so often finds in Islamic art and architecture. Of greater interest is the Yeni Cuma Mosque, formerly the Church of St. Eugene, where Mehmet the Conqueror, who went on to capture Constantinople, offered his first Friday prayers after taking Trabzon.

Trabzon today is rather a sorry, dilapidated place. Its crumbling medieval city walls are surrounded by poor neighbourhoods of broken houses and rubble. Perhaps the mess will be cleared away. Indeed, a start appears to have been made, with pleasant gardens planted by one section of wall. Trabzon long ago lost its place as a key Black Sea port, and with the rise of Samsun, along the coast, it looks unlikely to regain it. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the city was flooded by traders from Russia, Ukraine and Moldova, and became known for its “Russian Market”, as well as for the profusion of ex-Soviet prostitutes, known locally as “Natashas”. Both appear to be on the wane now, perhaps due to the dire economic climate, which has affected Turkey too.

Trabzon has never made anything much of its position on the coast, except for its utilitarian value as a port. The old walled city is set back from the sea, on a plateau, with deep gullies around it. Nowadays, like other towns on Turkey’s eastern Black Sea coast, the coastal highway passes along the seashore, cutting it off from the city. Next to the highway, by the dolmuş station, is a grimy stretch of seedy hotels (some of them certainly used by the Natashas). There is no attempt at a seaside promenade (even allowing for the relative lack of interest in beaches in a conservatively Muslim town), no seaside cafes or restaurants. Rather, the life of the city is up the hill, away from the sea, notably at the large square, or “Meydan”, where, throughout the day men, and some women, sit and sip tea, and count their prayer beads.

Impressions of Istanbul

So many Western visitors have recorded their impressions of Istanbul over the past couple of centuries, of its breathtaking views, its monumental buildings, its exotic sights and smells, its mysteries, that it has all become rather clichéd, even if much of it is true. It is an impressive city. The sheer scale of the place, not just its grandeur, but the teeming masses of its people, the hustle and bustle, can be overwhelming.

For two hundred years, under reformist sultans and since Atatürk’s cultural revolution, the question of Turkey’s identity, whether Western or Oriental, has vexed Turks and foreigners alike. The monuments of the glorious Oriental past dominate the Istanbul skyline. The splendid mosques, and Topkapı palace. But, on the Bosporus, there is also the ostentatious 19th century Dolmabahҫe Palace, a consciously Western substitution for Topkapı (although its women were still confined in the harem).

While visiting Istanbul, I was reading Orhan Pamuk’s “Istanbul: Memories and the City” (a wonderful book that went a long way to restoring my faith in Pamuk after reading his horribly tedious novel, “Snow”, which, as I wrote in my first entry on this blog, I hated). Pamuk, himself a child of the Westernising elite, wrote of the melancholy of a city in decline, which had lost an empire, and had disappointed in its attempts to reinvent itself through emulation of the West, destroying much of its own heritage in the process. Writing of the fires that ravaged the city in the 1950s and ’60s (and which had, in fact, ravaged it for centuries), Pamuk described the “loss and jealousy we feel at the sudden destruction of the last traces of a great culture and a great civilisation that we were unfit or unprepared to inherit in our frenzy to turn Istanbul into a pale, poor, second-class imitation of a Western city.”

Wooden houses in Istanbul

But Turkey and Istanbul have moved on. Pamuk’s regret at the loss of so many of the fine old buildings along the Bosporus, and of the city’s old, picturesque (if shabby) poor districts of wooden houses is understandable. With them the soul of the city as it once was fades away. But the city is reinventing itself. Its inheritors are not just the Westernised, secular elite. The waves of more conservative Muslims from Anatolia who have poured into the city in recent decades, swelling its population and changing its character, have discomforted many. Their numbers, the wealth of some of them, and their political clout, expressed through the mildly Islamist ruling Justice and Development Party (AK), have raised the concerns of some pro-Western secularists in Turkey and Western governments abroad, that the country may be turning its back on the West, and returning to its Oriental, Eastern roots. Such fears have been highlighted by recent foreign-policy moves focused on Turkey’s eastern neighbourhood, and the country’s impatience with the EU integration process.

Wandering through Istanbul for a few days, it did not feel like any other European city I know. In Beyoǧlu, where I stayed, yes, the atmosphere was clearly European. But walking down towards Galata, or struggling through the crush in the underpass from Eminönu, or in the narrow streets, crowded with tiny shops and stalls, with swarms of people thronging on all sides, it is a different world. It was not about Islam, although the preponderance of women wearing veils in much of the city was striking. It was rather, for example, the very different approach to personal space. The crush, the pushing, the constant hustling by traders; the exclusively male tea shops, with huddles of men sitting around on little stools, chatting, playing backgammon, slurping tea through sugar lumps placed behind their teeth.

But that is not to say that Istanbul and Turkey should not be considered part of Europe, or that they should be excluded from the EU. Europe has always been a diverse place, and Turkey has for centuries been a part of Europe’s history. South-east and much of central Europe were at one time Ottoman, their landscapes dotted with minarets. But looking forwards, the point is not the history, but what Turkey can offer to Europe, and what Europe can offer Turkey today. Many of the reasons why the EU should open itself to Turkey are well-worn: its strategic importance between Europe, Russia, the Caucasus and the Middle East; the valuable example of a predominantly Muslim democracy, integrated with the West. But there is also the vibrancy of the place, with its young, thrusting population.

I think the melancholic depiction of the Istanbul of Pamuk’s childhood is not the dominant picture of the city today. The headscarf wearing, conservative Anatolians who have elbowed their way into Istanbul in recent decades may not be what the Western elite hoped for. But many of them are successful. They have been building a new city. Neither looking backwards to the Ottomans nor exclusively westwards to Europe, they are energetically remaking their city on their own terms. They are not turning their backs on Europe. Rather it is the EU that has not played straight with Turkey, moving the goal posts and slowing down integration since Cyprus joined the union, and since sceptical governments were elected in Paris and Berlin.

The energy of modern Turkey, with its young and growing population, and its increasingly vibrant and powerful economy, would bring a lot to Europe. So too would Turkey’s increasing authority in its neighbourhood, which it has lately mostly applied constructively. One is tempted to wonder whether old Europe, with its ageing population, rigid employment practices, and barely growing economies is not in fact afraid of Turkey’s energy. Turkey needs Europe too, as an impulse for needed reforms, for greater respect of human rights. If Europe accepts Turkey, Turkey will become more European, though always distinct.

A visit to Sofia

Visiting Sofia, one is struck by the evidence of the overlaying cultures and civilisations, one upon the other, that have replaced, but not fully eradicated those that came before. First there are the ancient remains, the Roman sites that are being revealed as the foundations of new buildings are dug, and by the current work on the metro in the city centre.

The Sveti Sedmochislenitsi Church

Then there are the Ottoman buildings. Ottoman rule ended only in 1878. More survived than, for example, in Belgrade, where very little remains to show it was once a predominantly Muslim city. As the Ottoman Empire gradually retreated and was ejected from central and eastern Europe, from the end of the 17th, and through to the 19th century, the usual pattern was to wipe out all trace of its having been there. Muslims were expelled or fled, and the mosques were mainly destroyed. But Bulgaria was a late-comer to national liberation.

A small town of a little over 10,000 when it was chosen as the capital of the newly independent state, Sofia had been a provincial centre in Ottoman times. Of course, the new nation constructed buildings appropriate for a European capital of a mainly Christian country, notably the enormous Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, named in gratitude to Bulgaria’s Russian liberators. Some Ottoman buildings were converted to new uses, notably the 16th century Black Mosque, the Orthodox Sveti Sedmochislenitsi Church for the past century or so, now unrecognisable as the Muslim edifice it once was. The mosque itself had been built on the site of an earlier convent. Earlier still had been a 4th or 5th century Christian basilica, and before that a pagan temple.

But some of the Ottoman heritage remains. The hamam next to the one surviving mosque is no longer in use, but looks splendid from the outside. Also from the 16th century, and recently reopened after falling into disuse in communist times, the Banya Bashi Mosque is named after the baths. My companion on an evening stroll through the city told me that, as a boy in the 50s and 60s, he and his father went there regularly, as they did not have a bath in their home. And the building in which the archaeological museum is now housed was formerly Sofia’s largest mosque, the Grand Mosque.

A reminder of the pre-Islamic, Christian Balkans is the restored basilica of Hagia Sophia, close to the Cathedral. It was built in the 6th century, before the arrival of the Bulgars, during the reign of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian, who commissioned the great basilica of the same name in Constantinople.

Sofia was perhaps not the most obvious choice of capital for the new state. Nowadays, entering or leaving the city through its soulless, dilapidated suburbs, a wasteland of concrete monstrosities from the communist era, is a depressing experience. But it is a city with roots, with a long heritage. Its city centre, steadily being renovated, is increasingly matching its ambitions.