A thousand-year-old industrial site discovered in Harput Castle

Restoration and archaeological excavation work continues at Harput Castle, located in the historic Harput neighborhood, which has been settled since 3000 BC and was surrounded by walls by the Urartian Kingdom in the 8th century, with the support of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the Elazığ Governorship, and Fırat University. Within the scope of the excavations carried out for 11 years under the leadership of Prof. Dr. İsmail Aytaç, Head of the Fine Arts Department at the FÜ Faculty of Education, many historical structures and more than 100 thousand historical artifacts have been unearthed in the castle, which is on the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List.

A thousand-year-old "industrial site" was discovered in the area between two bastions on the western walls of Harput Castle, which was surrounded by walls by the Urartian Kingdom, based on findings obtained as a result of 3 years of excavation work. In the industrial site, which was determined to be a thousand-square-meter complex consisting of iron workshops, smelting furnaces, and storage areas as a result of the excavations, it was revealed that the industrial workshop section was used until the 1850s, based on copper coins, some porcelain furniture components, and other findings obtained later.

Excavation and restoration work continues in the workshops, which were determined to have been actively used during the Byzantine, Artuqid, Seljuk, Dulkadirid, Aq Qoyunlu, and Ottoman periods and are at least a thousand years old.

''THERE ARE SMELTING FURNACES USED FOR DIFFERENT PURPOSES ACCORDING TO INTERTWINED HEAT DEGREES''

Providing information about the area used as an industrial site of the period, Prof. Dr. İsmail Aytaç said, ''The section where the blacksmith workshops are located in Harput Castle is the restored part. This area we see is an area of approximately one thousand square meters. We are in the part that is a cistern at the bottom and a workshop at the top. Our excavations and work on the side continue. In this part, the restorations have been completed and it has been opened to visitors. There are smelting furnaces used for different purposes according to intertwined heat degrees. Next to them are the iron ingots found here. These ingots obtained in the region were brought here and turned into products. Some were made into products using the casting technique, and some were turned into products using the forging technique, especially after being shaped. A large number of arrow and spearheads, metal horseshoes and nails, ornaments, and furniture components were found here''.

''WE UNDERSTAND THAT MORE MILITARY EQUIPMENT WAS PRODUCED DURING WARTIME''

Stating that the thousand-year-old industrial site was used until 150 years ago based on the objects they obtained, Prof. Dr. Aytaç said, ''We understand that more military equipment was produced during wartime. There is also a workshop section where works related to daily life were produced during peacetime. It would not be wrong to call it the industrial site of its time. We can say that the workshop section is at least a thousand years old and was used until the 1850s. Both a copper coin found here and some porcelain furniture components and other findings show that this place was used until those dates. When the military garrison in Harput Castle moved to the city in the 1860s, this place gradually fell out of use and was then covered with soil. We carried out its excavations as industrial heritage and brought it to the point of being brought into tourism''.