The Rough Guide to Turkey, 4th Edition (Rough Guide Travel Guides) (Paperback)

by Rosie Ayliffe (Author), Marc Dubin (Author), John Gawthrop (Author) "The easiest way to get to Turkey from Britain or Ireland is to travel by air..." (more)
Key Phrases: few pansiyons, pansiyon owners, frequent dolmuses, Black Sea, Cumhuriyet Cad, Aya Sofya (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
INTRODUCTION

Turkey is a country with a multiple identity, poised uneasily between East and West – though, despite the tourist brochure cliche, it is less a bridge between the two than a battleground, a buffer zone whose various parts have long been fought over from both directions. The country is now keen to be accepted on equal terms by the West, having long been the only NATO member in the Middle East region and, as of December 1999, officially promoted to EU candidacy status. But it is by no stretch of the imagination a Western nation, and the contradictions – and fascinations – persist. Mosques coexist with Orthodox churches; remnants of the Roman Empire crumble alongside ancient Hittite sites; and, despite the fact that Turkey is now a secular state, the country’s heritage as home to the city of the caliphate and numerous dervish orders, plus contemporary Muslim fundamentalist movements, points its moral compass consistently south and east rather than northwest.

Politically, modern Turkey was a bold experiment, founded on the remaining, Anatolian kernel of the Ottoman Empire, once among the world’s largest, and longest-lasting, imperial states. The country arose out of the defeat of World War I, almost entirely the creation of a single man of demonic energy and vision – Kemal Ataturk. The Turkish war of independence, fought against those victorious Allies intending to pursue imperialistic designs on Ottoman territory, has (with slightly stretched analogy – Turkey was never a colony) long been seen as the prototype for all Third World wars of liberation in this century. It led to an explicitly secular republic, though one in which almost all of the inhabitants are at least nominally Muslim (predominantly Sunni).

Turks, except for a small minority in the southeast, are not Arabs, and loathe being mistaken for them; despite a heavy lacing of Persian and Arabic words, the Turkish language alone, unrelated to any neighbouring one, is sufficient to set its speakers apart. The population is, however, in spite of official efforts to enforce uniformity, ethnically remarkably heterogeneous. When the Ottoman Empire imploded early this century, large numbers of Muslim Slavs, Kurds, Greeks, Albanians, Crimean Tatars, Azeris, Daghestanlis, Akhazians and Circassians – to name only the largest non-Turkic groups – streamed into the modern territory, the safest refuge in an age of anti-Ottoman nationalism. This process has continued in recent years from formerly Soviet or Eastern Bloc territories (including even a few Christian Turks or Gaugaz from Moldavia), so that the diversity of the people endures, constituting one of the surprises of travel in Turkey.

It’s a vast country – France would fit within its boundaries with plenty of room to spare – incorporating characteristics of Middle Eastern and Aegean, as well as Balkan and trans-Caucasian, countries. There are equally large disparities in levels of development. Astanbul boasts clubs as expensive and exclusive as any in New York or London, yet in the chronically backward eastern interior you’ll encounter standards and modes of living scarcely changed from a century ago – an intolerable gap in a society aspiring to full EU membership and other accoutrements of Westernization. Governments have sporadically attempted to address the anomalies over recent years, and the 1995-approved customs union with the EU has resulted in a flood of European imports, but it’s debatable whether the modernization process begun during the late nineteenth century has struck deep roots in the culture, or is doomed to remain a veneer, typified by a mobile-phone- and credit-card-equipped urban elite.

But one of the things that makes Turkey such a rewarding place to travel is the Turkish people, whose reputation for friendliness and hospitality is richly deserved; indeed you risk causing offence by refusing to partake of it, and any transaction can be the springboard for further acquaintance. Close to the bigger resorts or tourist attractions, much of this is undoubtedly mercenary, but in most of the country the warmth and generosity is genuine – all the more amazing when recent Turkish history has demonstrated that outsiders usually only bring trouble in their wake.

Turkey has been continuously inhabited and fought over for close on ten millennia, as the layer-cake arrangement of many archeological sites and the numerous fortified heights, encrusted with each era’s contribution, testify. The juxtaposed ancient monuments mirror the bewildering succession of states – Hittite, Urartian, Phrygian, Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, Armeno-Georgian – that held sway here before the twelfth century. There is also, of course, an overwhelming number of graceful Islamic monuments dating from the eleventh century onwards, as well as magnificent city bazaars, still holding their own despite the encroachments of chain stores and suburban shopping malls. The country’s modern architecture is less pleasing, the consequence both of government policy since 1950 and of returned overseas workers eager to invest their earnings in real estate – an ugliness also manifest at the coastal resorts, where the beaches are rarely as good as the tourist-board hype. Indeed it’s inland Turkey – Asiatic expanses of mountain, steppe, lake, even cloud forest – that may leave a more vivid memory, especially when accented by some crumbling kervansaray, mosque or castle.

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--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 896 pages
• Publisher: Rough Guides; 4 edition (August 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1858285429
• ISBN-13: 978-1858285429
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,467,395 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars First steps to Turkey, January 31, 2002

By	steve estvanik (seattle, wa USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Turkey: The Rough Guide, Third Edition (3rd ed) (Paperback)

This is the best single guidebook we've found for Turkey. We escort small groups to Turkey, and the Rough Guide is consistently the best single reference for general and historical information. Combined with the Blue Guide to Turkey, it's easy to plan your trip. As usual with the Rough Guides, it has a lot of information for many types of travelers without sacrificing cultural and historical details. Well organized, with good maps (much better than the Lonely Planet series)

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars The last Rough Guide I will buy, May 21, 2007

By	E. Baker (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Rough Guide to Turkey 6 (Rough Guide Travel Guides) (Paperback)

I found the Rough Guide to Turkey extremely frustrating. It is the most poorly organized travel book I have used. Even good information, if poorly organized, becomes useless. I found myself frequently having to piece together information from 3 or 4 different sections to decipher anything useful.
Transportation information: useless.
Accommodation listing: mixed. Of two hotels marked with their highest recommendation, one was very good, the other the worst we stayed in. After that we stopped using the book's suggestions, and just asked other travelers.
Historical information: good, concise, interesting.
Site and activity information: incomplete or incorrect.
We were traveling independently by public transportation for 9 days throughout northern and western Turkey. Whenever I saw another traveler with a different guide book, I begged to borrow it. My Rough Guide ended up in the trash can.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, accurate, and detailed guide. Best we have used, August 30, 1999

By	Gary L. Barrett (USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Turkey: The Rough Guide, Third Edition (3rd ed) (Paperback)

We used the Rough Guide to Turkey in the summer of 99. Compared to other guides this is the best we have used. While there were a few areas that needed updating, if the guide said a tout would appear to lead you through tunnel, it would happen with uncanny accuracy. Provides almost-guide quality history with substantial detail. Only criticism was that hotel/restaurant not complete but good enough. We used for auto trip Instanbul/Capadoccia/Med coast.