Table of Contents
Matthew LaCroix films a walk over megalithic ground in Turkiye, titled as Korzut and Cavustepe, with Robert Schoch and Hans Oreheim. The talk on the hill is mostly LaCroix’s, with Schoch’s measurements folded in. Much of the standing wall, he says, is local limestone cut from the ridge. Dark volcanic columns are different. They are not native to this mountain, and broken pieces lie scattered downhill. He reports Schoch judging a central block at least twenty tons and some columns around seven to ten tons, plus a quartz-rich sandstone harder than the volcanic stone and andesite. LaCroix doubts that an ordinary bronze-age or iron-age toolkit explains the labor, and he leaves energy or vibration as a guess. Bedrock ledges, he says, brace the walls in earthquakes and hold the slope. A Haldi temple and a fertility shrine are treated as later. His question is whether older stone was stripped, patched, and claimed. He also rejects the usual label of false windows for a three-opening design. The dates remain what these three propose on site.
Key points
- LaCroix narrates the walk, and he reports Schoch’s tonnage and hardness judgments from the ridge.
- Local limestone forms much of the visible wall, while the dark columns are said to come from elsewhere.
- He thinks the labor sits awkwardly with a simple bronze-age or iron-age toolkit.
- Bedrock ledges, in his reading, brace the masonry in earthquakes and keep the hillside from sliding.
- Urartian pottery and a Haldi temple are treated as later than some of the stone he is questioning.
- He doubts the textbook label of false windows for a three-opening design he sees as a signature.
Short quotes
Stone right here in the center is at least 20 tons
Matthew LaCroix, Schoch and LaCroix on the Turkish stones
He repeats the geologist’s on-site figure for the block in the middle of the wall. Watch at 2:31
I believe it was part of an old storage area likely during the urartian time period
Matthew LaCroix, Schoch and LaCroix on the Turkish stones
Walking the upper ground, he reads a jar-filled space as storage from the Urartian period. Watch at 17:33
These are what were called false windows but there are no holes underneath to be Windows
Matthew LaCroix, Schoch and LaCroix on the Turkish stones
He rejects the textbook label for these stones because nothing underneath them opens like a window. Watch at 46:21
Video by Matthew LaCroix. Watch on YouTube.