ABOUT OLD HOUSES AND CAVES IN CAPPADOCIA

In whole history, Cappadocia hosted multiple civilizations. Obviously, all of them had different cultures and traditions and it effected architecture too. Today you can find houses in caves and stone houses that humans used to live.

The first local peoples in Cappadocia were hunting with tools they made and eating wild plants. Due to both harsh and cold weather conditions and many dangers in nature, they settled in caves or rock shelters, and abandoned their nomadic life. Since tuff is so easy to carve, they picked to live in here. Whenever they want they were making the place wider or adding some stairs in it etc. It was also incredibly suitable for hiding from attacks. Living inside caves leaded to creation of underground cities. Peoples who realize the comfort of living in the underground city, decided to move religious places into underground. Even today, oranges,lemons etc. that are coming from another parts of Turkey are keeping in underground places. Also , the way they build this caves were providing them approximately 16 degrees of weather for both of winter and summer season.

After cave-carved shelter type houses, peoples dceided to move into stone houses . Since, the region is pretty rich for stone, it has benefits like providing a serious insulation against heat and cold, and is very easy to process when it comes out of the quarry has made it popular in the area.

Today, its still a legal requirement that having yellowish-beige looking houses with maximum of 3 floors in some parts of Cappadocia.

STONE HOUSE IN URGUP