A Note on the South-eastern Borders of the Empire of Trebizond in the Thirteenth Century

Abstract

The churches of Ispir and Bayburt, standing in dominant positions in the castles which command these towns, inevitably prompt the question “Who built them?” A final answer cannot be given until the two sites are excavated or documentary sources are discovered, but the circumstantial evidence, both historical and stylistic, provides a number of indications for their origin. Both Ispir and Bayburt stand in an area which has always been a marcher land, and in the Byzantine period it was in dispute many times between the Armenians, the Georgians and the Byzantine Empire, with the Persians and Arabs, and later the Turks also making their claims in the area. Ispir castle stands on a rock dominating the middle reaches of the River Çoruh, the Acampsis or Boas of the Ancients, and apart from commanding a part of the river valley which is wide and fertile, it is more or less a half-way halt for the direct route northwards from Erzurum across the Pontic mountains to the sea at Rize.

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