Turkey Guide
Lake Van and the southeast
İshak Paşa Sarayı
Six kilometres southeast of Doğubeyazıt, the İshak Paşa Sarayı (Tues– Sun 8am–5pm; 5YTL), is a half-ruined seventeenth-century palace set on a 2000-metre-high plateau overlooking the town. The designer seems to have taken elements from every architectural style extant in Anatolia and incorporated them into the palace's construction: Selçuk, Ottoman, Armenian, Georgian and Persian influences are all clearly evident.
A fortress was constructed here in Urartian times, later the Selçuks and Ottomans built castles to control east– west traffic on the Silk Route. The palace itself, more Xanadu pleasure-dome than military stronghold, was begun in 1785 by Çolak Abdı Paşa, a local chieftain of uncertain (Kurdish, Armenian or Georgian) background, and completed by his son, İshak Paşa, in the nineteenth century. According to legend, the Armenian architect had his hands amputated once he'd completed the work to prevent him from building anything else as magnificent. Another legend asserts that the palace originally had 366 rooms, one for every day of a leap year. By 1877 the complex was already in decline, being used by the Turkish army as a barracks; subsequent periods of Russian occupation set the seal on its decay.
You enter via a grandiose gateway, which once boasted gold-plated doors: the Russians removed these in 1917 during their retreat from Anatolia, and they're now on show at the Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg. From the outer courtyard, an ornately carved portal leads to a smaller, inner courtyard. Straight ahead of you is the harem entrance, while to the right is the entrance to the selamlık or men's quarters. The tombs of İshak Paşa and his favourite wife stand in a türbe in one corner of the inner court.
The harem contains fourteen fireplace-equipped bedrooms (in which four hundred soldiers were quartered in 1877) overlooking the valley below, a kitchen and two circular bathrooms. At its centre is a colonnaded dining hall.
The selamlık also contains a library, bedrooms and a fine mosque, retaining much of its original relief decoration and ceiling painting. You can reach the roof of the chambers adjoining the mosque, giving fine views of the domes and points of the skyline. Across the valley is a mosque dating from the reign of Selim I, who defeated the Persians at the battle of Çaldıran (70km south of Doğubeyazıt) in 1514, and a much older fortress dating from Urartian times. The visible remains, however – excepting an Assyrian relief – are more recent. The foundations on the plain below are all that's left of Eski Beyazıt (Old Beyazit), a city founded by the Urartians. It was inhabited until 1930, when – in the wake of an unsuccessful local Kurdish rebellion – the place was forcibly depopulated and the new Doğu (East) Beyazıt founded in its present location.
Practicalities
To reach the İshak Paşa Sarayı take a taxi from Doğubeyazıt's Atatürk statue for about 10YTL return (this includes waiting time). If you're visiting out of season, ask your hotel or a travel agency to confirm opening times, as these can sometimes be a little erratic. There's a teahouse/snack bar above the entrance gate and a basic campsite (Murat Camping) on the road below the palace, charging about €2 a tent, with a restaurant and washing facilities.