Description of the attraction
The unique medieval cave town of Bakla is 18 km away. from Simferopol near the village of Skalistoye. This is a fortress in the rocks, with the remains of a citadel, an underground passage and a whole system of caves for various purposes, carved into a limestone rock.
Devil's cave
The southern slopes of the Crimean Mountains consist of soft limestone, which is subject to destruction and weathering, forms natural caves and shelters. It is easy to enlarge the room or expand the cave here - that's why people settled here for a long time.
Not far from the medieval city is the so-called Devil's cave - Shaitan-Koba … Lived here 300 thousand years ago neanderthals … This small four-meter grotto was their home.
A cultural layer was excavated, consisting of the remains of animal bones and flint tools, and a hearth on which food was cooked. Primitive people hunted mainly saigas and wild donkeys. Mammoths were also found then - their bones were also found, but they were far from the main part of the diet.
Cave city
The word "Bakla" itself comes from the Turkic "baklak" - an eggplant for water, a vessel. Here really a lot of "vessels" carved into the rock, only they were not intended for liquid, but for grain … But as the local population called the city, we do not know, the name "Bakla" is of late origin. This is what the inhabitants of the surrounding Tatar villages called these rocks in the 17th-19th centuries. Another version of the origin of the name is from the Türkic word "beans": the cave excavations are similar in shape to beans.
The city arose in the most protected place - on both sides it was covered by a sheer cliff, and on the third - by a cliff. The exact dating of the origin of the settlement here has not yet been established. Some of the buildings and burials belong to the 3rd-4th centuries, and in the 5th century there was already a fully-fledged fortified city.
According to archaeological data, the local population was goths and alans … The Alans are a Sarmatian nomadic tribe that came to Crimea in the 1st-2nd centuries. The first tribes of the Goths appeared in the Crimea later - in the 3rd century AD. NS. and mixed with the Alans, forming a separate ethnic group, which is now commonly called the Crimean Goths. They occupied the mountainous areas of the peninsula. By the 5th century, that is, at the time of Bakla's heyday, the Crimean Goths were already Christians, subordinate to Byzantium and were mainly engaged in agriculture. They spoke their own dialect, close to the Germanic languages - the last traces of this ancient dialect were traced in the Crimea until the 18th century.
This city has become the most northern outpost of the huge Byzantine Empire … In the IV century, an invasion of the Huns swept across the Crimea, but in these places archaeologists did not find any traces of the battles of that time - apparently, the war did not get here. And in the 5th-6th centuries, the Byzantines confidently oust the Huns from the Black Sea region. They build their fortresses on the site of the former ancient Greek cities - for example, in Chersonese, v Alushta … But they are interested not only in coastal areas, fortifications appear in the mountains as well - the so-called "long walls" blocking mountain passes and crossings. The city of Buckla became the northernmost part of this fortification system. The fortress was small. It was designed not so much to resist a large army, but to shelter the local population from danger and to notify the central regions of Crimea about the attack.
The area of the ancient settlement is about a hectare … Bakla was built like an ordinary medieval city: with a strong fortified citadel, a posad and numerous outbuildings around the citadel. At the earliest time, primarily wine was produced here - most of all open buildings associated with wine production. Cisterns, sedimentation tanks and wine storage facilities were cut right in the rock. The fortifications themselves were created in the rock that sheltered the city. In the event of an attack, the city could be defended from the caves. Niches for lamps were found in the caves, staircases and a whole system of passages through hatches and corridors were created by the builders.
Citadel was a rectangle, two hundred meters wide and sixty in length, and was composed of limestone slabs. Traces of two towers have been preserved along the edges of the cliff. On one of them there was a combat platform from which it was possible to fire at the surroundings. The most interesting object is an underground passage-tunnel carved into the rock, which led from the fortress to the city.
The fortress was fighting. She suffered greatly from one of the attacks in the 6th-7th centuries. Traces of destruction and restoration have been found. It was fortified in 841 at Emperor Theophilus, in connection with the more frequent attacks of the Khazars: a new line of walls appeared, and the gap of half a meter between them was filled with mortar. The fortress was rebuilt again in the 11th century. It is about the life of the fortress at this time that we know best.
There was a fairly dense urban development of two-storey houses with three or four rooms, which were separated by streets and alleys. The remains of pottery production and many granaries were found. Crimea was the granary of Byzantium and Bakla was a large grain trading center … One of the granaries has 109 large tanks carved into limestone and two more cellars - and this is only one, and many of them have been found near the city.
Temples of the city
Whole were found in the city eight temples of the XI-XIII centuries … Inside the citadel itself there is a chapel and graves next to it. The rulers of the city were buried here. A complex of two structures was found in the rocks above the city: a temple on the lower tier above the burial ground and a chapel above it, carved into the rock. A long and very low corridor led into it. Burials there are both ordinary and cave ones - and it is unclear which of them appeared earlier.
In another rock there is the remains of a monastery with a system of cells and preserved drawings on the walls … Several more churches were located on the plateau under the city.
There are so many temples that according to one version, this was the seat of the bishop Khazar Kaganate - legendary city Fully … We know the name of this city from written sources, but the exact location is still a mystery. Perhaps it was here, although there are more than a dozen versions of the location of the city. If this version is correct, then Saint Cyril, one of the founders of Slavic writing, has been here. True, the legend says that he found pagans who worshiped an oak tree in the city of Fulla, and in his time Christians already lived here. But there were no such pagans anywhere in the Crimea, so, most likely, the legend is mistaken.
The entire XIII century Crimea is under attack Tatar-Mongols … In 1299, the peninsula was completely conquered Khan Nogai and became part of Golden Horde … Most likely, this was the final point for the city of Bakly. From this time on, it has fallen into disrepair. In the XIV century, no one lives here anymore. New settlements in the district appear already in the 16th century and Crimean Tatars live in them - by that time nothing remained of the Gothic population.
In Soviet times, short archaeological surveys were carried out here by the staff of the Bakhchisarai Museum, who explored all the Crimean cave cities. In 1929-30. a Neanderthal site was found in the Devil's Cave. And the first full-fledged research of Buckla herself began in 1961. Archaeological expeditions worked here for 20 years, until 1981. Archaeologists D. L. Talis and V. E. Rudakov worked here. In the late 70s, the archaeological expedition was headed by the historian Vladislav Yurochkin.
Durnoy Yar gully and Skalistinsky burial ground
As in many places of the Crimea, the ancient burials around Bakla were mercilessly plundered. One of the largest necropolises in Europe is located on the Durnoy Yar gully, near the city.… The burials date back to the 6th-9th centuries. According to them, you can establish the ethnic composition of the then population. Rock burials-crypts were brought with them by the tribes of Alans. Gothic elements in burials can be set according to typical utensils and decorations. But, to our great regret, a catastrophe occurred for historical science: when in the 80s the research stopped due to insufficient funding, the necropolis was almost completely dug up and plundered by "black archaeologists". Up to 90% of the ancient burials were lost. At the moment, the entire gully is pitted with pits and underground passages.
Another burial ground - a little earlier - was fully explored. It was dug up in 1959-60. archaeologist E. V. Weymarn … It has nearly 800 burials. Many utensils and ornaments were found here. By these graves, the date of the penetration of Christianity here is clearly determined. Crosses and other symbols appear only in the 6th century.
Several things from Skalistinsky burial ground now can be seen in the Bakhchisarai Museum. These are brooches, dishes, jewelry, several crosses and belt buckles.
A new stage of excavation at Bakly fell on 2003-2005, but at the moment scientific research is not carried out there, and the remains of ancient buildings and burials are still the prey of robbers. For example, in 2013 a group of "black archaeologists" was detained here. They dug graves in Durnaya Balka and what they thought was valuable they sold, and everything else was simply thrown away as unnecessary.
Interesting Facts
Bakla is considered a mystical place among the local population. The rocks around it have animal forms and animal names - for example, the rocks of the Sphinx and the Serpent.
The geological layers here are so interesting and diverse that geology students come here from year to year to practice. Bakla is considered not only a historical but also a natural monument.
On a note
- Location: Skalistoye village, Bakhchisarai district.
- How to get there: by train from Simferopol to Pochtovaya station or by Simferopol-Nauchny bus to Skalistoye station.
