By the 600’s, the unique social fabric of Cappadocia had begun to fray. Emperors deplored the activism of the Cappadocian hierarchs, who were not afraid to speak out against their temporal masters if they exceeded their authority or ruled in an unjust manner. It became the policy of the Emperors’ to erode the authority of the Cappadocian clergy as much as possible.
Utilising the services of the unscrupulous nobleman John the Cappadocian, the Emperor Justinian imposed heavy taxation upon the monasteries and also sowed the seeds of destruction among the Cappadocian aristocracy. Through the imposition of economic blockades, John was able to break the economic back of the local landowners and appropriate vast farmland for the Emperor. The great social upheaval that result, as well as famine, was to disrupt the hitherto peaceful social structure of the area. Of greater importance however was the impending storm that was gathering in the southeast. In 636, Syria fell to the fanatical Muslims, who with the fervour of the newly converted, swept across Mesopotamia, Egypt and Palestine.
All of a sudden, Cappadocia becomes a borderland. It received its first Arab attack in 647 and for the next two hundred years, Cappadocia would become a vast battleground, a desolate and uncertain place. The continuous Arab raids altered the Cappadocian way of life forever. Hitherto a wealthy, relaxed and peaceful agricultural community, small towns and villages were completely destroyed by successive Arab attacks. Refugees fled to the large cities such as Caesaria, which were fortified and became insular looking. Those that remained behind in the countryside became troglodytes, carving homes for themselves in the harshest of mountains and eking out an impoverished existence, away from the ravages of the Arabs.
Predictably enough, the constant attacks caused a resurgence of monasticism in the mountains, which in Cappadocia are as perforated as Swiss cheese from the endeavours of the cave dwelling monks. At any rate, the large traditional monasteries fell into disuse around 800, as monks opposed to iconoclasm fled to Sicily. It was during this period that the military legend of Cappadocia came into full fruition. The hardy Cappadocians, recruited into the Byzantine army, were assigned as defenders of the borders.
The exploits of these superhuman Akrites, who were able to leap tall mountains in a single bound were immortalized in demotic song and are still commemorated today. In fact, it is argued that the Byzantine epics extolling the Akrites, form the basis of Greek demotic music. Of greatest renown is Digenis Akritas, the son of the Arab Emir Musur and the princess Irene Douka.
In 865, Michael the Third led a massive attack, which swept the Arab marauders out of Cappadocia. His advance was followed up by Basil the Bulgar Slayer who in 871 swept the surrounding regions of Arabs and liberated parts of Syria. The Arabs would never return and the Byzantines would begin their counter-attack. This martial region, would become the training ground of Byzantium’s greatest generals and emperors, including Ioannis Kourkouas, Nicephoros Phocas and Ioannis Tsimisces. Phocas himself was proclaimed emperor of Byzantium in Caesaria, capital of Cappadocia in 963. In the meantime, under the enlightened rule of the Macedonian-Armenian dynasty, Cappadocia was set up as a ‘theme; or state, with its own army and rule.
The privileges of the landowners were restored and once more, the land began to flourish, attracting the great noble families of Phocas, Maleinos, Balantis and Alyatis to its soil. They proved the catalyst for equitable redistribution of imperial lands to the Cappadocians. While being the land of liberation, Cappadocia also became the land that stages the beginning of the end of the Byzantine Empire. It was the scene of the great rout of Manzikert, when in 1071, the Byzantine army was completely annihilated by the Seljuk Turks. That date marked the beginning of a steady migration of Turcoman tribes into Asia Minor. Their pillaging of the Christians of Cappadocia reduced them to a state of penury.
Even more catastrophic was the formation of petty Seljuk sultanates which fought each other and caused Christians to be drawn into bloody civil wars. These sultanates will eventually be unified by Kilic Arslan into the Sultanate of Rum, with its capital at Iconion. The birthplace of the whirling dervishes, their founder, Jelaleddin Al Rumi drew much from the Cappadocian Orthodox mysticism, as did Hadji Bektash, the founder of a popular sect of Islam. During the successive Seljuk and Ottoman occupations, the Greeks of Cappadocia were subjected to the same twists and tortures of fate as all others. However, they tenaciously held on to heir identity.
When after centuries of rule, they began to lose the Greek tongue, they still stubbornly wrote their Turkish with Greek characters, known as ‘Karamanlidika.’ Various ecclesiastical commentaries were published in Karamanlidika by the Patriarchate of Constantinople, and for the benefit of the Sultans. As traders, craftsmen and expert farmers, the Cappadocians, indistinguishable culturally from their Turkish neighbours, stubbornly kept their identity and religion. In the nineteenth century, the neoclassical vogue reached the area, with Greeks like Usta Usak Kalfoglou naming his son, Homer.
The Hatti Sherif (1839) and Hatti Humayun (1856) reforms allowed limited self-expression to the Cappadocians who vigorously founded schools to spread the Greek language as well as cultural leagues. Cappadocian literature flourished. Cappadocian musicians were known for their innovative ways, their progressive character and vivid artistry.
The rembetika songs stem from nineteenth century innovations of Cappadocian music. Sadly, as always in Cappadocian history, the years of peace were dispersed by an oncoming storm. When it cleared, after 1924 the aboriginal inhabitants of Cappadocia had been uprooted and transplanted in Greece. The harsh countryside and the ruined churches, the bones of Hellenism in this forgotten region remain to bear witness to its passing. The land has still not recovered from the loss of its people. And all about the hollows of the mountains, in this great biblical catastrophe, primeval whispers groan in pain: “Εθρηνούν τα δένδρα ηχούντα: που ει ο Αδάμ;” (The trees mourn, crying out: Where is Adam?) For the Cappadocian paradise is no more.
* Dean Kalimniou is a Melbourne solicitor and a freelance writer.