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Photo: Gordion Archive, Penn Museum, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
This large settlement was the chief city of the Phrygians, and previously a stronghold of the Hittites. It suffered a devastating fire in 800 BC but was rebuilt, only losing its importance under Cimmerian / Persian rule from 540 BC. Its three sites are visited on the same ticket.
Gordion was the capital city of ancient Phrygia. It was located at the site of modern Yassıhüyük, about 70–80 km (43–50 mi) southwest of Ankara, in the immediate vicinity of Polatlı district. Gordion's location at the confluence of the Sakarya and Porsuk rivers gave it a strategic location with control over fertile land. Gordion lies where the ancient road between Lydia and Assyria/Babylonia crossed the Sangarius river. Occupation at the site is attested from the Early Bronze Age continuously until the 4th century CE and again in the 13th and 14th centuries CE. The Citadel Mound at Gordion is approximately 13.5 hectares in size, and at its height habitation extended beyond this in an area approximately 100 hectares in size. Gordion is the type site of Phrygian civilization, and its well-preserved destruction level of c. 800 BCE is a chronological linchpin in the region. The long tradition of tumuli at the site is an important record of elite monumentality and burial practice during the Iron Age.
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Duatepe was another strategic stronghold on elevated ground. It's now the site of the most extensive set of statues commemorating the battle, including one inspired by a photo of Kemal Atatürk taken while he was observing the battleground on a pair of binoculars.
Sakarya Şehitleri ve Zafer Anıtı
The monument was built in 1973 on a wooded hill just north of the centre. You enter through a military cemetery: turn right for the museum, which exhibits photos and documents from the battle. Then a stairway between 21 pairs of slabs – one for each day and night of the battle – takes you to the flat top of the hill; the stairway is said to symbolize the unknown fate the battle would bring and the relief at its end. On the summit is the main statue of three figures.