Cappadocia

The strange Cappadocian landscape consists of volcanic rocks that were, for many centuries, exposed to erosion. The tufa is soft and can easily be worked. Therefore, people started to make artificial caves; vave dwellers in eastern Anatolia are mentioned in the fourth century BCE by the Greek publicist Xenophon (Anabasis, 4.5.25).

Later, churches were created, which became shelters for refugees during the great wars between the Byzantine and the Sasanian Empires. Several caves are still inhabited.