TABULAR STATEMENT OF THE EVIDENCE OF TRAVELLERS IN RESPECT OF THE FLUCTUATIONS IN LEVEL OF THE THREE GREAT LAKES.
| Year. | Lake Van. | Year. | Lake Urmi. | Year. | LakeGökcheh. |
| 1806 | Jaubert attests a gradual rise in the waters,threatening Arjish and the suburbs of Van (Voyage enArménie, etc., p. 139). | 1811 | Morier attests a relapse. The former island of Shahi hasbecome joined to the mainland by a swampy isthmus during the last twoor three years (Second Journey, p. 287, seq.). | ||
| 1812 to 1829 | Progressive relapse of about 10 feet during this period attested by Monteith(J.R.G.S. 1833, vol. iii. p. 56). | ||||
| 1838 | Brant attests a relapse which, according to thenatives, has effected a gain of one mile in ten years to the plain onwhich Arjish stands (Journal R.G.S. 1840, x. p. 403). | 1834 | Relapse attested by Fraser since his last visitin 1822 (Travels in Kurdistan, pp. 47 seq., andNarrative of Khorassan, p. 321). | ||
| 1830 | A low level, perhaps aminimum, is attested by Monteith. The canal to the Zanga is aninsignificant runnel, supplying the river with the smallest portion ofits waters (J.R.G.S. 1833, vol. iii. p. 43). | ||||
| 1838 | Loftus records a rise on native authority,commencing during the winter. In twelve months, viz., by the winter of1839, the lake is said to have risen nearly 6 feet. In the next two years, viz., by 1841,it is said to have risen altogether 10 to 12feet, necessitating the evacuation of Arjish by the inhabitants,the place becoming an island (Quarterly Journal Geol. Soc. 1855,p. 318). | 1838 | Autumn. Rise attested in general terms byRawlinson (J.R.G.S. 1840, vol. x. p. 8) and more precisely in1839, by Perkins on native testimony (Residence in Persia,Andover, 1843, p. 394). Rise has been gradual. | ||
| 1856 | Lieut. Owerin of the topographicalstaff of the Caucasus, estimates that nearly ⅛th of the waters ofthe lake find an egress through the canal to the Zanga (Petermann’s Mitt. 1858, p. 471). Other evidence goes toshow that in the forties and fifties the lake was certainly higher thanin Monteith’s time. | ||||
| 1847 | Hommaire de Hell attests a relapse (Voyage enTurquie, etc., quoted by Sieger, Schwankungen, p.6). | ||||
| 1850 | Layard attests a rise “during the last fewyears.” Many villages on the margin are partly submerged. Iskele,the port of Van, is still in- habited; but the greater part of thevillage is under water (Nineveh and Babylon, p. 408). [Layardwas perhaps only witnessing the effects of the rise which commenced1838.] | ||||
| 1859 to 1879 | Relapse during this period isassigned to the lake by Brandt (Zoologischer Anzeiger,ii. 523 seq.), from whose observations we may infer aminimum about 1879. Islands had formed; these again had become apeninsula. The canal to the Zanga seems to have been scarcely operativeat all. | ||||
| 1852 | Loftus attests a considerable relapse duringrecent years, said by the natives to have commenced in 1850. Arjish isconnected by a passable isthmus to the mainland for eight months in theyear (op. cit. p. 318). | 1852 | A relapse is attested by Perkins to Loftus (QuarterlyJournal Geol. Soc. 1855, p. 307). | ||
| 1856 | Rise may be deduced from N. von Seidlitz whoseems from a distance to have seen Shahi, an island in October(Petermann’s Mitt. 1858, pp. 228, 230). | ||||
| 1863 | Strecker records a continuous rise during the yearspreceding his writing, as evidenced by Turkish officials of hisacquaintance (Petermann’s Mitt. 1863, pp. 259seq.) | 1891 | Relapse has continued. Treesplanted thirty years ago on the margin of the water at the island ofSevan are now standing some 50feet away, and some 7to 10 feet above thelake level. (Belck in Globus, vol. lxv. p. 302). | ||
| 1875 | A maximum at about this period may be inferredfrom the accounts given by Bishop Poghos of Lim to Dr. Belck(Globus, vol. lxiv. p. 157), and by the Rev. Mr. Cole of Bitlisto Dr. Butyka (Globus vol. lxv. p. 73). From this period thereappears to have been a gradual relapse until 1892, and possiblylater. | ||||
| 1898 | Rise dating backseveral years is attested by Belck and Lehmann. The trees alluded toabove are now standing in the water (Zeitschrift fürEthnologie, 1898 p. 414). | ||||
| 1898 | Günther chronicles arise during the last two years on native evidence(J.R.G.S. November 1899, p. 510). | ||||
| 1898 | Evidence of Oswald and myself infers arise during the last few years. |
The same phenomenon of a rise in level was apparent on the margin of the large lake in the crater on Nimrud. There the brushwood, representing the growth of many years, was submerged; and much had already perished from want of sustenance. All the evidence points to the fact that such changes are of a temporary nature, and that a period of increase is followed by one of decline. The most probable explanation is that they are due to climatic conditions, which, it is well known, are variously operative over cycles of years. In the absence of any observatory in these countries this question is largely a matter of surmise or, at best, of inference. The existence of such periodical fluctuations may be regarded as having been established; it remains to consider the changes of a more permanent order.
We must not forget that at a period relatively recent in geological time this lake of Van was but a part of an extensive inland sea, which appears gradually to have become divided up into a series of basins. There can be little doubt that down to quite a late geological epoch no such barrier had been constituted between this basin and that of the plain of Mush, which immediately adjoins it upon the west. The waters have left their mark upon the rocky boundaries of that plain; and to their action I do not think we should err in attributing the peculiar appearance of the basal slopes of the Kerkür Dagh, where they face the great depression of Mush. To the same period perhaps belong several terraces which may be traced upon the bush-grown face of the southern coast of Lake Van between Garzik and the Güzel Dere. The highest of these is perhaps the most conspicuous, and may be situated at an elevation of a hundred feet or more above the present level. Just as the waters of the plain of Mush were drained away through a narrow opening in the mountains which hem it in upon the west, so it is quite likely that a similar vent was offered by the gorge which cuts through the parapet of Taurus in the direction of Bitlis, and at the present day affords an easy passage to the caravans from the plains of Armenia into the defiles of Kurdistan. Loftus chronicles a tradition that the waters of Lake Van cover a plain that was once studded with villages and gardens. The streams of Arjish and the Bendimahi Chai—and presumably the Khoshab—are said to have met and formed one large river about midway between Arjish and Bitlis. His informants were under the belief that it had issued from the plain through a hole in the earth; and that when this passage had been closed up by a sudden convulsion the present lake formed.[12] This story is at least not lacking in verisimilitude, so far as the existence of a former river is concerned. This river would have probably flowed to the Tigris, of which it would have been the principal branch. The cause of its being dammed up was perhaps the outpouring of lavas from Nimrud, which have formed the plateau between Tadvan and the head of the plain of Mush—a plateau which rises to a height of 680 feet above the lake, and, extending across from Nimrud to the face of Taurus in the south, chokes the entrance to the Bitlis gorge. It is this barrier which actually maintains the lake of Van. No eruptions on this scale are recorded during the historical period; and, of course, it is not impossible that they were originally submarine.
These phenomena, which are partly attested by the ancient lake terraces and in part suggested by the general structure of the country, belong to an epoch which, if quite modern from the standpoint of the geologist, probably lies beyond the range of the archæologist as well as of the historian. Much the same conditions as at the present day appear to have prevailed during the historical period—a vast sheet of water, deep and translucent, dammed up by the volcanic barrier at its westerly extremity. I think there can be no doubt that the permanent tendency of this sheet of water has been to rise in level. Moreover, all the evidence is to the effect that this tendency has been operative in the case of the other two seas. Dr. Belck has recorded that in the year 1890 during the month of July he came across a little lake at the eastern end of Lake Gökcheh, separated from it by a tongue of land scarcely more than 55 yards broad, and connected with it by a stream descending from the mountains and piercing through the isthmus. On the margin of this shallow lagoon, near the outflow of the stream, he discovered an ancient Armenian graveyard of which the stones were under water. When he returned in August of the following year they were only just dry. His visit coincided with the latest stage of a period of decline; and it seems certain that since the time when the cemetery was constituted the norm about which the fluctuations oscillate had risen in a marked degree. The same traveller draws our attention to the interesting circumstance that the three last lines of the cuneiform inscription of Rusas the First (c. 730–714 B.C.), cut in the face of the rock overlooking that same northern lake, have been almost completely destroyed by the erosion of the waters, although placed just above their level in 1891. It seems incredible that the Vannic king should have engraved his memorial in a situation where it would be exposed to the periodical floods.[13] As regards Lake Urmi I need only recall the important discovery of Mr. Günther in 1898. In the islands of that sea he found many species of living animals which could not have crossed the stretch of salt water, amounting to a distance of some 10 miles, that at present separates their homes from the shore. In his opinion the zoology affords conclusive testimony of these islands having been joined to the mainland at no very distant date. Upon one of them he found the skeleton of a wild sheep.[14] The evidence which may be collected upon the shores of Lake Van all points in the same direction of a progressive upward tendency.
Strecker has thrown out the suggestion that this process may be accountable for the junction of the Arjish arm to the main body; and that we may therefore attach some credence to the statements of Pliny that in his time there were two lakes.[15] However this may be, we are not dependent upon such hypotheses, or upon the stories current of submerged causeways or bridges. The three old fortresses of Akhlat, Adeljivas and Arjish all bear testimony to a considerable rise in the level of the lake since the days when they were built. The walls of the first two on the side of the water have either fallen in or are being slowly undermined. Arjish has been permanently abandoned by its inhabitants. Immemorial villages, like that of Kizvag between Akhlat and Tadvan, are being menaced by the latest periodical increase, which seems to have commenced about 1895. Nature herself speaks eloquently in the same sense. An ancient walnut-tree which stands on the rocky bank of the lake in the gardens of Erkizan, a quarter of Akhlat, had already been deprived of a great portion of its foothold when we encamped beneath its boughs in 1898. In the Sheikh Ora crater a giant mulberry, which may have been some 500 years old, was standing with half its roots in the water and was already doomed. The most obvious explanation of this gradual rise in the norm of the lake level is furnished by a cause, which must be constantly operative, namely the increase of sediment deposited upon the bottom. But whether this factor by itself be sufficient to have produced such important changes is a question upon which I am not qualified to pronounce an opinion.[16]
II.—The Ancient Empire of Van
Deep in the curve of the bay, which with minor indentations extends from the promontory and island of Ktutz to Artemid, lies the isolated rock with the mediæval city at its southern foot and the long line of gardens stretching eastwards across the plain towards the slopes of Mount Varag. These various features are disclosed or suggested in my illustration ([Fig. 123]), which was taken from those distant slopes. But before I invite my reader to explore the ancient township, something must be said upon a topic which here fascinates the traveller’s interest equally with the characteristics of the strange lake beside which he sojourns. I have already on several occasions remarked upon the insignificance of the human element in these Armenian landscapes. At Van for the first time we become sensible of a different impression, derived, not indeed from the peoples who now inhabit the country, but from the monuments of a remote civilisation which abound in the neighbourhood, and of which the spirit is wafted towards us across the ages. Here the massive substructures of an aqueduct, there the Cyclopean masonry of the fragment of a wall tell the tale of man’s mastery over Nature, and insensibly conjure the vision of the plains crossed by great roads, the rivers spanned by bridges, the fertilising waters brought from afar. Our curiosity is enhanced by the inscriptions in the cuneiform character which are deeply incised in the hard stone of the various works. But it rises to the degree of fervour when we survey the rock of Van, clearly recognised as the very navel of this old polity. Its precipitous sides are quite a library of inscriptions, carved upon their face in spaces polished by human hands. Square-cut shadows disclose the entrances of chambers hewn into the calcareous mass at a considerable height above the level of the plain. And something in the spirit of the works and in the choice of situation at once distinguishes them from the rock dwellings, such as those at Vardzia near Akhalkalaki, with which we have become familiar during the course of our journey south. It is evident that in their original purpose they were only a feature of a large design which mocks the scale of the existing fortifications.
