Ancomah

Ancomah (Antzomakh, Antzimah) is a mythological place which was first mentioned by Hasan Umur in the 1940s. It is approximately fifty meters inland near Trabzon, Turkey. It is a place on the lower slopes of a mountain.

According to the story, Ancomah had been a very rich city before the Bosporus appeared. With the existence of the Bosporus, the relationship between the city and the sea disappeared and the city was abandoned. According to the people who live in Baltaci River, the city was so near the sea the iron rings which were used to tie the ships can be seen, but no one has seen them yet.

One of Umur’s friends who lived in Divran, the closest town to Ancomach, talked about extraordinary features of the city. “We hear from our grands that there was a town. People would use special iron pipes to pour needed milk from the plateaus.”

Today there is a small lake about 30 metres wide and the people believe that there is a fortune under the water. Apparently, when the city became far away from the sea, the king understood that the city had no value anymore. He had a big hole dug near the river, placed his valuable goods and then poured wax on it. After the wax became rigid, he created a small lake by pouring water using a secret waterway. Antzomakh derives from antique Greek (αντίμαχος) “a place to meet in wartime” (Homer, Iliad 4.123, 132, 138, II. 12.188).

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There is also a Greek village in Kos ( _tr. İstanköy) island in Aegean Sea called Αντιμάχεια (coord|36|48|39|N|27|5|59|E|) with probably the same word origin and perhaps similar origin of the legend.

The legend is reminiscent of the Atlantis of Plato, and connection of the term "Atlantis" and "Antzimah" has been suggested. In the Trebizond region, an archaic Greek dialect persists since the 7th century BC, with the oldest traditions and fables and most of the village’s names same as antique Peloponnese.

ee also

*Atlantis
*Trabzon

References

* [http://www.karalahana.com/english/archive/folklore.html Ancomah] Özhan Öztürk Black Sea: Encyclopedic Dictionary (Karadeniz: Ansiklopedik Sözlük. 2. Cilt. Heyamola Publishing. Istanbul. 2005. ISBN 975-6121-00-9.