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History of Kayseri


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and Theophilus the martyrs, Gregory of Nazianzus, Gregory of Nyssa and Basil of Caesarea. In the 4th century, bishopBasil established an ecclesiastical centre on the plain, about one mile to the northeast, which gradually supplanted the old town. In it Basil included a system of almshouses, an orphanage, old peoples' homes and a leprosarium, a leprosy hospital. A portion of Basil's new city was surrounded with strong walls and turned into a fortress by Justinian. Caesarea became in the 9th century a Byzantine administrative centre as the capital of the Byzantine Theme of Charsianon.

The Arab general (and later the first Umayyad Caliph)Muawiyah invaded Cappadocia and took Caesarea from the Byzantines temporarily in 647. The city was calledKaisariyah by the Arabs and later Kayseri when it was captured by the Seljuk sultan Alp Arslan in 1064. It became one of the most prominent centers of initially the Danishmendids (1074–1178), and later the Anatolian Seljuk Sultanate (1178–1243), until it fell to the Mongolsin 1243. Within the walls lies the greater part of Kayseri rebuilt between the 13th and 16th centuries. The city became Ottoman in the 15th century.

Thus, there were three golden-age periods for Kayseri. The first, dating back to 2000 BCE, was when the city was a trade post between the Assyrians and the Hittites. The second golden age came during the Roman rule (1st-11th C). The third golden age was during the reign of Seljuks (1178–1243), when the city was the second capital of the state.

The 1500-year-old castle, built initially by theByzantinesand expanded by the Seljuks and Ottomans, is still standing in good condition in the central square of the city. The short-lived Seljuk rule left large number of historical landmarks; historical buildings such as the HunadHatun Mosque complex, KilijArslan Mosque, The Grand Mosque and GevherNesibeHospital. The Grand Bazaar dates from the latter part of the 1800s, but the adjacent
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