Note 84 — Chapter IV · VAN

I must not close this chapter and dismiss the memories of the paradise of Van without bestowing some little space upon the surroundings of the city, which abundantly justify the Armenian proverb. The governing feature of the nearer landscape is the lofty parapet of Mount Varag, distant from the citadel some eight miles in an easterly direction and nearly ten miles from the margin of the lake. The plain rises gradually beyond the limits of field and garden to meet and mingle with those slopes. Spurs connect the mountain with the irregular hill mass on the north of the suburbs, which in its totality appears to be known under the name of Zemzem Dagh. Like Varag itself, these hills are composed of a hard limestone; and their south-westerly extremity is signalised by a very bold, detached crag, standing forth like a sentinel (Fig. 133, and see the plan). This portion of the mass is known as Ak Köpri, which means in Turkish “the white bridge.” That is the name of a straggling quarter, inhabited by Mussulmans, on the north side of the little river and close to the crag.84