Guide
The Manazan caves are not natural: they are a five-storey settlement cut entirely by hand into a tall rock mass on the eastern side of the Yeşildere valley, between the villages of Yeşildere and Taşkale, forty kilometres from Karaman on the road that links them. The rock is a clay-rich limestone, and that is thought to be part of the reason the place was chosen, since it holds temperature and humidity steady; the other reason was security. The lowest two storeys run east to west as rows of small cell-like rooms, positioned to watch the valley in both directions. The upper storeys cut into the high central mass are known locally as Kum Kale, At Meydanı and Oluler Meydanı, the Sand Castle, the Horse Ground and the Ground of the Dead.
Weathering has destroyed the front face of the complex, so there is no longer a clear entrance. The first storey holds a number of rock-cut burial chambers, and among the rooms running east to west on this level several have been identified as chapels, with traces of geometric designs and wall paintings still visible. The largest chapel is at the eastern end; it is barrel-vaulted, and its southern wall, which stood on the slope, has collapsed. There is no firm evidence for when the caves were cut, but small finds from the site point to their being carved and occupied in the sixth and seventh centuries, in the Byzantine period. You need your own vehicle to get there.