The Northwest Anatolian Road System According to XIIIth-XIVth Century Byzantine and Islamic Sources

Abstract

Although human culture, in general, is an outcome of the relations between people and their environment, the impact of geography is more evident on nomadic societies in more specific ways. This impact throughout history has functioned at a basic level in terms of general tendencies, correlativity and continuity in socioeconomic, cultural and political fields. In this regard, it is generally accepted that roads have political, economic, military, cultural, and historical roles in the medieval period. In this article, rather than suggesting that geographical factors are the primary determinants of the history of Northwestern Anatolian region, it will be argued that without an understanding of the natural environment of the area occupied by a given community, it is impossible to understand the history of the region as a whole. We will thus demonstrate the importance of natural surroundings as one of the important historical determinants in the case of North Anatolian geography; and we will attempt to reveal the region's commercial and military roads used in 13th and 14th centuries in the light of a detailed analysis of all available contemporary sources.