Afyon, Turkey
Tourism

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poppies grow in the countryside around the town, making the area one of the world's largest producers - hence also the town's name (meaning "black opium castle"). Cultivation and processing for the pharmaceutical industry are both strictly controlled; penalties for possessing drugs are severe and prove an effective deterrent.

Formerly a halt on the caravan route between the Aegean and Konya, Afyon remains an important road and rail junction to which cereals and wool are brought for onward shipment. Merchandise produced in the town and surrounding countryside includes carpets and intarsia-work. The springs in the vicinity of Afyon are justly famous, the well-known "Kizilay" mineral water coming from this area for example.

History

Some historians identify Afyon's citadel hill with Hapanuva (mid second century B.C.), a fortress from which the Hittites held sway over the native Arzawa. Already settled in the Phrygian period when it was called Akroinos, the town was later absorbed into the Pergamene Empire, afterwards becoming a Roman possession and later, in 395, Byzantine. It achieved fame as a result of the battle (in 740) in which Leo III successfully repulsed an Arab incursion. The Seljuks under Alaeddin Keykubad I (1219-36) enlarged both the town and the fort, at that time known as Karahisar-Sahip after the Seljuk vizier Sahip Ata. In the 17th century when the Ottoman Empire began to collapse, the town was the center of a pasha revolt.