Sturdy and angular like a Lego fort, Bodrum Castle was built at the very dawn of the 15th Century by the Knights Hospitaller who needed a fortified outpost to confront the Turks. To save time they ‘borrowed’ stonework details like pillars and reliefs from the nearby Mausoleum of Maussollos and the fort sprang up out of green volcanic stone over about 30 years – which was quite quick – beginning with the interior chapel. The chapel was renovated in the Gothic style about a hundred years later and then when the castle feel to the Turks in the 16th Century it became a mosque. The thick walls are far too big a job to replace but they have been strengthened and thickened at least twice.

Each of the towers within the walls are unique and each one has its own bit of castle of defend – that way each group within the order lived and worked separately – often decided by which part of the world the knights came from. The inside of the castle was built with the best defensive technology they could muster in the 15th Century, a maddening, weaving maze of corridors leading in from each gate, fully open to the sky for the easiest possible access to people with bows and arrows and boiling liquids wanting to repel visitors.

One of the points of interest for visitors are all the different crests, mottos and patterns carved into the walls. Commemorating battles and particular knights, about 200 still remain but there used to be hundreds more.

Written by  World Reviewer Staff.

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