Divers Discover a 3,000-year-old Underwater Castle in Turkish Lake

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Understanding Divers Discover a 3,000-year-old Underwater Castle in Turkish Lake

According to Turkish news agencies, the castle with an underwater fortress is estimated to be about 3,000 years old.

Photographer Tahsin Ceylan, who heads the diving team, told the Daily Sabah that local rumors show that the ruins can be found underneath the lake surface, located in the east of the country. But archaeologists and museum officials said there was probably nothing more to be discovered.

Ceylan and two divers dived and what they found was quite spectacular.

The site is about 1km2 wide, with walls 3.4 meters high in some places. Since there has never been an excavation at this lake, no one knows exactly how many ancient structures are at the bottom of the lake.

The stones used to make the walls will surely be the ruins of the Urartian civilization, an iron age kingdom gathered around the lake. In the past few thousand years, Lake Van has risen several hundred meters.

Lake Van covers about 1,450 square miles, and has been a fairly famous tourist destination. However, Ceylan told the Hurriyet Daily News that he hoped the underwater ruins would attract new tourists, both tourists and international archaeologists.

"When the lake level rises, people withdraw but these ancient buildings are still there. Although there are also a few castle buildings in the lake that are ruined by the water environment, most are still quite intact." - Ceylan said.