Unexpected discovery while 'saving' ancient monastery on steep cliff

Since its founding in the 4th century AD by some of the first Christians to arrive along the Black Sea coast, the Sumela Monastery has witnessed the rise of the Roman Empire into the Byzantine period, the rise of the Ottomans, Turkey's struggle for independence after World War I, decades of vandalism and neglect, and then a miraculous revival in modern times.

Sümela's tumultuous history makes one think it's a site that appears to have been created by artificial intelligence or computer graphics. In fact, the chapel, courtyard, library, living quarters, bell tower, aqueduct, and a sacred spring are all encased in rock and perched precariously on a rocky outcrop nearly 300m above a wooded river valley in the Pontic Alps .

Every day, thousands of visitors, including religious pilgrims, are mostly attracted by the splendor of the frescoes and early Christian architecture along the cobblestone path to the monastery.

Sümela Monastery is located at an altitude of nearly 300m above the valley below.

This place is now a national museum and no longer belongs to a religious community.

The monastery has undergone years of restoration to ensure it is safe for tourism and to minimize damage caused by fires, treasure hunters, vandals and chaotic visitors.

'We always have problems with falling rocks. To avoid damage to structures and harm to visitors, we hire climbers to protect the cliffs,' said Levent Alniak, manager of museums and historical monuments in Trabzon province.

Suspended in mid-air, climbers use steel cables and large metal stakes to secure steel nets and railings to the towering cliffs above the monastery.

The ongoing restoration has uncovered unexpected treasures such as a secret tunnel leading to a previously undiscovered chapel, which may have been used as a lookout post to protect the monastery.

Inside the chapel, archaeologists found impressive frescoes depicting heaven and hell, life and death.

Historical and legendary origins of Sümela

According to legend, Sümela originated in 386 AD and was a miraculous discovery by the Greek monks Barnabas and Sophronios.

They were drawn to this remote land by the statue of the Virgin Mary and Saint Luke the Apostle hidden in the Pontic Alps.

The priests discovered this sacred relic (a portrait of the Virgin Mary and the Child Jesus which they named Panagia Soumela) in the cave that later became the Rock Church.

Sümela is popular with both Christian and Muslim pilgrims, and was a Greek Orthodox monastery until the early 20th century.

Many Greeks living in the Pontic Alps and the nearby Black Sea coast chose to relocate to Greece, including the monks of Sümela Monastery.

Fearing robbery during their journey to Greece, the monks buried the monastery's treasures in secret locations in the Altindere Valley , hoping to retrieve them at some point in the future.

The abandoned monastery attracted treasure hunters looking for its precious objects. Panagia Soumela was eventually restored by priests and is now kept inside the Nea Sumela Monastery in northern Greece.

However, some relics were smuggled out of Türkiye and are now in museums or private collections around the world.

By the 1970s, the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism initiated the first efforts to preserve and renovate Sümela as a national treasure.