Only a small part of this road is visible today. It is a caravan and trade road that the Urartians used about 2,800 years ago, built in the reign of the Urartian king Sarduri II, and it was discovered in the 1980s.
The paved ancient road has been traced beginning 40 kilometres short of Bingöl and following the Saman stream intermittently for about 20 kilometres. It linked Tuspa, the Urartian capital at Van, with Elazığ and Malatya. It lies just south of the main Bingöl-Elazığ road, at Kuruca.
When to go
- Climate
- Across Bingöl as a whole, monthly mean temperatures run from -2.1 °C in January to 26.7 °C in July; the mean stays between 15 and 25 °C in May, June and September; rainfall is heaviest in January (137 mm) and lightest in August (4 mm). Long-term means for 1961-2025 from the Turkish State Meteorological Service (MGM).
