SANLIURFA, TURKEY—The Anadolu Agency reports that traces of a madrassa, or Islamic school, have been uncovered in Harran, a site in southeastern Turkey that has been continuously inhabited for 8,000 years. The city is known to have had five madrassas. This one has been dated to the twelfth century, during the reign of the Zengid Dynasty of the Seljuk Empire. Mehmet Önal of Harran University said the school had 24 aboveground rooms, a monumental door, a portico, and a kitchen, where the bones of sheep and goats were found in hearths and ovens. “This shows us that food was prepared here and people here left the city in a rush, leaving the food on the stove without being eaten, as if thoroughly convinced that Mongols would take over the city,” Önal explained. To read about the twelfth-century summer capital of a forgotten Islamic empire, go to "Minaret in the Mountains."
