Abandoned Syriac Christian Village Near Turkey-Syria Border 🇹🇷

🇹🇷 Hey folks! I am Argun Konuk and welcome to another Eastern Turkey vlog. We keep exploring Turkey's amazing cultural diversity.

In this travel video, I visited an abandoned ghost Syriac village named Qelith (Kıllıt). The modern-day Turkish name of the village is Dereçi. It is located in the Savur district of Mardin Province in southeast Turkey, 47 kilometers from the Turkey-Syria border.

Here in this village, I met Sami, one of the last Syriac Christian residents of the area. He gave me a tour of the village and showed me the ancient churches. We also talked about the village, the Syriac community and daily life.

Later on I went to Sami's house and had coffee. There I met his brother who had immigrated to Sweden like pretty much all the Syriacs of the village. I even spoke Swedish with him! As always, I experienced great hospitality like I do everywhere in Turkey.

The village of Qelith is one of the rare settlements in the world where you'll find 3 churches from 3 different sects of Christianity: Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant.

The Syriacs are one of the oldest indigenous people of the Levant area and northern Mesopotamia.

They speak Syriac, a dialect of Aramaic, which is believed to be the language of Jesus.

Originating from the Assyrians, the Syriacs are one of the oldest groups of Eastern Christianity.

Enjoy!

© Argun Konuk