1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Angora
ANGORA, or Enguri. (1) A city of Turkey (anc. Ancyra) in Asia, capital of the vilayet of the same name, situated upon a steep, rocky hill, which rises 500 ft. above the plain, on the left bank of the Enguri Su, a tributary of the Sakaria (Sangarius), about 220 m. E.S.E. of Constantinople. The hill is crowned by the ruins of the old citadel, which add to the picturesqueness of the view; but the town is not well built, its streets being narrow and many of its houses constructed of sun-dried mud bricks; there are, however, many fine remains of Graeco-Roman and Byzantine architecture, the most remarkable being the temple of Rome and Augustus, on the walls of which is the famous Monumentum Ancyranum (see Ancyra). Ancyra was the centre of the Tectosages, one of the three Gaulish tribes which settled in Galatia in the 3rd century B.C., and became the capital of the Roman province of Galatia when it was formally constituted in 25 B.C. During the Byzantine period, throughout which it occupied a position of great importance, it was captured by Persians and Arabs; then it fell into the hands of the Seljuk Turks, was held for eighteen years by the Latin Crusaders, and finally passed to the Ottoman Turks in 1360. In 1402 a great battle was fought in the vicinity of Angora, in which the Turkish sultan Bayezid was defeated and made prisoner by the Tatar conqueror Timur. In 1415 it was recovered by the Turks under Mahommed I., and since that period has belonged to the Ottoman empire. In 1832 it was taken by the Egyptians under Ibrahim Pasha. Angora is connected with Constantinople by railway, and exports wool, mohair, grain and yellow berries. Mohair cloth is manufactured, and the town is noted for its honey and fruit. From 1639 to 1768 there was an agency of the Levant Company here; there is now a British consul. Pop. estimated at 28,000 (Moslems, 18,000; Christians, largely Roman Catholic Armenians, about 9400; Jews, 400).
(2) A Turkish vilayet in north-central Asia Minor, which includes most of the ancient Galatia. It is an agricultural country, depending for its prosperity on its grain, wool (average annual export, 4,400,000 ℔), and the mohair obtained from the beautiful Angora goats (average annual clip, 3,300,000 ℔). The fineness of the hair may perhaps be ascribed to some peculiarity in the atmosphere, for it is remarkable that the cats, dogs and other animals of the country are to a certain extent affected in the same way, and that they all lose much of their distinctive beauty when taken from their native districts. The only important industry is carpet-weaving at Kir-sheher and Kaisaríeh. There are mines of silver, copper, lignite and salt, and many hot springs, including some of great repute medicinally. Average annual exports 1896–1898, £920,762; imports, £411,836. Pop. about 900,000 (Moslems, 765,000 to 800,000, the rest being Christians, with a few hundred Jews). (J. G. C. A.)
See C. Ritter, Erdkunde von Asien (vol. xviii., 1837–1839); V. Cuinet, La Turquie d’Asie, t. i. (1891); Murray’s Handbook to Asia Minor (1895); and other works mentioned under Ancyra.