Akdamar Legend
The Akdamar Island, the favorite of the local tourism, is in fact a little island. Its length is one and half kilometers and its width is only 500 meters. But this island hosts a legend spreading beyond borders. According to this legend, a monk lived in Van. The monk had a daughter called Tamara with a proverbial beauty. All young men in Van were in love with her. But Tamara fell in love with a handsome Turkish young man. These two young persons began to date secretly. The monk tried to separate them but he couldn’t. At the end, he found a solution and built a church on the island to imprison there his daughter for life. She took his daughter with him and isolated her on the island. But love surmounts all obstacles. The two young persons made a plan. The young man began to swim each night to the island. Tamara showed him the way with a lantern. But the monk heard about this secret plan after some time. And one night, he put the lantern on a place where the sharp rocks of the island are found. The young man was not aware of this danger; he swam as usual to the island and hit to the rocks and died. And at the moment he went down in the dark waters of the Lake Van, he cried “Ah, Tamara”. Tamara, hearing this cry, threw herself to the lake to follow her lover and joined him in death. So, the island is named after this passion.
Though the word is changed to Akdamar today, the cry “Ah Tamara” keeps ringing in the ears even after many centuries.
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