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Both of these city gates are located along the western stretch of the fortification wall of the Upper City. Both display two doorways originally built as parabolic arches, flanked by towers. In each doorway there used to be a pair of huge wooden doors which swung open toward the interior on pivots set in the large stone sockets. They thus match the two great city gates in the southern curve of the wall enclosing the Upper City, the Lion and the Sphinx Gate, save that these in the north boast no sculptural ornament. The Lower West Gate is visible from the street, that is, past the Kizlar Kaya to the northwest. It must stand just over a path which-hundreds of years before this wall was ever built-led up out of the valley nearly parallel to the postern wall you see today. The Upper West Gate, on the other hand, lay further uphill out of sight from the street. It served as an entrance to the high ridge in the west of the new city, a district not yet archaeologically explored. |
