[206] The rule of the Seljuks was followed by that of their Tartar conquerors. In the first half of the fifteenth century Erzerum was in the keeping of the Turkomans, from whom it was wrested by the Ottomans under Mohammed II. [207] The name Erzerum dates from Mussulman times, but its exact derivation is obscure. It may either signify the land (Ard in Arabic, Arz in Turkish) of Rum, or of the Roman Empire; or it may be compounded of this last name and of the name of an unfortified town in the vicinity which was known as Artze or Artsn. It is quite probable that this town was at an early date called Artze of Rum to distinguish it from another Artze in the south of Armenia which lay within the Persian sphere. [208] Local tradition places the site of the first of these Artzes close to the present city and on or near the banks of the Kara Su. We know that the place was sacked by the Turks in the middle of the eleventh century; [209] and according to Saint Martin the survivors took refuge within the walls of Theodosiopolis, to which they transferred the name of their own populous town. [210] However this may be, the ancient Armenian name of Karin is still applied to the present city. [211] The monuments of the Eastern Empire have been seen in Erzerum by modern travellers; and the chain of history has not been broken in a manner to disparage the identity of the Roman fortress with this key to the Asiatic dominions of the Ottoman Turks. CHAPTER X RETURN TO THE BORDER RANGES--THALATTA, THALATTA! From Erzerum to the Black Sea, at the nearest point, near Rizeh, is a distance as the crow flies of 88 miles, or, measured to Trebizond, of 114 miles. Yet the distance by the main road to the ancient capital of the Grand-Comneni is little less than 200 miles. [212] This large discrepancy is due to the great height of the block of mountain on the north of the plain of Erzerum, and, more especially, to the essential character of the sea of troughs and ridges, interposed between the town of Baiburt and the coast. The Turkish Government have built a magnificent chaussée across this country, constructed in the seventies by French engineers. But whatever its value in time of war, it has failed to revolutionise the methods of transport in vogue from immemorial time. Vehicular traffic is conducted between the termini in summer, and in winter the journey is feasible on a sledge. But the camel, the mule, and the packhorse are still the principal means of carriage, and the caravan has not yet fallen into disuse. With horses which were short of work after their long rest in Erzerum we reached Trebizond during the height of winter in six days.