Altıntepe — "Golden Hill" — is a low conical mound rising out of the plain about twenty kilometres east of Erzincan. From the seventh century BC it was a fortified outpost of the Urartian kingdom, the rival of Assyria that controlled most of eastern Anatolia for around three hundred years. Excavations have uncovered a temple complex, a columned audience hall with frescoes of striped lions, royal tombs, and an open-air sanctuary built over an earlier shrine.
The site itself is modest at ground level — outlines of foundations, a partial reconstruction of the temple platform, a small site museum — but the location is extraordinary. From the top of the mound the whole sweep of the Erzincan plain spreads out below, ringed by mountains. The combination of plain ruins and dramatic landscape is much more rewarding than the on-site interpretation suggests.