Şebinkarahisar

Can a mineral hide in a town’s name? The “şebin” in Şebinkarahisar is said to come from şap, the alum this land has yielded for centuries. Karahisar, the other half of the name, it owes to the dark basalt hill rising above the town. So the name is like the town’s own map: alum beneath the ground, a black rock above… Alum was once used to fix dyes in cloth and to treat hides; so who knows in which colorful fabrics, sold in which distant bazaars, the white crystals from this town’s soil lived on…