Geo-spiritualities of the flood: Political geologies of the Great Deluge on the mountains of Anatolia

For centuries, the mountains of contemporary Turkey’s Eastern and Southeastern Anatolia region have occupied a central place in religious and spiritual cosmologies about the mythical Deluge. Two mountains, in particular – Mount Judi and Mount Ararat – figure as the final resting place of Noah’s Ark after the Great Flood in creationist Christian and Muslim beliefs. They have been the leading two – and often competing – locations worldwide for those searching for the remains of Noah’s Ark. This chapter examines beliefs and practices around Mount Judi and Mount Ararat as the two most popular mountains among the manifold beliefs about the final resting place of Noah’s Ark in Turkey and beyond. Exploring the geological materiality of Flood narratives, it unpacks the spiritual-political histories and cosmologies that the two mountains are embedded in. Pitched against each other as Noah’s Ark’s resting places, the mountains are also intertwined with territorial imaginaries, colonial and nationalist projects, insurgent movements, and the making of extractive frontiers in the Anatolian Anthropocene. The mountains where it is believed that Noah’s Ark came to rest are geo-spiritual formations that also bear witness to ongoing environmental, political, and cultural catastrophes in a deeply troubled nation-state.