Treasure Hunt at the Jinn Tumulus | A True Horror Story
True Horror Story Summary: This tells of the paranormal events, car breakdowns, and terrifying truths about jinn experienced by a group of friends hunting for treasure at a cursed tumulus on a trip from Ankara to Kırıkkale.
Hello, I wanted to share an incident that happened to me with you and your readers. My name is Oğuz. My family and I live in Ankara, but we are originally from Harikli village, bağlı to the Delice district of Kırıkkale.
In 2003, I went to Russia to work for a company belonging to our village. I worked there for many years and met and befriended people there whom I hadn’t known despite being from the same village. After some time, we all made a permanent return to Turkey. But now, we have a group of friends consisting of nine people, which we call the “Russia Group.” We meet once a week, have samovar-barbecues, and go hunting in the village 3-4 times a year.
It was January 2017. I, Özkan, Şenol, Ümmet, Süleyman, Emre, Bahadır, Cüneyt, and Adem, nine friends, decided to go to the village and go hunting. We asked for the keys to the summer house belonging to my old boss, located below the cemetery at the village entrance, which had a large garden. Thankfully, he didn’t refuse us and gave them. We set off in three cars. We arrived at the village around 10:30 PM. We ate and drank at the boss’s summer house, filling our stomachs. After chatting for a while, around 11:30 PM, we said, “Let’s go hunting.”
I, Şenol, Bahadır, and Cüneyt got into my car, and we set off. The other five went to get Ümmet’s father’s Renault 12 because it had high ground clearance. Ümmet’s father was also the village headman. In Kırıkkale villages, cars like Toros and Broadway were generally used because the roads were bad.
About 3-4 kilometers outside the village, there is a small stream, one of the tributaries of the Kızılırmak river; we call it “Öz.” We headed towards Öz. We were driving slowly for them to catch up, but we saw that the others were nowhere in sight. We waited for a while on the roadside in pitch darkness. As we waited, a Renault car sped past us. Thinking “other hunters,” we didn’t pursue it. Then, when my friends next to me said the ones who passed were our guys, we had already lost them.
We were searching for the others among the fields. It was freezing cold outside. The mud on the ground was frozen solid like asphalt, and there were patches of snow here and there. It was pitch dark. Apparently, our friend Bahadır was terrified of the dark. We had been searching for the others in the fields for an hour but hadn’t found any trace. Bahadır finally lost it out of fear. He turned to us and said in a trembling voice, “I’m hearing the call to prayer in the middle of the night, do you hear it too?” I said, “Son, are you kidding? What call to prayer at this hour?” He insisted, “I swear I hear it, look, it’s being recited, it’s not stopping.” Not wanting to scare him further, we made light of it, saying, “Your brain is playing tricks on you, don’t worry.”
We checked our phones occasionally. Phones usually didn’t get reception where we were. The last time I checked, I had a signal. I immediately called the friends. We agreed to meet at the bridge over Öz. We arrived at the bridge before them and started waiting. About 10 minutes later, they showed up. “What did you do, find anything?” I asked. Ümmet said, “There’s nothing on that side. Let’s check the fields on the left; they usually hang around there. I shot two rabbits last time I came.”
With Ümmet leading, we drove through the fields and finally stopped in front of a hill. One of the friends said, “Get out of the car. No rabbits or anything. Since we’ve come this far, I’ll show you something else.” We got out and followed him. What we thought was a hill was actually what treasure hunters call a “tumulus,” a burial mound where kings or nobles were buried. We climbed to the top of the hill. At the very top, there was an area slightly dug up by one or two excavator scoops. For some reason, they had abandoned it later. Ümmet said he came hunting last week and found bones here. He thought there was treasure under the grave. Indeed, when we hit the spot where the bones came out, a hollow sound came, as if it was empty 30 cm below, like there was a coffin there.
We examined the place a bit, joking among ourselves. We talked about how we could dig, what we might find. Şenol got excited, saying, “Let’s poke around with a screwdriver, see if there’s a loose spot.” Jokes were made like, “You can’t start this without a pickaxe and shovel, should we bring the village imam?” We said, “Okay, we’ll come back tomorrow morning then, no rush.” Ümmet, however, was muttering, “If bones came out, where’s the treasure? Why did they leave the digging and go?”
Thinking about it, an article I read came to mind. According to it, in the past, people used to build nearly a hundred decoy graves in different places to hide the tombs of kings. As we were examining and thinking about how to dig, I heard the sound of a child crying from the dark side. At first, I thought, “Probably children from the village.” Then suddenly, my hands and feet went numb, I felt like I was going to fall. Because there wasn’t even a house nearby, let alone a village. We were in a desolate place. Only the lights of the salt mines were visible in the distance; nothing else could be seen. “I hope what I’m thinking doesn’t happen to us,” I said to myself. What came to my mind, as you might guess, was the possibility that this place was claimed by jinn. Because wherever there is treasure, there is a high probability of jinn.
Of course, while I was thinking about these things, Bahadır, who was afraid of the dark, was looking around anxiously and cursing: “To hell with your treasure and your grave… Let’s go already, I’m going to lose my mind!” Seeing his state, I didn’t mention the crying child sound, not wanting to scare him more. It seemed like no one else had heard it anyway. Supporting Bahadır, I said, “Guys, let’s go already, we can’t dig anyway, we’re freezing,” and suggested, “Let’s get back to the village and figure out what to do.”
Şenol, hearing about the treasure, had gotten very excited. He insisted, “Let’s go to the village, get pickaxes and shovels, come back and dig until morning.” Ümmet, seeing Şenol’s state, fueled him even more, walking around the tumulus saying, “There’s a lot of treasure here, look, there are places on the slope that sound hollow too,” pushing the matter further. We kicked the spots he showed; they really sounded hollow inside.
It was around 4:35 AM, and the weather had become very cold. We were all freezing. As a result of Bahadır’s insistence, we decided to go back to the village. On the way back to the village, Bahadır mentioned he was about to go crazy and said he heard a child crying. I turned to Bahadır and said, “Brother, I swear I didn’t say anything not to scare you, but I heard that child’s voice too.” Bahadır, in shock, let out a string of curses, “But how? Anyway, we’ll talk at the house,” we said.
Before long, we arrived at the boss’s summer house. Let me describe the house a bit: It had two large rooms, two bathrooms, two toilets. Inside, there was a large living room with an American kitchen. The front of the living room had fully retractable sliding glass doors. As soon as we arrived, we gathered around the fireplace. We were quite cold and started talking.
Bahadır began: “You heartless guys, you were going to drive me crazy! You’re joking, but see, Oğuz heard what I heard too!” he said. The friends looked at me, asking for confirmation. In response to their questions, I said, “I didn’t hear the call to prayer, but I heard the crying child’s voice very clearly.” Our friends started joking again and talking among themselves. Some said, “Let’s get pickaxes and shovels, go dig,” while others said, “Let’s sleep.” In the end, we decided to go look when morning came and went to sleep.
The fireplace fire wasn’t enough to warm us. We slept in the freezing cold house. We woke up frequently throughout the night because of the cold. Seeing it wasn’t working, we got up early and prepared breakfast. We were planning to return to our homes today. So we cleaned the summer house and left it as we found it. Bahadır and I were thinking, “Let’s tour the village a bit more, then return to Ankara,” but Ümmet and Şenol wouldn’t sit still. “Let’s go dig this treasure, there’s definitely treasure there, we’ll get rich,” they were egging each other on and had convinced the other friends too. They went and brought pickaxes and shovels from the village.
We locked the house door and were about to get into the cars to go to the tumulus when I saw that the rear tire of my car was flat. “Guys, my tire is flat. We drove through the fields yesterday, probably a tree stump or something punctured it. There’s no spare, this won’t get us anywhere,” I said.
We decided to go in two cars again. “When we come back, we’ll pump air into your tire and check it,” they said. Agreeing, I got into Ümmet’s car. Four of us set off. The other friends were supposed to come in Özkan’s car. We had barely gone 300 meters out of the village when Ümmet’s car first started sputtering, then stopped. We got out and opened the hood. Ümmet said, “There was a problem with the gas regulator, it does this occasionally. It’s probably the same issue again.” Looking back, the others hadn’t moved at all; they were still in front of the garden. Ümmet was fiddling with the car, but whatever he did, it wouldn’t start. Phones started getting reception. We were signaling the other friends from afar to come join us, but they didn’t understand. I told Ümmet, “Let’s push the car to the village entrance.” Ümmet got behind the wheel, and we pushed it all the way to the summer house.
When we reached the friends, they said Özkan’s car had also broken down and wouldn’t start. It cranked but wouldn’t start. I asked Özkan, “Did it run out of gas?” When we looked at the gauge, it showed the car had fuel.
These events couldn’t be a coincidence. It was as if someone was doing everything they could to prevent us from going there. Ümmet, who had been persistently pushing us to dig the tumulus, now started saying, “Son, forget the treasure, let’s fix the cars and go back to Ankara.” Şenol got angry, “Friend, weren’t you the one nagging us about the treasure? Come on, we were going to get rich, what changed your mind?” Ümmet replied in a trembling voice, “Let’s return to Ankara, I’ll tell you everything.” It was clear Ümmet was hiding something from us. We all said, “If you’re going to tell us, tell us here!” Seeing our seriousness, Ümmet said, “Okay, let’s fix the cars first, then I’ll tell you.”
We inflated my car’s tire using Adem’s father’s air compressor. We waited a bit to see if the tire would deflate. Seeing it didn’t, I went to Çerikli town, bought 5 liters of gasoline for Özkan’s car, and came back. By the time I returned, Ümmet had found and fixed the problem with his own car. When we put gasoline in Özkan’s car, it started too. Özkan, seeing the car start, looked at our faces in astonishment. I said, “Man Özkan, your car just ran out of gas!” He replied, “Brother, I swear the gauge showed it had fuel, you saw it too.”
Once the cars were ready to go, I asked Ümmet, “Alright, tell us the story now. Why did you give up on the treasure when you were so eager before?” Ümmet took a deep breath and began to explain:
“An acquaintance, whose name he didn’t mention, arranges for an excavator operator and brings him here one night to dig the site. The excavator digs once, fails to pick up sand, and breaks down. They repair it, it digs again, takes a couple of scoops, and the excavator breaks down again. The men start getting angry, asking the operator, ‘What kind of excavator is this, brother? Didn’t you do any maintenance?’ The operator replies, ‘Man, what maintenance? It’s a brand new excavator, this is the first time it’s broken down.’ After fiddling with it for a while, they get it working again. Just as the operator digs for the third time, he freezes with a terrifying expression on his face, without taking the scoop. They ask, ‘What’s wrong, brother? Dig, why did you stop?’ The operator suddenly throws himself out of the vehicle and starts screaming and shouting, throwing himself on the ground. When the man becomes mute and unable to speak, the treasure hunters realize he’s been possessed by jinn.”
Şenol asked, “Son, are these guys crazy? Why are they digging at night? Are the days too short?” Ümmet replied, “During the day, the gendarmerie detects it quickly. I don’t know if they watch via satellite or if someone reports it, but they immediately shut it down.” “Okay, what happened next, tell us,” we said, and he continued:
“They rush the excavator operator to a hodja in Kırıkkale. The hodja reads prayers, blows, writes amulets. The operator, having recovered, sends a truck the next day, loads the excavator, and leaves without saying anything.”
Hearing this, Şenol got even angrier, “Son, are you crazy? Why didn’t you tell us this before?” Ümmet said, “There was a chance of getting rich at the end of it, cousin. I didn’t know these things were real. There are other things you don’t know,” he said and continued:
“That place was supposedly the first settlement of our neighboring village, Eskiköy. According to rumors, jinn claimed the place, and all sorts of incidents happened. They brought hodjas, but whatever they did, they couldn’t get rid of them. Eventually, the villagers couldn’t cope and had to move the village. I thought these were just rumors.”
Şenol said, “Damn it, Ümmet, are you going to drive us all crazy? Is this the time to tell us this? Tsk!”
We had already set off while discussing these matters. We arrived in Ankara around 3:30 PM. Everyone went home. Bahadır wasn’t feeling well. As soon as he arrived in Ankara, his father took him to a cinci hoca (jinn expert). Bahadır sent a resentful message to the WhatsApp group: “To hell with your village, your treasure, your hunt, your rabbits… They were apparently trying to possess me! I went to the hodja. He said, ‘A jinn touched you, but thank God it didn’t possess you. Don’t go to such places,'” he wrote.
Immediately after, Cüneyt sent a video to the group. He had recorded it while examining the tumulus. At the end of the video, there was an incredibly terrifying sound that everyone in the group noticed immediately. Şenol had also found a cinci woman (clairvoyant) through an acquaintance in Bursa and sent her the video. He spoke with the woman on the phone. The woman told Şenol everything before he even said anything: “You went to a place where there are many jinn, and you wanted to take the treasures they claimed, but you couldn’t,” she said. Şenol said, “Auntie, you’re absolutely right, word for word. Send this to me as a voice recording so my friends can hear it too.” Şenol then forwarded the woman’s voice recording via WhatsApp. The woman briefly summarized our experiences and sent a voice message saying, “My child, stay away from those places. They will possess you there. It’s very dangerous there, never go there again.”
When I told people around me what we had experienced, I was astonished by the stories that emerged about that place. My father’s uncle, the late Mehmet Dayım, existed. One day, while irrigating the field, he stayed until dark. As he was returning to his village on his donkey, he approached a fountain at the beginning of the slope. He saw a group a little further ahead. The group had set up a feast around a fire and were having fun. When they saw Mehmet Dayım, they called out: “Hey, come sit, have a bite to eat, join us,” they said. He approached and looked at the feast; everything imaginable was there. They chatted for a bit while standing, then sat down. Just as he was about to bring the morsel to his mouth, he remembered he hadn’t said Bismillah (In the name of God). One of them shouted, “Don’t you dare say what you’re thinking!” Mehmet Dayım became suspicious and said, “Bismillahirrahmanirrahim.” Instantly, the place filled with dust and smoke, making it impossible to see. When the surroundings cleared, he saw that there was no fire, no feast, and no men. They had all disappeared! The various foods laid out before him had turned into donkey, goat, and cow dung. The morsel in his hand, which he was about to put in his mouth, was also cow dung. He immediately got up and went back to the village, reciting prayers.
I understood that we had narrowly escaped a major disaster. 6-7 months later, when we went to the village, we couldn’t resist our curiosity and went to the tumulus again in broad daylight. We saw that someone had brought an excavator again, dug up half the tumulus, and made a mess. Whether they took the treasure is unknown, but we weren’t sad at all. Because we were grateful that we hadn’t lost our minds.
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