The ancient city of Didyma once connected to the city of Miletus by a long causeway. This Sacred Way was lined with sculptures and votives representing sphinxes, reclining lions, and priests of the temple of Apollo. It is likely that the name "Didyma" originates in Asia Minor...it is similar to a Greek word meaning ‘twins’...referring possibly, to Apollo and his twin sister, Artemis. This site was the center of a great cult statue of Apollo, a colossal temple to the god, and home to an oracle of Apollo.

The Temple of Apollo was of the Dipteros style...meaning; two rows of peripteral columns. The dimension were huge...120 meters long, 60 meters wide and 24 meters high. There were 122 Ionic columns.

Temple of Apollo 313 BC-1 AD Hellenistic Greece

Herodotus, the father of history wrote of ancient Miletus. The city began as an Ionian port in the 11th Century, but by the 7th it had become the most important port city in the area. Under Lydian rule, it became prosperous, and many philosophers and scholars called Miletus their home. Thales, the mathematician, engineer and philosopher of nature lived there, as did the historians Aneximenes and Anaximander. Hecataeus the father of geography also called Miletus his home. Destroyed by the Persians in 494 BC, it was rebuilt in the 470’s BC, and became prosperous again. In 334 BC Alexander the Great conquered Miletus. After his death, the city was ruled by the Attilids of Pergamon. By 200 BC the Romans controlled the city. Finally, in the 12th Century AD, the Seljuk Turks established control over Miletus.

Excavations of the city were begun by the Berlin Museum in 1895. Theodore Wiegand directed the excavations. Many of the architectural monuments, including the Market Gate of Miletus and the Harbour Monument reside in the Pergamon Museum in Berlin.

The Theatre reign of Emperor Trajan Greco-Roman Greece

Bouleterion 2nd C. BC Greco-Roman Greece

Faustina Thermal Bath 2nd C. BC Greco-Roman Greece

In 334 Alexander the Great visited Priene...a city being newly rebuilt under the guidelines of the architect Hippodamus. Alexander donated money to the city and had an inscription placed in the new temple of Athena. Later, the city came under Roman rule, but, as it was no longer of importance as a port city, little construction followed, and Priene remains one of the best-preserved Hellenistic cities. Carl Humann, director of the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, along with Theodor Wiegand excavated the city in the late 1800’s. The market gate of Priene is in the collection of the Pergamon Museum, along with other artifacts.

Athena Temple 4th C. BC Hellenistic Greece

The Theatre 3rd C. BC Hellenistic Greece

The Sacred Way 2nd C. BC Hellenistic Greece

Aphrodisius was an important city in Hellenistic times. It became yet more prosperous under Roman rule in the 5th Century AD. In the early part of this century, French archaeologists excavated. The work continues under the Turkish government with a Turkish director at present.

Theatre 1st C. BC Hellenistic Greece

Temple of Aphrodite 1st C. AD Hellenistic Greece

Stadium 2nd C. BC Hellenistic Greece

The stadium held 30,000 spectators and is one of the best preserved of ancient stadiums.

In 190 BC, the city of Ephesus had 250,000 inhabitants and was the capital city of the Asian province of the Roman Empire.One of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World...the Temple of Artemis was built here. By 262 AD, however, Christianity was a powerful force. By 431 AD, the Third Ecumenical Council was held in the Mary Church to decide church doctrine. It is said that the Apostle John had accompanied Mary here. John wrote his gospel, and died here. Legend says that Mary may have died here, as well.

Justinian, the great Byzantine Emperor, built the Basilica of St. John to hold the Saint’s remains. By the 11th century, the Seljuk Turks occupied the area. Excavations and reconstructions by the Turkish government continue to the present time.

Temple of Hadrian 4th C. AD

Curettes Street 4th C. AD
Celsus Library 135 AD(c)

The Temple of Artemis was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. The temple was a modified dipteral...two rows of columns on the long sides and three on the short. There were 127 columns. It burned the night Alexander the Great was born. A madman named Erostratus set the blaze so that his name would go down in history. The Ephesians began reconstruction, and the following temple was considered yet more perfect and beautiful than its predecessor. The city of Ephesus had, by this time, however, been Christianized, and the temple never drew the same attention that it had in the past. In time, the stones of the temple were vandalized, and then used as construction material. One of the drums is in the collection of the British Museum in London.

The temple was dedicated to Artemis...an Eastern diety originally called Cybele...and later, Diana. The goddess was associated with fertility and growth. Cult sculptures are preserved in the Ephesus Museum.

Basilica of St. John 6th C. AD Byzantine

Isa Bey Mosque 1375 Ottoman Turkey

The Ottoman Empire reached into this area of Asia Minor, and new prosperity came to the people living in the vicinity of the St. John Basilica. Ephesus had been completely abandoned by this time. A building program of Mosques was begun. The town of Selcuk never rivalled the ancient city of Ephesus.

Priapos 2nd C. AD Roman

Artemis the Great 1st C. AD Roman

Artemis the Beautiful 2nd C. AD Roman

Troy is truly a legendary city. In fact, until 1871, people believed it to exist only in Homeric legend. Heinrich Schliemann ( our old buddy from Mycenae) was an amateur archaeologist in the true sense of the word "amateur". He dug for love of history not money. He had read Homer's Iliad and The Odyssey and believed that they told stories of true places that existed on earth, not only in the imagination. In 1871 he began excavations at Troy.

Schliemann's excavation work probably destroyed valuable information at the site. Archaeology was not yet a formal discipline. He also removed works and took them back to Germany without Turkish permission. None the less, his discoveries convinced the world to look carefully at his findings. Schliemann discovered nine layers of Troy…the oldest dating back to about 3600 BCE, and the most recent dating from about 300 CE, during the Roman period. Interestingly, the level called Troy VII seems to have been destroyed by fire at about 1300 BCE which sets it within the framework of the timeline historians set for the Trojan War.