TRAIAN FOUNTAIN

Ephesus  

TRAIAN  FOUNTAIN

      This is the structure at the right side of Kurets Street. Its excavation is completed and the structure is partly repaired.  According to inscriptions on the cotnice at the side of the door, it was built between years 102-114 (A.D) and was dedicacated to Emperor Traian between 98-177 (A.D).

 At inscription the word 'neokoros' was used in front of Ephesus word. It shows that town had could make 'Emperor Temple'. If a city was neokoros, it was prestige for the city. Ephesus was in competition with the neighbour cities Smyrna, Tralles and Pergamon. Due to that
 the word neokoros was used at the inscriptions with honour. The building had 'U' shaped plan and two parted columns.

      It had two pools, which covered its middle and the front water was flowing into the pool from a big canal which had Emperor statue on. In the niches
  at the beck of the columns, there were statues of Dionysos, Afrodit and Satirs with the statues of Emperor's family. These statues are exhibited at the ''Fountains Foundlings '' hall of Ephesus Museum.

Hadrian Temple at Ephesus

   It  is the most beautiful building whose restoration is completed on Kurets Street, Temple of Hadrian. Emperor Hadrianus whose name was given to the Temple came to Ephesus couple
 of times. According to its inscriptions, the building was completed on 138. It was being built by P.Quintillus and was dedicated to Emperor. Once while Emperor
 Hadrianus was coming to Ephesus from Athens, the forename Zeus Olympos was given to him. During this visit on 128 (A.D) Emperor has given them the right to make
 temle on his name. Ephesians built the big Temple close to Meryem church. It was called Olympeion, was destructed by Byantium.

  Harian Temple at Kurets Street was in korinth orde and consited of a cella and a platform in the front. The cella door is high and wide. 4 columns at the facade
 carry the arched pediment at the top. There is the head of city goddess Tykhe embroidered on the keystone of the pediment arch. there is a bust of the girl similar
 to Meduza, among acanthus leaves, in the middle of thympanumun, which is above the door.

  At both sides of upper lintel of the door, there is the frieze of Temple. there was Androklos and wild boar, gods and Amozons and Dionysos regiment was embroidered
 on frieze from left to right.

  At the other half of the frieze, from left to right, there was Athena, Selene, a man who can't be identified, Apollon, a woman, Herakles Androklos, Theodosius, son
 and wife of Theodosius Artemis of Ephesus and Athena. While the the temple was repaired after the earthquake in the 4th century (A.D), the fourth which is understood
 that was made quite after a while was pud.

  As it was understood from the inscripted bases, the bronze statues of the emperors, who were emperors at the same times, were exhibited on these bases. These are:
 Diocletian, Maksimian, Constantius Cholorus aand Galerius (A.D. 293- 305).

Temple of Artemis

The Temple of Artemis is one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Cruise customers that their next stop is Kusadasi Port. Their first choice to visit Ephesus Ancient City with Ephesus Tours, in general they visit Temple of Artemis too.

Temple of Artemis at Ephesus.

Ephesus Stadium

Ephesus

The stadium, which is located immediately to the south of the gymnasium, was built by the Emperor Nero (54-68 A.D.). The whole measures 228 x 38 m. , with the tiers of seats resting against the slope of Mt Panayir and the northern section of the cavea supported by vaults. The finds include a number of column capitals and roughly carved marble slabs. The building was later used as a quarry for building materials for use in the construction of the Byzantine castle, with the result that very little now remains. The stadium was used for chariot races, athletic displays and gladiatorial combats and marble reliefs depicting gladiators are displayed along the Marble Way. In the hilly terrain opposite the stadium a number of buildings of uncertain date have been unearthed. These include a fish market, a Byzantine fountain and a funeral chamber thought to be that of Androcles, the legendary founder of the city. The Marble Way (Via tecta) connecting the Artemision to the centre of the city, passed by here. The stadium is now used for the camel wrestling competitions which have gradually become a traditional feature. Every year, in spring, visitors come from all over the country for the festivities taking place during the annual fair.
Ephesus Tours

History of Ephesus

According to the old legends, Ephesus was founded by the female warriors known as the Amazons. The name of the city is thought to have been derived from "APASAS", the name of a city in the "KINGDOM OF ARZAWA" meaning the "city of the Mother Goddess". Ephesus was inhabited from the end of the Bronze Age onwards, but changed its location several times in the course of its long history in accordance with habits and requirements. Carians and Lelegians are to be have been among the city's first inhabitants. Ionian migrations are said to have begun in around 1200 B.C. According to legend, the city was founded for the second time by Androclus, the son of Codrus, king of Athens, on the shore at the point where the CAYSTER (Küçük Menderes) empties into the sea, a location to which they had been guided by a fish and a wild boar on the advice of the soothsayers. The Ionian cities that grew up in the wake of the Ionian migrations joined in a confederacy under the leadership of Ephesus. The region was devastated during the Cimmerian invasion at the beginning of the 7th century B.C. Under the rule of the Lydian kings, Ephesus became one of the wealthiest cities in the Mediterranean world. The defeat of the Lydian King Croesus by Cyrus, the King of Persia, prepared the way for the extension of Persian hegemony over the whole of the Aegean coastal region. At the beginning of the 5th century, when the Ionian cities rebelled against Persia, Ephesus quickly dissociated itself from the others, thus escaping destruction. Ephesus remained under Persian rule until the arrival of Alexander the Great in 334 B.C., when it entered upon a fifty year period of peace and tranquillity. Lysimachus, who had been one of the twelve generals of Alexander the Great and became ruler of the region on Alexander's death, decided to embark upon the development of the city, which he called Arsineia after his wife Arsinoe. He constructed a new harbour and built defence walls on the slopes of the Panayır and Bülbül Mts., moving the whole city 2.5 km to the south-west. Realising, however, that the Ephesians were unwilling to leave their old city, he had the whole sewage system blocked up during a great storm, making the houses uninhabitable and forcing the inhabitants to move. In 281 B.C. the city was re-founded under the old name of Ephesus and became one of the most important of the commercial ports in the Mediterranean. In 129 B.C. the Romans took advantage of the terms of the will left by Attalos, King of Pergamon, by which they were bequathed his kingdom, to incorporate the whole region into the Roman Empire as the province of Asia. Ancient sources show that at this time the city had a population of 200,000. In the 1st century B.C. the heavy taxes imposed by the Roman government led the population to embrace Mithridates as their savior and to support him in his mutiny against Roman authority and in 88 B.C. a massacre was carried out of all the Latin speaking inhabitants of the city, which was then stormed and sacked by a Roman army under Sulla, It was from the reign of Augustus onwards that the buildings we admire today were constructed. According to documentary sources, the city suffered severe damage in an earthquake in 17 A.D. After that, however, Ephesus became a very important centre of trade and commerce. The historian Aristio describes Ephesus as being recognised by all the inhabitants of the region as the most important trading centre in Asia. It was also the leading political and intellectual centre, with the second school of philosophy in the Aegean. From the 1st century onwards, Ephesus was visited by Christian disciples attempting to spread the Christian belief in a single God and thus forced to seek refuge from Roman persecution. Besides enjoying a privileged position between East and West coupled with an exceptionally fine climate, the city owed its importance to its being the centre of the cult of Artemis. For the Christians, the city, with its highly advanced way of life, its high standard of living, the variety of its demographic composition and its firmly rooted polytheistic culture, must have presented itself as an ideal pilot region... From written sources we learn that St Paul remained in the city for three years from 65 to 68, and that it was here that he preached his famous sermons calling upon the hearers to embrace the faith in. one God. He taught that God had no need of a house made with human hands and that he was present in all places at all times. This was all greatly resented by the craftsmen who had amassed great wealth from their production of statues of Artemis in gold, silver or other materials. A silversmith by the name of Demetrius stirred up the people and led a crowd of thousands of Ephesians to the theatre, where they booed and stoned Paul and his two colleagues, chanting "Great is Artemis of the Ephesians! Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!" So turbulent was the crowd that Paul and his companions escaped only with great difficulty. From his Epistles to the communities it would appear that Paul spent some time as a prisoner in Ephesus. Legend has it that St John the Evangelist came to Ephesus with the Virgin Mary in his care. Some also say that it was here that he wrote his Gospel and was finally buried. In 269 Ephesus and the surrounding country was devastated by the Goths. At that time there was still a temple in which the cult of Artemis was practised. In 381, by order of the Emperor Theodosius, the temple was closed down, and in the following centuries it lay completely abandoned, serving as a quarry for building materials. The situation of the city, which had given it its privileged geographical position, was also the cause of its decline and fall. The prosperity of the city had been based on its possession of a sheltered natural harbour, but by the Roman period ships reached the harbour to the west of Mt Pion 1.5 km from the Temple of Artemis through a very narrow and difficult channel. The cause of this was the Meander (Cayster) River, which emptied into the Aegean a little to the west of the city of Ephesus, where it created a delta formed by the alluvium carried down by the river over thousands of years. By the late Byzantine era the channel had been so silted up as to be no longer usable. The sea gradually receded farther and farther, while the marshy lands around the harbour gave rise to a number of diseases, such as malaria. The new outlook that had arisen with the spread of Christianity led to the gradual abandonment of all buildings bearing witness to the existence of polytheistic cults and the construction in their place of Christian churches. In the year 431 the third Ecumenical council took place in Ephesus. Emperor Theodosius convoked another council in Ephesus in 449, which came to be known as the "robber council". From the 6th century onwards the Church of St John was an important place of pilgrimage, and Justinian took measures to protect it by having.the whole hill on which it stood surrounded by defence walls. Shortly afterwards, the Church of the Virgin and other places of worship were destroyed and pillaged in Arab raids. In the 7th century the city was transferred to the site now occupied by the town of Selçuk and during the Byzantine era Ephesus grew up around the summit of Mt Ayasuluğ. The city enjoyed its last years of prosperity under the Selçuk Emirate of the Aydınoğulları. During the Middle Ages the city ceased to function as a port. By the 20th century the silt carried down by the Meander had extended the plain for a distance of 5 km.