Ephesus....the capital of Rome's Asian provinces

My alarm went off at 6:00 am this morning…..the sky was still dark, but I had to get up and ready myself for the daytrip to Ephesus. On my way to the new mosque, I walked along the familiar path bordering the seafront to the left and the beachfront restaurants, cafes and clubs on the right.  I couldn’t quite determine in some cases whether the handful of people I saw and heard in the predawn light were just starting the day, or finally ending the previous one…..

At the mosque, I stood waiting for the shuttle bus that would take me to the main tour bus.  A moment later, another individual arrived who also appeared to be waiting.  He introduced himself as Faust, an Italian from Sicily with long dark hair, beard, dressed all in black, and bearing a large tattoo on one forearm.  Faust, I soon learned, lives in Amsterdam and works for booking.com handling customer complaints!  I told him that I had booked my hotel here through booking.com, but so far have no complaints…

Our shuttle arrived, and we rendezvoused with the tour bus in Torba, picking up various other passengers from their hotels along the route.  Our tour guide, Ahmet, was cheerful and joking with us in order to jolt us awake.   Enroute to Ephesus, we made two stops – one to eat a Turkish breakfast beside a lake, and the second, a typical Turkish tourist trap trick, to shop at a large jewelry showroom.  There we were “held captive” for 45 minutes, looking at beautiful but expensive gold jewelry and precious gems.

The lake formed over a period of centuries during which continuous deposits of silt in the Menderes River basin gradually filled in, creating an extremely fertile alluvial plain and this large inland lake which is a mixture of sea water and fresh water.  The local people live from fishing these waters, and growing a variety of crops in the rich soil.  Now in September, we saw fields filled with cotton ready to be picked.(This reminded me of the cotton fields of Georgia that I  first saw on a roadtrip to visit my aunt and uncle in Florida when I was 11 years old.  I recall my shock at seeing African Americans living in shacks  as though the civil war had ended yesterday…) Our guide told us that the same fields were used in a successful crop rotation plan that produced cotton in summer, sunflowers in the autumn and rice in the winter months when the fields are flooded. 

We saw many olive groves, as Turkey is a big producer of olive oil. The Anatolia region produces black, green and red olives. I wondered why we rarely see Turkish olive oil for sale in Western Europe, or in the U.S.market where all olive oil is almost exclusively from Italy.  Faust mused that  not much wine is produced in Turkey despite conducive climatic conditions, but we concluded together that this is perhaps due to the fact that Turkey is a Muslim country, secular or not!

Upon arrival at Ephesus, we quickly surmised that off-season or not, this is a big attraction, second only to Cappadoccia. Our guide explained that many buses bring groups from cruise ships that dock all along the Aegean coast.  Nevertheless, Ephesus, or Efes as the Turks call it, did not disappoint.  This was an ancient Greek colony founded near a prehistoric site that has been dated back to 5,000 B.C. The Myceneans and Hittites also settled here. The Greek settlement fell under Roman rule in 133 B.C. and reached its height under the reign of Emperor Augustus.  Ephesus became the capital of the Asian province of the Roman Empire, and was at its peak a city of 250,000, as much as half of this population consisting of slaves. Recent excavations have focused on the so-called “slope houses” located across from Hadrian’s Temple.  Archeologists have uncovered two city blocks of these luxurious dwellings which were two-storied with frescoed walls and mosaic floors.  They were heated by hot air circulated in the walls in winter, and had both hot and cold running water.  The basic plan was peristyle, meaning that each house had an inner courtyard or atrium that provided light and access to air since there were no outside windows.  It is believed that there are approximately 2,000 such houses still under the ground. 

We walked along the three main streets (Kurets, Marble and Harbor Streets ) of this city which is being slowly uncovered by a team of Austrian archeologists. They  have been working since the early 20^th century, but have still only brought approximately 30% of the total  city to light.  Most amazing is the fact that this city, the largest in the ancient world, was established as a port.  The aforementioned silting in of the river basin caused this city to become landlocked as the coast moved further and further away over the centuries. 

At Ephesus we could see the huge amphitheatre, and the impressive Celsus Library from the first quarter of the 2^nd century A.D.  Even in its ruined state, it is a majestic structure that symbolizes Ephesus with its classical beauty and proportions.  We also saw a frieze depicting Nike, or winged Victory as the Romans called her, Our guide claimed that the rope we saw in front of Nike was placed there to prevent visitors from touching the right breast of Nike which is said to bring victory to those who do so!  He said that over many years, her right breast had grown smaller than the left so it is now off-limits.

After the tour, we were driven to the nearby town of Selçuk which has an impressive fortress high on a hill overlooking the city of 32,000.  We had a buffet lunch there included in the tour, and I indulged in a glass of pure, freshly squeezed pomegranate juice. (see photo)

The Museum of Underwater Archeology (Sualti Arkeolji Muzesi)

Here is an explanation of how globalization began....it is certainly not a new concept.....:-)

A recreation of the ancient pottery kilns for firing the amphorae

For my pottery-making friends, Brenda, Geoff and Barbara, here is a depiction of the firing of the ancient amphorae.

This huge cactus was covered with buds about to bloom! Wish I could see them!

A typical Muslim grave marker; I saw a whole cemetery full of these on the way to Akyarlar.

I read this on a mulberry tree....it made me wonder whether Shakespeare might have plagiarized the story of Romeo and Juliet!

This morning after breakfast, I headed for Bodrum Castle to visit the Museum of Underwater Archeology, the brilliant idea of  an American professor (named Bass) from the University of Pennsylvania who had participated in some archeological digs in Turkey while still a graduate student in the 1960’s.  Together with his Turkish counterparts, they conceived this fascinating museum in the heart of the medieval castle which was built as a stronghold by the Knights of St. John after they were chased from Rhodes and before they ended their days on the island of Malta. 

On my way to the castle, I stopped to watch Turkish children during their recess playing ball in the school courtyard.  The school is right near the sea, and all the tourist hubbub.  I wonder what it must be like to grow up in such a place which resembles a sort of paradise for both foreign and Turkish tourists.  Many of the tourists here now are Turks, though today I also heard French, German, Dutch, Russian and Bulgarian.

I spent two and a half hours exploring the excellent exhibits of artifacts found under the sea along the Turkish coast, including an ancient Egyptian cargo from the 14^th century B.C. with bronze-age tools, scarabs and a tiny golden deity figure believed to be the protector of the ship.  There was also an Anatolian ship from the 5^th century B.C. that is referred to as the glasswreck, as it was bearing a huge amount of glassware, as well as thousands of shards of broken glass.  This was an early form of recycling, as the shards were collected by peddlars and resold to be melted down and formed into new glass objects.  The museum has one of the four largest collections of ancient glass in the world.

Another of the museum’s impressive collections is that of huge clay amphorae used to store and transport oil, wine and other foods.  These vessels are tall, with two handles, and a cone-shaped, cylindrical body.  The museum has literally hundreds of them that were found in the various shipwrecks on display.  Some of the ships themselves are partly reconstructed, using the pieces of hull and plank that were found.  Since these shipwrecks are thousands of years old, not much remains of the ships themselves, but amazingly as much as 20% was found in some cases if the hull was resting in sand.  

Other treasures I viewed included coins from numerous ancient civilizations, jewelry, an ancient and primitive chess set, grooming tools including a delousing comb, cooking pots and utensils, swords,  hatchets, anchors….The history of anchors was quite interesting.  Originally, they were just huge stones, but then wooden anchors were developed.  To make them heavier, deep grooves were carved into the base of the anchor, then liquid metal was poured in.  These eventually evolved into the heavy iron anchors we normally think of.

The castle has a number of towers, each dedicated to a different language group of the Knights….hence the English, German, French, and Italian.  Inside the Snake Tower which was used as a hospital, there was a display devoted to objects related to health, life and death, including tiny carved figures displaying different maladies, some primitive surgical instruments (ouch!), and a carved figure of Priapus, son of Aphrodite and Dionysus.  If you have never seen a depiction of Priapus, here is what Wikipedia has to say about him J:

In Greek mythology, Priapus or Priapos (Ancient Greek: Πρίαπος), was a minor rustic fertility god, protector of livestock, fruit plants, gardens and male genitalia. Priapus is marked by his absurdly oversized, permanent erection, which gave rise to the medical term priapism. He became a popular figure in Roman erotic art and Latin literature, and is the subject of the often humorously obscene collection of verse called the Priapeia.

Thus ended my tour of the underwater treasures museum and Bodrum castle.  I enjoyed a break from the sun in the pleasant shaded tea garden of the museum where I drank Ayran (a salty liquid yogurt drink), and ate various dried fruits stuffed with hazelnuts, almonds and pistachios.  I  reserved my place on the bus to Ephesus tomorrow morning.  I have to meet the driver in front of the new mosque (the one with the grocery store in the basement level!) tomorrow morning at 6:45 am!