EPHESUS

HISTORICAL NOTES

The first traces of occupation of the area where the city of Ephesus later stood date back to 5000 B.C. During the Bronze Age, the hill called Ayasoluk (from Hagios Theologos) was already the site of a fortified settlement; it was probably the site of Apasa, mentioned in Hittite sources of the mid-2nd millenium, from which the Hellezined name Ephesus would have derived.

Only a few individual tombs remain of the Minoan settlement and the Mycenaean emporium which were founded here. Numerous legeds flourished in antiquity on the birth of Ephesus, but the most popular myth attributed its foundation to the hero Androclus, son of King Codros of Athens, to whom the oracle had predicted that he would have founded a city guided by a fish and a boar.

After many wanderings, Androclus arrived at a locality in Asia Minor, running into some fishermen who were cooking fish. While he was with them, some burning coals fell out of the hearth and onto a nearby bush, waking up a boar that, as it fled, indicated the site of the future city to the hero. In reality, there is very little information on Ephesus in the Archaic Age; genereally speaking, it is believed that Ionic-speaking peoples coming from the Westsettled in the region in around 1100 B.C., at first remaining separate from the native inhabitants.

In the place where Artemision later rose, there had originally already been a sacred area dedicated to the ancient local goddess, the Great Mother of nature, men and animals, and plant life, who was assimilated by the Greeks into Artemis. In the most ancient period, the population had settled around this sacred area, as well as in the plain that stretched at that time as far as the sea, and in the saddle between the city’s two high spots. These three settlements, populated by peoples of different origins but now inhabiting together, would allegedly from the first city of Ephesus. In around 700 B.C., the city, which had become a member od the Ionian League (a confederation of Asian Ionian cities whose center was in the sanctuary of Poseidon on the peninsula of Mycale), progressively consolidated şts position in the Meander Valley and successfully fought off an attack by the Cimmerians, an Asian tribe related to the Scythians who had invaded Asia Minor, bringing death and destruction.

By the 6th century B.C., Ephesus had become a place of great cultural and philosophical development.

In around 560 Croesus, the king of Lydia, after imposing his hegemony over the city, promoted the creation of the first large marble temple dedicated to the goddess Artemis, which is incorporated and replaced more ancient buildings of worship that had stood on the site since the 8th and 7th centuries B.C. At the same time, the Greek population was forced to abandon the fortified city on the northern slopes of Mount Pion and to integrate with the indigenous population in a single settlement situated around the sanctuary. The hegemony of the kingdom of Lydia over Ephesus did not last long: when Croesus was defeated by Cyrus in 546 B.C., Ephesus, like all the cities of the Ionian League, fell into Persian hands, but unlike the other cities, it did not later take part in the Ionian revolt that ended with the destruction of Miletus in 494 B.C.

After the Persian wars, Ephesus was a member of the Delian-Attic League, maintaining its autonomy from both Athens and Sparta; from 386 B.C. it returned under Persian rule, up until the time of Alexander the Great. After Alexander’s death in 323 B.C., the city became the object of the disputes of his successors: ruled first by Antigonos Monophtalmos, after 301 it fell under the control of Lysimachus of Thrace. Lysimachus planned a new city, intending it to be the capital od his kingdom, moving the site from the plain to the area between Mounts Pion and Coressus (today’s Panayır and Bülbül Dağ). The new city was laid out according to Hellenistic urban planning rules, with a regular plan and impressive defensive walls enclosing a vast area, almost certainly never completely occupied. Considerable streches of the walls built by Lysimachus remain along the entire edge of the two high lands. Two gates have been identified, the one called “Magnesia”, in the saddle between the hills, and the one below the northern slopes of the Bülbül Dağ, through which the sanctuary of Artemis was reached.

Among the characteristics of this new city, worthy of mention is the creation oftwo agorai, one for commercial use and the other for civil and political purposes.

Of the ancient urban layout, only the street running between the city’s two high points, Curetes Street, called Embolos in antiquity, was preserved.

Until the king’s death, the new foundation was called Arsinoeia, named after his wife, Arsinoe.

The Battle of Corupedium (near Magnesia ad Sipylum, or the present-day Manisa, on Mount Sipylus) in 281 A.D. brought the death of Lysimachus and turned the city over into the hands of the kings of Syria, the Seleucids, with an interval from 246 to the end of the century durig which it was under the power of the Ptolemies, the kings of Egypt.

After the defeat of the Seleucids in the Battle of Magnesia in 190 B.C., the Romans forced Antiochus III, with the peace treaty of Apamea (188 B.C.) to surrender the territory of Asia Minor, as far as the Taurus mountain chain, to the Attalids, the kings of Pergamon.

After about sixty years, Ephesus came definitely under the possession of Rome in 129 B.C., as per the testamentary instructions of Attalus III, the last king of Pergamon.

The rapacity and injustice of the Roman government during the Republic were among the reasons for the hate that developed against the new rulers, and for the enthusiasm with which, in 88 B.C., Ephesus joined the revolt of Mithridates VI, king of Pontus, which brought about the slaughter of 8,000 of the Italic population residing in the territory.

In 86, Sulla took back the city and punished it by revoking its freedom, which was not restored until the mid-1st century. B.C. Caesar went there in 48 B.C., after the Battle of Pharsalus and his victory over Pompey. Later Marc Antony did also, in the year 41 to obtain money from the province, and then again in 34-33, together with Cleopatra. With the advent of Augustus, the city enjıyed a long, stable period of tranquility and prosperity and became, in 29 B.C., the seat of the Roman governor of the province of Asia.

The cultural and economic growth of Ephesus, which became one of the chief metropolises of the ancient world, continued to increase during the 2nd century A.D. The Roman city copied and extended the Hellenistic layout: the main axis consisted of the great colonnade, 500 meters long, which led to the harbour.

Another porticoed street, called Stoa of Damianus (after a 2nd-century A.D. sophist who had designed its layout), joined the city with the Temple of Artemis. Numerous other streets such as the so-called “Marble Street”, flanked by porticoes, fountains nymphaea, and baths, enriched the urban layout of the imperial Roman Age.

The decline started, in parallel with that of the entire eastern part of the empire, with the failure of the security at the eastern borders and with the progressive decrease in trade, to which, for Ephesus in particular, was added the slow silting up of the gulf because of the silt deposits from the Caystros River.

Nevertheless, the city enjoyed a considerable historical and monumental importance even during the Christian Age, when churches were erected on Ayasoluk Hill, where, according to tradition, the tomb of St. John the Evangelist was located, between the harbour and the hill of the archaic temple, the “Double Church” of St. Mary. Ephesus was the site of the third Ecumenical Council, and in 395 it became part of the Eastern Empire until the 14th century, when it was conquered by the Selçuk Turks (1375). Then, from 1426, it became part of the Ottoman Empire.

The archaeological excavations, carried on by O. Benndorf, the first director of the Austrian Archaeological Institute, began in April 1895 and have continued in successive campaigns up to the present day.

THE ARTEMISION

When the Ionian peoples landed in the Caystros plain, they found the sacred area dedicated to a female deity who represented the local aspect of the great Anatolian goddess, the Mother, the lady of fertility, vegetation, life, and death. The Greeks, although they lived separately from the natives at first, introduced into the sanctuary the gods they had brought with them from their homeland, so that the area held various cult buildings, which date from the 8th and 7th century B.C.

In around 560 B.C., King Croesus engaged Chersiphron of Knossos, his son Metagenes and Theodoros of Samos to erect a large temple to the ancient goddess, whom the Greeks had by then associated with the goddess Artemis, and who had remained, or had become once again, the dominant deity of the sanctuary.

The study of the various building phases of the sanctuary is not simple, because of the total destruction of the part above ground and the presence of a water-bearing layer below, which must be continually emptied with a draining pump.

The Archaic Temple

The temple ordered by Croesus was an exceptional work of colossal proportions, with a stylobate measuring 55.10 x 115.14 meters, making it the largest in the Greek world and, what is more, the first monumental building constructed entirely of marble.

The building was dipteral, without and opiasthodomos, and various theories have been suggested as to the arrangement of the columns, of which no traces remain, but which was followed, in the general layout, in the subsequent Hellenistic Age temple.

The archaic temple already had the characteristic, like the Didyma temple of Miletus, of having the bottom part of the columns engraved with figures. According to Pliny, there were 36 columnae celata, and fragments of them have been found, one of which has an inscription on its base with a dedication to Croesus, confirming the words of Herodotus (I, 92), who stated that the king offered the sanctuary “the golden heifers and most of the columns”.

The Hellenistic Temple

According to the ancient accounts, the temple was destroyed by a fire, set by a madman named Herostraus in 356 B.C., on the same night Alexander was born. The fire caused great damage, because the ceiling of the temple was made of wood; we also know that Alexander, before leaving for the expedition against Persians, made a sacrifice amidst the temple ruins and offered to shoulder the costs for the rebuilding, an offer which was courteously turned down by the Ephesians.

The new temple, those architectect was Cheirokrates (or, according to another interpretation, Dinokrates, Alexander’s architect), was erected on the foundations of the previous one, with the difference that it was raised by 13 steps, while the archaic building had a rather low platform, which was inadequate for the weak nature of the soil.

There was the same number of new columns with reliefs as in the previous version; according to the most common interpretation of a passage by Pliny the Elder (Nat. Hist., XXXVI, 21, 95), the height must have reached 18.40 meters, and one of the columns was allegedly carved by Scopas, the famous sculptor born on Paros, who lived between 420 and 340 B.C. The peristasis kept, on the wings, the dipteral arrangement of the older building (with two rows of columns), but the western façade now had three rows of columns. An examination of coins has made it possible to establish that the front pediment was decorated with sculptures and a graphic reconstruction has been attempted.

It is this temple of the 4th century B.C. that was considered one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, and which Pliny called “the light of Asia”.

The entire sanctuary must have contained many other sculptures and paintings also; according to the Greek scholar Strabo, Praxiteles was believed to have worked on the altar. The richness of the donations made to the goddess also made the sanctuary one of the region’s most important economic and banking centers.

The Altar

Opposite the temple’s façade, therefore to the west of it, there had been an altar since the archaic period, but the structure we know best is that of the Hellenistic-Roman Age.

It was a large rectangular construction, accessed from the western side, which occupied an area of 32 x 22 meters, and it was covered with marble relief slabs, one of which depicted an Amazonomachy. The altar was decorated by columns against the wall outside and a portico inside.

The Cult Image

We do not know what the very ancient cult statue was like, but we know that the one from the classical and Roman Age was made of wood (sources give different indications as to the kind of wood: cypress, oak, elm), and only the face, hands, and feet were visible, blackened by the use of oil; in fact, in the copies carved out of colored marbles or in paintings, these parts are shown in black. The iconography of the Artemis Ephesia is very particular, but not unique in asia Minor. The goddess is always shown frontally, with her arms at her sides, her forearms outstretched, and her feet together. Her head is veiled, and she is wearing a cylindrical headpiece, the polos, which may take the shape of a crown of walls or, during the Imperial Age, that of a small decorated temple.

At the sides of her face is a sort of nimbus, with rows of lion and griffin protomesi which seems to have been the representation, carried to the frontal side, of an original decoration of the part of the garment that hung on the back of the head. The high part of the breast-piece sometimes has symmetrical little nikai figures, below which is the element that has caused the most debate, i.e., several rows of ovoid protuberances, differently arranged depending on the period: in rows, in a semicircle, or in a triangle.

The most common explanation is that they are breasts, originally intended as real, and later just a decorative element, used as a symbol of fertility.

Other theories, also deriving from the fact that these elements are usually not shaped like real female breasts, have included bee eggs, dates, and planets. One last interpretation identifies them instead as bull testicles, hung from the statue on the occasion of sacrifices.

The Clergy

Heading the clergy of Artemis was a high priest, called “Megabyzus” and wearing a characteristic priest’s costume, rendering evident the ancient eastern origin. The priestess of Artemis also had an important role, and likewise the person in charge of decorating teh goddess. Among the associations of a sacred nature, worthy of mention were the Curetes, who re-enacted the drama of the birth of the goddess each year in the sacred wood of Ortygia. A sacred college was made up of women who were addressed with the title “Melissa”, meaning bee, a symbol that is found on the coins of Ephesus and in the decoration of teh garments of the cult statue, and which reconnects with the fertility symbols.

THE STATE AGORA

Conceived under Lysimachus of Thrace, the upper agora was completely rebuilt during the Augustan Age: it is from this period that the Temple built on the western side of the square dates. Its few remains make it possible, however, to reconstruct it as a prostyle, peripteral edifice (with 6 x 10 columns), and with a well for rituals created in its foundations. There are various hypotheses as to the cult practiced there: Isis or Dionysus, or perhaps the temple was dedicated to Augustus.

A scruptural cycle, believed to have been from a pediment, has been attributed to the building and was found reused in the decoration of the Fountain of Dominitian; it depicts Ulysses, his companions and Polyphemus, and today is in the Ephesus Museum. Also attributed to the Augustan Age is the construction of the so-called Double Temple, two small temples in antis on a single podium, preceded by a great staircase, which may most likely to be identified as the temple to the Divine Caesar and Goddess Rome, a gift from Augustus during his stay at Ephesus in 29 B.C. to the Romans residing in Asia.

Between 4 and 14 A.D., the entire north side of the agora was occupied by an impressive two-story civil Basilica (length 164.80 meters) with a nave and two aisles, richly decorated and accessible from the square by means of four steps. The discovery of numerous sections of the frieze carrying a bilingual inscriptionin Latin and Greek has made it possible to attribute its construction to a wealthy family of Ephesus, commemorated in numerous city monuments; the inscription commemorates, in fact, C. Sextilius Pollio, his wife Ofillia Bassa, and her son C. Ofillius Proculus. The magnificence of Sextilius Pollio made possible, during the same period, the construction of one of the numerous aqueducts that supplied water to the city.

In the Greek text the monument is called “stoa basilike” (royal porch), while the Latin version refers to it as “basilica”. But in reality it has nothing to do with the canonical Latin basilica; it is a very long stoa with a nave and two aisles, an example and result of architectural experiments between Greek and Roman architecture.

The building annexed to the easternmost extremity of the basilica is the Chalcidicum, used for the imperial cult, as seen by the monumental seated statues of Augustus and Livia found on the site, and today kept in the Museum.

At the northern corner of the agora was the Bouleuterion, a semicircular 1,500-seat hall where the meetings of the Boule, the city’s Senate, were held, and which also probably doubled as an auditorium (odeion) for concerts. In the administrative quarter of the Augustan neighborhood, the Prytaneion, the official seat of the Prytans (magistrates) and the city’s cult, was also erected: a large perstyle court, with Doric columns, led to the main hall, originally richly decorated, and probably used for public parties and banquets connected with religious events.

Many of the architectural elements of the Prytaneion- including the Doric columns on which there were inscriptions with long lists of the cult followers, the Curetes, in charge of the ceremonies- were recycled for use in the 4th century A.D. along the Curetes Street, which was named after them.

THE SQUARE AND THE TEMPLE OF DOMITIAN

During the period of Domitian (81-96 A.D.), a large artificial terrace, looking onto the State agora, was built with a series of arches on two levels, and completed to the north with a monumental façade, decorated with images of barbarians (perhaps executed during the Antonine Age).

Inside this large basement were a 154-meter-long cryptoporticus and shops.

A double staircase led from the portico to the terrace and temple; the sacred edifice was pseudodipteral, with 8 Corinthian columns on the front and 13 on the sides, a very deep cella, and a pronaos with a wider central intercolumniation.

Originally dedicated to the cult of the living emperor Domitian and his wife Domitia, it was later consecrated, after teh emperor’s damnatio memoriae, to his father Vespasian. The insertion of this new complex followed the Hellenistic urban plan layout perfectly. In front of the temple, of which few traces remain on the ground, was an altar, of which musch of the decoration, consistinf of a heap of weapons, has been recovered.

Among the fragments of imperial statues found in the temple edifice, or particular importance is a colossal portrait statue of the emperor Titus.

South of the Chalcidicum, opposite the western terracing wall of the State Agora, remains the base of an honorary monument, clad with marble slabs, with a small central niche bordered with pillars.

According to the bilingual Latin and Greek inscription on the monument, it was erected in honor of C. Sextilius Pollio, the meritorious citizen of Ephesus, by his stepson on a site provided by the city. The Fountain of Domitian, erected in 92-93 A.D., is made up of two parts: a niched structure facing the agora, and a large apse facing onto the eastern side of the square of hte same name.

CURETES STREET

The main city street, which ran between the two high point of the city, was known in ancient times as the Embolos, and it is there that the annual procession was held on 6th May in honor of Artemis. Today called Curetes Street, it joined the State Agora with the Trade Agora (Tetragonos Agora) and the Library of Celsus. Rebuilt and restored a number of times during the Roman Age, it progressively came to be flanked by colonnades, honorary and funerary monuments, public buildings, and shops.

THE MONUMENT OF MEMMIUS

On the northern side of the Square of Domitian is the Monument of C. Memmius. This personage, commemorated in an inscription in Latin and Greek, may presumably be identified as a nephew of Sulla, the son of C. Memmius, a friend of Cicero, to whom Lucretius’s De rerum natura was probably dedicated, and who died at a young age in 50 B.C.

The general arrangement of the above-ground part, with arches on the façade, is certainly Western in taste; the scruptural decorations, in particular the reliefs adorning the attic, show traditional motifs: a toga-clad man (togatus), a “grieving warrior”, the trumpet or torch carrier, and a fourth figure at an altar.

The intersection between Domitian Street and South Street is marked by the fountain erected in honor of the Roman governor C. Laecanius Bassus in 79 A.D. It was, in reality, a nymphaeum, consisting of a basin closed on three sides by façades decorated with beautiful sculptures; a statue of Bassus was situated on a tall base on the northwestern side of the basin.