The Aegean Coast region is home to some of the most famous ruins in Turkey, and one of the highest densities of UNESCO World Heritage Sites in the country. Its history combines the ancient civilizations of Caria, Ionia, Lydia, Mysia and Troad, and is home to world-famous sites like Ephesus, Aphrodisias, Miletus, Pergamon, and Troy.
Miletus is a lesser-visited site located on the plains of the Meander River; while its ruins themselves are no match for the splendor of cities like Ephesus, the city is of incredible historic importance. The rational thought developed in Miletus dominated the academic world of Greece. With its focus on rational, non-supernatural explanations for natural phenomena, it laid the foundation for all scientific inquiry and rational thinking to come. After ultimately falling to the Persians, most of the city’s intellectuals fled to Athens and thusly laid the foundation for the city’s philosophic tradition.
Aphrodisias, once a part of ancient Caria, was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2017. The city, named after the goddess Aphrodite (who in Aphrodisias blended elements of the Anatolian fertility goddess Cybele with those of the Greek Aphrodite) was home to a workshop in which some of the most sought after marble sculptures in all of Rome were produced. Many of these sculptures, along with entire structures built of intricately carved marble are still found at the site.
Ephesus, the most visited ancient city in Turkey, has been undergoing excavations for almost two centuries leading to a massive site with endless structures to see. Its Temple of Artemis was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, although little of it remains today. With ruins that span from prehistory through Hellenistic and Roman and into the Christian era, the city allows visitors to witness the transformation of cultures across time and how the city’s natural surroundings (in this case silt accumulation) played a role in its transformation.
Troy, the city of legends and the basis for Homer’s The Iliad…for centuries Classical Scholars considered it to be a land based in myth, not history. It wasn’t until excavations of a mound known locally as Hisarlik began in 1860 that archeologist Heinrich Schliemann realized the magnitude of his discovery: the mythical city of Troy was real. And not only was it real, the city was inhabited for over 4000 years from the Neolithic to the Roman Period.
Pergamon, a prosperous city in ancient Mysia, is located 26 kilometers inland from the Aegean Sea and became the capital of the Kingdom of Pergamon during the Hellenistic Era. The city is known for being the northernmost of the Seven Churches of Asia Minor in the Bible’s book of Revelation. The city was also home to the ancient world’s second largest library after that of Alexandria. In line with its massive library that contained over 200,000 scrolls, Pergamon was a major producer of parchment, the word itself a corruption of pergamenos, meaning “from Pergamon”.
