Ephesus: The History Behind the Ruins

for regular videos on ancient cultures and forgotten civilizations Please Subscribe I want to show you something I just got this isn't it fantastic it's a map made of natural wood this was made by the enjoy the wood company and they have a bunch of different Maps but their 3D wooden map was my favorite and they give you a box with a bunch of pieces and you just put it together like a puzzle uh there's this super strong two-sided sticky tape that comes with it you just put it on the backs and and then you just press it onto the wall falling it sticks they also provide these pins with flags of the various countries so I put the ones on the countries I've visited so far in the Antiquities travel guide so now I can admire this elegant map and dream about the far away lands I want to visit it makes me look forward to the future with a sense of hope and anticipation this is a great piece of wall decor for any interior it's a mood Setter and it starts conversations I liked it so much that I became an affiliate with the company and now I can offer a 10% discount code for anyone else who wants to get one and if you don't like this one there are many other styles to choose from it also makes a cool gift for someone else and definitely carries that wow effect you can get one by going to enjoythe wood.com worldof Antiquity or by clicking on the link below the video or you can just go to enjoythe wood.com and use world of antiquity as a discount code The city of Ephesus was a powerhouse of commerce and culture in Classical times. Located in Anatolia, on the western coast of the Aegean Sea, the ancient Ephesians enjoyed centuries of wealth and prosperity. Fortunately, and rather amazingly for us, a significant part of the city still stands. We are going there in this episode, and we’ll be happy to show you around. As we uncover some of its mysteries in this video tour, you are bound to hear things about this fascinating city that you have never heard before. [Music] welcome to the Antiquities travel guide a helping hand for visiting historic places follow us to different countries as we search for ancient artifacts if you too wish to explore the ancient pass through Travel will'll help you plan where to go what to see and how best to enjoy what you encounter in this series of the atg you can accompany test and me on our Trek through Tura homeland of the ancient frians Lans Trojans Hittites lydians Galatians and Greeks come on let's go Driving north from the site of the ancient city of Miletus, which we showed you in our last episode, we made our way up the western coast of Anatolia towards Ephesus. 2,500 years ago, this territory was dotted with Greek cities. Ephesus was one of the big ones. But its origins preceded Greek times. During the Late Bronze Age, prior to the Trojan War, Ephesus was a mere coastal village known as Apaša, in the Kingdom of Arzawa. We know from Hittite records that this kingdom feuded with the Hittites, and occasionally the Hittites would come and forcibly bring Arwaza into vassal obligation. By 1190 BCE, Arzawa was captured by Madduwatta, a disloyal Hittite vassal, and it was never again retaken by the Hittites. Not long after that, the Hittite Empire ceased to exist. On our way, we stopped in the coastal town of Kuşadası. This place too had ancient origins. We think it was once a Greek city called Neapolis and was for a time under the jurisdiction of Ephesus. But our purpose here was to get something to eat. I had heard of an excellent restaurant called Kazim Usta, so we decided to try it out. Accompanying Tess and I, as usual, was our Turkish guide Mustafa, and behind the scenes our videographer Rachael. I just want some chicken fingers chicken nuggets I'm literally dead right now are you dead I'm literally dead right now People have been sustained by the bounty of the sea here for thousands of years, and I couldn’t help but feel a connection with the ancients as we partook, though I am sure the recipes have changed a bit. The little village of Apaša 3,000 years ago also had a harbor, and its fertile plains and rivers brought settlers from the surrounding areas and from across the Aegean Sea. The Greeks had some interesting foundation legends about the town. One said that it was founded by the Amazons. As you may know, Amazons were a tribe of warrior women who were superhumanly proficient with bows and arrows and had little use for men aside from procreation. The city was named for the Queen of the Amazons, Queen Apasas, which meant Queen Bee. And this, they say, is how the city got the name Apasas (the Greek form of Apaša) and why the coins of Ephesus have the raised image of a bee on one side. Though we should mention here that the coins also have an image of a stag on the other side—and both the bee, and the stag symbols can be attributed to the goddess Artemis, goddess of nature, the hunt, and childbirth, which makes more sense. Artemis worship, as we will see, played a prominent role in Ephesian culture. Another Greek legend credits Androclus, son of the (possibly mythical) King Codrus of Athens, as the founder of the city. It was said that Androclus left Athens to seek a location for a new settlement. Before setting across the Aegean Sea, Androclus consulted the Oracle at Delphi, who gave him a cryptic message. The Oracle told him that a fish and a boar would signal the location of the new city. So, Androclus went on his voyage, and landed on the shores of Anatolia where he and his crew camped in a clearing on the coast. That evening while cooking dinner, a fish flew from the pan into a nearby bush, starting a fire. The fire flushed a wild boar out of the surrounding brush. The words of the Oracle of Delphi echoed in Androclus’s ears, and so Ephesus was established in that area. Though I love a good oracle story, it seems more likely that early Greek migrants came to the small town of Apasas, identified it as a location that was abundant in food and resources and decided to stay and build a new city here. This was around the 10th century BCE. It is also assumed that the Greek immigrants adopted the Mother Goddess, who was worshiped by the locals and aligned her with their goddess, Artemis, building a temple dedicated to her on an older sacred site that predated the Greek migration to the area. Apasas evolved into Ephesos. There are more expensive places to stay near Ephesus, but if you are on a budget, you might want to try Ephesus Centrum. I chose it because it was inexpensive and had great reviews, especially for the service. It’s rustic, but really close to the site, and in a convenient location for shopping. The next morning, it was time to explore the ruins of the ancient city. Information is scanty for Ephesus’s early history. We know that by the 7th century BCE it had grown into a thriving urban center and that a series of tyrants ruled the area through the 6th century. Then, like other cities in this region, Ephesus was taken by Lydia. When the early Temple of Artemis was destroyed by a flood, the Lydian king, Croesus, helped rebuild the temple in 550 BCE. The new temple was a grandiose version of the previous temple and took 10 years to complete. Under Lydian rule, the citizens of Ephesus were allowed a great deal of autonomy, and the city became a prime spot for trade and a center of learning and culture. Heraclitus the famous philosopher was from Ephesus. Even the women of Ephesus were respected and given more rights than was customary in the Greek world. Many of them were artists, teachers, and painters. The female painter Timarete of the 5th century BCE is known for her painting of Artemis. In 546 BCE, the Persian ruler, Cyrus the Great conquered King Croesus and took control of Lydian territory, including Ephesus and the other Greek cities on the coast. The Ephesians participated in the Ionian Revolt against the Persians from 499 to 494 along with the other Greek cities around here, but alas the revolt was put down. Ephesus remained on good terms with the Persians after the revolt, and after Xerxes, the Persian King, was defeated in Greece in 478, he returned here to the Anatolian coast and sacked all the Greek shrines of the Ionian alliance cities, except those of Ephesus. okay so we just arrived at Ephesus Efes in Turkish and I'm really excited about this one um we got here early the gates open at 8:00 a.m. we are here at 8:00 a.m. on the dots to try to get started and try to avoid some of the crowds it does get pretty busy here so the cost to get in here is 400 L which is the equivalent of about $15 we decided to start at the Lower Gate there's two entrances um most people start at the upper gate and then kind of make their way down and to avoid some crowds we are starting at the Lower Gate making our way up so hopefully that works and I'm excited for this one so let's go In 412 Ephesus became an ally of Sparta during the Peloponnesian War. In 356 a crazed arsonist, Herostratus, purposefully burned the beloved Temple of Artemis here to the ground. hey we just stumbled across the arcadiana one of the important streets of the city uh colon and uh leading to the theater it was named arcadiana cuz it was uh named after arcadius the Emperor who well he refurbished it the street existed long before him but the name aradi stuck Ephesus would not be freed from Persian rule until Alexander the Great seized the city in 333. After that, the citizens worked together to repair the Temple of Artemis, and they created the most lavish temple in the ancient world. It’s estimated that the new temple was four times larger than the Parthenon. Sadly, it no longer stands, but we have evidence of its magnificence from the famous Greek writer Antipater of Sidon who listed it as one of his 7 wonders of the world. After the death of Alexander, the Macedonian General Lysimachus took control of Ephesus and changed the city’s name to Arsinoe, in honor of his wife. When he died, they changed the name back. During the Hellenistic period, the Seleucids ruled here for a while, then the Ptolemies, and then the Kingdom of Pergamon. that means the harbor is down there that's where the harbor is A large commercial Agora was built near the port at the end of Arcadiana Street, also known as Harbor street. And the first theater was erected, but this is not it. This one comes from Roman times, an enlarged version of the original. Construction began in 54 CE during the reign of the emperor Claudius and continued into Nero’s reign until 68, when a third story was added. It could accommodate 24,000 spectators. In the 2nd Century CE, an aqueduct was constructed through the upper section of seats, and an awning was added to provide shelter for the spectators. Rome first came to control Ephesus in 133 BCE, when they inherited Pergamon’s territory, but the citizens continued to clash with their rulers. In 88 BCE they joined Mithridates the Great of Pontus in a revolt and killed all the Roman residents of the city. The fight was short, and in 86 Ephesus was back under Roman rule and saddled with a heavy fine for their actions. And when subsequent civil wars broke out in Rome, the citizens of Ephesus chose poorly, aligning themselves with the losing side. Even so, Ephesus continued to prosper. Augustus Caesar affirmed Ephesus as the first city of the Roman Province of Asia in the 1st century BCE. This was a large commercial center called the Tetragonos Agora, which means the Square Market. And it is shaped like a square. The market area was constructed in the 3rd century BCE, but it was enhanced considerably in the Roman period. It was surrounded by colonnaded porticoes decorated with the statues of famous people: officials, athletes, orators, and philosophers. Behind the colonnades were about a hundred rooms, most of which were shops, but there also were workshops, meeting rooms for guilds, and storage rooms. A combination solar and water clock was found in the center of the agora, but it seems to have been added later, around the 6th century CE. The apostle Paul, the famous Christian missionary of the first century CE, likely worked right here in the agora with his friends Priscilla and Aquila in their tentmaking and leatherworking business for a time. But they got into trouble when a silversmith named Demetrius, who sold silver shrines of Artemis, riled up a crowd of people, saying that the Christians were going to detrimentally affect their business. A riot broke out, and a couple of Paul’s companions were dragged to the theater, which at the time was under construction, and we can only imagine what they were going to do to them there. One of the prominent citizens, a man named Alexander, tried to reason with the crowd, but knowing he was Jewish, they shouted him down, saying, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!” Finally, the city clerk was able to calm them down and get them to disperse. Paul, meanwhile, got the heck out of there. The agora had three gates, but this one is the best-preserved and most impressive. It is called the Gate of Mazaeus and Mithridates because it was built by two former slaves of those names and dedicated to the emperor Augustus Caesar, who had freed them. here we are at the end of Curetes Street and right over here the entrance to the agora the commercial part of the city and the library of kelsus uh right there before you this is probably the most famous structure at Ephesus the library of kelsus look at the facade here the entrance was right here this was built in7 CE by a man named Julius kelus Aquila for in honor of his father who had been a Consul of Rome and a governor uh here in the area and it was also his father's mosum so there was a marble sarcophagus in here with a lead coffin and from what I understand the coffin has never yet been opened This library, which is estimated to have held 12,000 scrolls, was the third largest library in the Roman world after the Library of Pergamum and the Library of Alexandria. right here is Hadrian's Gate built to honor the emperor hadrian and uh of course it parts of it are gone but it had a three part entrance and at the top there was a huge statue of Artemis up there uh but in later times of fourth Century or so uh Christians objecting to the goddess being up there pushed it off and destroyed it we are here at the Terrace houses and it's actually an additional 170 L to get in which is about $7 this uh section just recently open to the public um shows all these houses that have been excavated on the hill of some pretty I think well-off people this particular unit unit 6 is quite large uh but you can see pillars still here from their Courtyard and their house this would have been open to the Sun light and then you know you they would have lived you know you come out into the courtyard and probably be a garden there or something although it was paved looks like it was paved um but uh you can see some artwork still on the wall walls covered with plaster and they paint them and hopefully we'll see some even better artwork as we go through here you you can also avoid the crowds here because I guess the tours aren't coming through here what's interesting is that the uh the people who are very wealthy um didn't want to show off so all the good stuff's on the inside if you looked at the outside of the houses it would have been very plain yeah I don't know maybe they didn't want robbers uh targeting their homes I don't know Everything under this roof is called Terrace House 2. What you’re seeing here is basically a city block of private residences, like a condominium. These homes, constructed between the 1st and 3rd centuries CE, belonged to the wealthy. What makes them so amazing is how well they are preserved. so this is actually a bath belonging to this flat or this apartment unit um it's very deep and it's very narrow it's interesting I wonder if they just stood in it but that's where they bathed you got to see this wall art up here it's amazing I'm getting serious Pompeii vibes look at the detail there Though the houses slowly filled with sediment over hundreds of years, excavations have revealed beautiful mosaics on the floors, and bright painted frescoes on the walls. There you can see frescoes depicting the Nine Muses, Sappho, and Apollo. where it was at this here is the Basilica now I know what you're thinking you're thinking oh Basilica that's a church right later on but this is built in the 2 century and the Basilica is a style right it's how you make it and this was part of the person's house this is where they would received the guests when they came over to visit okay talk about impressive so amazingly there aren't that many people in this Terrace House exhibit it is a little extra to get in but I think it's well worth it because there's so much to see here and you really get an idea for how these people live their daily lives there's even Furniture there's wall art um there's a ton to see in here so I would recommend it even though it's a little extra Marble columns and archways can be seen in the structures, and staircases lead to upper stories and courtyards. There are kitchens, dining rooms, reception halls, and bedrooms. The houses had toilets and plumbing, private baths, and heating systems that kept the houses comfortable for their privileged residents. Note that this is right in the center of town, close to the agora and some of the most important monuments of the city. In other words, this is a premium piece of real estate. The complex originally consisted of six residential units and later seven. Although they adjoined one another, the homes were separate. They did share the lanes and roads though, and a handful of other common spaces. this is dwelling unit 7 this is the next door neighbors this is Flanders's house I wish they had some signatures on this yeah the art was um chosen by the homeowner they they they want to reflect their social values um yeah what they think is important cuz you want people coming over and going oo wow I love this there's a lot of history here too because the houses were reused over the years different people lived in them they changed them around there was an earthquake here that caused these C uh houses to be abandoned and then later people came and lived in here poorer people came and lived in the rich people's houses um so yeah there's a lot of history here yeah These two inscriptions from the 4th century sit in front of a building called the Octagon. It seems by that time this area became a place where public notices were placed. The inscription on the left is in Latin and is an announcement from the Emperors Valentinian, Valens, and Gratian about the use of public funds for earthquake relief. The one on the right is in Latin and Greek and concerns the sharing of costs for festival games among four cities. The building behind the Octagon had a marble sarcophagus in it that held the body of a young girl, aged maybe 15 or 16, and it has been hypothesized to be the burial chamber of Cleopatra’s younger sister Arsinoe IV. Arsinoe fought Cleopatra, her half-sister, for control of Egypt. After her failed siege of Alexandria in 47 BCE, Arsinoe was sent here to Ephesus by Julius Caesar and exiled in the Temple of Artemis. It’s believed that Cleopatra urged Marc Antony to have her executed, which he did to prevent Arsinoe from challenging Cleopatra’s right to the Egyptian throne. this is the latrine you want to go see some toilets come on The baths and public toilets, called foricae, were constructed here for the citizens in the late 1st or early 2nd century CE. A single toilet was called a latrina in Latin, which is where the word latrine comes from. Remember, the wealthy had toilets in their homes, and so the public toilets were often used by the less fortunate. This forica was attached to the public baths, and there were 48 seats in total. Back then, the seats were protected by roofing and the rest of the room was open to the sky. Those that used the forica were given a stick with a sea sponge attached to the end and this was used for wiping. Then the sponge was cleaned with water that flowed through an additional small trough just in front of the toilets. It has been suggested that infections and even intestinal worms could have been spread at Roman public toilets such as this one. After attending to their business, people found the foricae to be a great place to socialize, staying for long periods of time and chatting with others using the facilities, which might seem a little off-putting to us these days. In the 5th century, the facilities were in disrepair and a wealthy woman named Scholastica restored the structures. right up across from the Terrace houses we have the Temple of hadrien it's a small little monument that was donated by a fellow named puus vus antoninus sabinus and uh it was dedicated to the emperor Hadrian we know that from an inscription also um a little bit later around 300 or so they uh put statues here of Dian Constantine and maximianus uh and up at the top you see uh depictions of the Ephesian Foundation myth in the reliefs uh but that was added in the late antique period can you guess what this might be based on things that we have seen my guess would be an nymphaeum you are correct did you know that audience yes this is a fountain here right this was dedicated to the emperor Trajan by a local Aristocrat named uh uh Tiberius Claudius Ariston and his wife and uh so this would be in the early 2 Century uh that this was put up and yes this would have been full of water Along Curetes Street, a series of statues were erected to honor the prominent citizens of Ephesus. so every one of these actually had a statue on them back in the day like this up here uh we have the so-called Hercules gate because there are two depictions there of Hercules uh this is from the late antique period the original gate would have been much wider during the Roman Imperial period but at some point they wanted to narrow the street to prevent wagons from getting through and so they put this gate in here uh which only allows pedestrians You can find board games on the street. This is the board for a popular game during Roman times called Ludus duodecim scriptorum, "game of twelve markings." There are three lines, each containing an X or star in the center with six spaces for pieces on each side. Very little is known about the specific gameplay. It involved three cubic dice and each player had 15 pieces. The fountain of Trajan, constructed in honor of the emperor, was built in 104 CE. Statues of Dionysus and Aphrodite surrounded the fountain along with statues of Trajan’s family and a statue of a satyr. These statues can now be seen in the Ephesus Museum. right here behind us there's a fountain here but right here is what we call the memmius monument it was a monument dedicated to a guy named Gaius Memmius who was the grandson of the famous Roman dictator Sulla yeah and so this was erected uh between about 50 and 30 BCE uh in honor of this fellow memus so an early structure in the city early Roman structure here we are at the remains of the Temple of domian domian was uh an emperor of the flavian dynasty near the end of the first century CE and uh you can see part of the temple here there's not much left but up at the top the emperor uh and I believe his wife the emperor was very big on the Imperial cult and the city had to have a special permission to erect a temple in the emperor's honor which the Ephesians did have and they made a during his Reign they made a temple for him here but more generally for the Imperial cult but Demian ended up getting assassinated and his memory was damned so uh nobody liked him after that so here at the temple people desecrated it there was a huge seated statue of demission here they broke up they they threw his uh images to the ground uh but the temple was then fixed up again and re dedicated to the flavian family in general so it still continued to exist uh for a while after that but then the Christians uh didn't like the Imperial Cult of course and once they were in charge they destroyed the whole thing there's a there's a museum inside there but I don't see an entrance it's called the inscriptions Museum it's inside the Temple of Domissan but I didn't see any entrance up the side I saw a sign that said inscriptions Museum but how do you get in The Inscriptions Museum was closed, but we could see some of the inscriptions through the bars and sitting around the outside. These can keep people who read ancient Greek happy and satisfied for hours. Some of the samples include a death sentence against a sacrilegious person, imperial letters, statements of citizenship rights, and funerary inscriptions. In the distance there is the Odeion/Bouleuterion, which was built by a wealthy Ephesian couple in the 2nd Century CE, and seated 1400 - 1500 people. The Senate and the Boules of Ephesus met regularly there to make decisions regarding construction of temples, collecting taxes, and administration and maintenance of the public buildings. Concerts and musical performances were also held there. this is actually a pomegranate tree you can see the fruit right there so pomegranate is really important in Greek mythology um the god of the underworld Hades would trick pany into coming back to the underworld a few months of every year by using the pomegranate um so very important in the history around here the culture so the pomegranate is a symbol for fertility and um the word ceday actually means pomegranate we visited ceday if you days ago how's that good We made our way back down Curetes Street to check out the other side of the city. Though the city was wealthy and prosperous, with these amazing buildings and a wall, they were still vulnerable. In 262, the Goths, who had been a thorn in the side of the Roman Empire, attacked Ephesus and laid it to waste. But the Ephesians, as usual, rebounded. We’re going to check out a famous ancient church. Yes, as with the rest of the Empire, Ephesus too adopted Christianity. Emperor Theodosius I, during his reign from 379 to 395, closed all the pagan temples and shut down the pagan schools in the city. Worship of the city’s patron goddess Artemis was banned, and the Temple of Artemis was destroyed by Christians of the city. The rubble was used for other buildings and churches. The women of Ephesus, who up to this point had great privileges here, were reduced in status and were no longer permitted to instruct men, or to work in the arts on their own. The face of the city changed, as new Christian structures went up and old religious edifices were converted into Christian ones. so here we are at the church of Mary uh near the harbor and this wasn't always a church there was a Roman building here before that uh the purpose of that building which was built in about the 2 centur is disputed there's two different points of view one is that it was a hall of the muses and another one is that it was a center for Commerce and banking very different but uh around the 4th century is when Christians took it and made it for their use and turned it into a church uh it may be because uh there was a fire damage to this church be uh to the building because uh we saw some evidence of fire damage uh maybe from the third Century so in the 4th Century they turned into a church but it became very famous about a c later in 431 when they held the famous ecumenical council of Ephesus here and uh all these church leaders from all over the Empire came here to meet now ever since then this became a very important church and other churches uh from that point forward would have been modeled on this church in this region other churches were built according to this model there were many additions made over the years so we're going to see things uh ranging from the fourth Century all the way uh to uh late Antiquity um but no one obviously uses it now The famous Third Ecumenical Council that was held in this building in June and July of 431 was convened by the emperor Theodosius II primarily to settle a heated dispute between Nestorius, archbishop of Constantinople and Cyril, archbishop of Alexandria. Both believed that Jesus Christ was God, but according to Nestorius, when Christ was born into this world, he was born as a human and then transformed into God, meaning that his mother Mary ought to be called simply “bearer of Christ” (Christotokos). But Cyril argued that Christ was born as God, meaning that Mary would then be the “bearer of God” (Theotokos). It is estimated that 250 bishops from all over the region traveled to Ephesus to take part in the debate. After more than a month of discussion, it was decided that Cyril was correct, and that Christ was born God. This led to what is called the Nestorian Schism. After the Council, this church was declared to be “the holiest church of the most holy, most honored and eternal virgin Mary.” so here we have the remains of the baptistery come on inside notice the beautiful marble lining the walls and here's the pool so this have been filled with water and the candidates would come down here into the water so this is clearly a baptism by immersion right uh some Churches today they just sprinkle but this they they put you underwater which was the original way um it's like you're you go you're being buried into the a grave and then you're coming you're being resurrected out of it so we're at the museum at Ephesus it is 30 Lira to park here but we just found a shady spot on the street right right over there so another option and it cost 100 L to get in which is about $3.80 in US oh you know where these were they were in the library of kelus you know the library of kelus we were taking our pictures they were all put up in there PL they have their scums GL uses and some look at that polish on that marble you see marble regularly you think oh it's not possible look at that Marcus aurelus they've got the um coins from the rain almost every Emperor going forward that were found here that's how long the city was inhabited almost every Emperor's face take a look at this so this is a uh a coral statue unfinished but you can see like how the sculptor roughed it out first and then these ones are done so see here this is a finished one it's been broken but yeah very early 6th Century BCE yeah check the out isn't this unbelievable have you ever seen anything so great and if I'm not mistaken those are all breasts those aren't great cuz she's she's she's a mother of all animals you'd love her and I think she feeds them all oh my God it's [Laughter] me and that's another version of her over here it almost doesn't look Greek the reason why she looks like this is they've mixed the Greek god art Greek goddess Artemis with cell who was more local so she doesn't look quite Greek you notice that oh so it's actually saying I don't even know if this is correct but that the mother goddess of Catal Hoyuk led to Kubaba led to Kybele maybe it makes sense I I can see this this leading to that that I can see uh maybe on this maybe this is a long time before remember I was telling you about the I showed you the Temple of Domissan this was from that Temple and that's Domissan there was this colossal statue of his uh and which of course got destroyed after he was assassinated and everybody hated him then but look at the size of it it's gigantic unbelievable look at this this is the altar from the domian temple you could see militaristic imagery representing demian's Great accomplishments and of course accomplishments of the Emperors in general Pro Consul Stefanos I don't know who he was reliefs of the parthan monument 2 Century oh look at Augustus Caesar himself and Livia his wife mhm this is the first ever Roman Emperor and his wife Livia During its heyday, the citizens of Ephesus would maintain the port and harbor regularly. Silt from the Cayster river (also known as the Little Meander River) would often clog the harbor and block ships from coming and going. Though it was extremely difficult, the citizens would clear the silt to ensure the success of imports and exports which maintained the economy. But by the 4th century, when the wealth and power of the citizens had dwindled, the harbor was neglected, and the city of Ephesus was slowly buried in the sands of the river, which led to its decline and ultimate abandonment in the 15th century. In our next episode, we are heading inland to visit two more amazing ancient sites: the city of Hierapolis, perched atop travertine terraces and known for its hot springs, and Laodikeia on the Lycus, better known as Laodicea, one of the largest cities in the region with remains that testify to its former greatness. So stay tuned, and don’t forget to subscribe!