Ancient Priene

At Priene we found a great notice board which showed how the ancient Gulf of Latmos has silted up since 1500BC. I’ve highlighted the 1500BC coastline in yellow and the sites we visited at Priene, Miletus and Herakleia. You can see that from the site of ancient Miletus we drove around 15km north across the floodplain to get to the ancient city of Priene.

We climbed up the steps of the main street to get to the highest point where we planned to stop for lunch. The location is truly spectacular with the ruins perched on a natural terrace part way up Mount Mykale. The combination of the high mountain cliffs towering above us and the panoramic view down south over the floodplain made for a very memourable picnic lunch spot.

The city was laid out in 450BC in a grid pattern designed by the city planner, Hippodamos of Miletus. Our lunch stop was at 14, the Sanctuary of Athena.

The temple was designed in the 4^th century BC by the architect Pytheos. Alexander the Great initiated the construction but it was not actually completed until the reign of Emperor Augustus (27 BC -14 AD); he therefore ended up being honoured alongside Athena.

The 37.2 x 19.5 metre temple had 66 ionic columns. 5 were re-erected in the 1960s  but the rest lie scattered around after they were toppled by earthquakes.

As you walk amongst the pine trees you see ruined buildings everywhere. It’s quite hard to get the scale of the place because the trees obscure your view but you start to feel that behind every group of pines there is another even better ruin.

The Buleurterion (assembly hall for the city council) particularly caught our eye. It was built around 200BC and could seat 500 people.

And so did the 6500 seat theatre, cut into the side of the hill. We couldn’t resist trying out the VIP seats on the front row, which are surprisingly comfortable.

We made a long trek all the way down to the western gate because our travel guide suggested that it was the better-preserved gate; frustratingly, it wasn’t. Actually the north-eastern gate, from which we exited the site, was much more intact. Interestingly, we had a much greater sense of actually being in a city on the road down to the western gate as the paved road was closed abutted by ruined buildings with small rooms (shops or houses we didn’t know), whereas the area around the road to the eastern gates seemed more open.  In any event, the exercise probably did us good and, but we were both weary from the afternoon sun when we got back to the car. We’d be turning back south to get to our last site of the day, the ruins of Ancient Herakleia.

Didim Marina, Turkey