9-8-13. Termessos, Turkey
The ancient city of Termessos has changed little since it was rediscovered two centuries ago. The ruins are located among the pine woods and gray cliffs of a national park, where no modern development is permitted. Although some paths have been cleared through the ruins, no excavations have been carried out. A potholed one-lane road leads eight kilometers through a dense pine forest to the parking below the ancient city. A great marble door, originally part of a gate built to welcome the Emperor Hadrian, rises among the trees a few yards from the ticket booth; nearby, a sign indicates the steep track to the ruins.
The path was shady and cool, but surprisingly steep. The lower walls were half-lost in a sea of waving branches; but the upper walls appeared with a flourish through a sudden clearing, arcing between two cliffs of gray stone. Just within, a large bath-gymnasium complex stands to nearly its full height. The façade, decorated with blank arches, was impressively framed by the crags of a nearby mountain.
A bit farther upslope stood the ruins of the ancient city center. I was particularly impressed by the main street. Though none of its columns are standing, the bases of the statues that once lined the street still poke out from the rubble, straggling in two uneven rows along the ancient pavement.
I continued through the agora, with its five unnervingly deep cisterns, to the ruins of the bouleuterion (city council house). Despite 15 centuries of abandonment, the walls of this structure still stand to nearly their original height.
Beyond are the remains of several small temples, reduced to picturesque rubble by earthquakes.
The ruins of the theater’s stage building framed a magnificent panorama of forested hills and valleys.
Even more impressive were the massive cemeteries on the slopes surrounding the city center. I spent hours climbing over literal heaps of sarcophagi.
As I neared the top of the hill, I was hailed from a fire watchtower on the summit. The voice belonged to a thin man in shirtsleeves, who stood on the wire balcony which circled the tower’s second story. Remembering that a hand-painted sign at the base of the track had advertised “fire tower – great views,” I waved and went up the tower. There I met the warder – endowed with the unlikely name of “Chingis” (that is, Ghengis) – who just might be the loneliest man in Turkey. He spoke no English, but eagerly invited me to sample the view from his balcony, handing me his forest service binoculars. I obliged him, looked around briefly – and returned inside to find him pouring tea for two. I exhausted most of the Turkish I knew in the ensuing conversation, but found my new best friend eager to answer all of my questions. Apparently he hosts about a dozen hikers on a busy day – he had me sign his register – a service that breaks up the tedium of literally staring at trees all day.
After taking my leave of Ghengis, I visited a cluster of tombs that he had pointed out from above, which consisted of four or five monolithic sarcophagi surrounding a collapsed mausoleum.
I ended my visit with a walk along the “Royal road,” the artery that connected Termessos with the outside world. The prominence of this area made it a favorite location for elite tombs, many of which are now evocatively wrapped in ivy.
The sides of one exceptionally-fine sarcophagus were decorated with the labors of Hercules.
5-29-17
Returning to Termessos four years after my initial visit, I decided to hike through the upper parts of the sprawling necropolis surrounding the ruins.
Pulling myself hand over hand up piled sarcophagus lids, I made my way to the crest of a rocky ridge several hundred feet above the picturesque theater. The view was awesome. To my left, beyond the jagged walls of the ancient city and the evergreen forest that engulfed it, umber hills rose toward the mountains of Lycia. On the right, framed by dark cliffs, the white buildings of Antalya clustered beside the gleaming Mediterranean. Clouds spilled over the mountain opposite and swept just over my perch, trailing streamers of fog through the pines on either side.
A gusty wind soon drove me back downhill. After another stint of crashing through brush and peering into mausolea, I returned to the path. Despite spitting drizzle, I paused in the dramatically sited theater. A narrow band of heavy clouds had blotted out the sun, muting the contrast of gray stone and blue sky. As always, my photos failed to do the scene any justice.
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