Apameia Kibotos

Apameia Kibotos is an ancient city in the Dinar district in the southwest of Afyonkarahisar Province, whose traces survive beneath the modern town and on the surrounding hills. Known as Kelainai in the Iron Age, the settlement took the name Apameia from the beginning of the 3rd century BC. The provincial directorate of culture and tourism notes that in the Persian, Hellenic and Roman periods the city was the satrapal centre of western Anatolia and was counted, together with Ephesus, as one of the two great cities of the region. The ancient geographer Strabo also describes Apameia in the Roman period as the largest trading centre of the province of Asia after Ephesus. The city owed its importance to its location. Apameia was founded at a point where the roads from the east to Ephesus and from the Ankara direction down to the Mediterranean coast met. For that reason most of the great armies of antiquity passed this way. The Persian king Xerxes is said to have stayed at Kelainai during his campaign of 481 BC, and Cyrus the Younger to have spent thirty days here with his army in 401 BC. Alexander the Great also stayed in the city for ten days during his campaign before setting out from here towards Gordion. The name Apameia comes from the Seleucid ruler Antiochus I Soter. Antiochus moved the people of Kelainai a little further down onto the plain, founded the new city and named it after his mother Apama. The city also gave its name to the Treaty of Apameia, signed between Rome and the Seleucid kingdom in 188 BC. The epithet Kibotos means chest or coffer in Greek and is thought to refer to the city's commercial wealth. In the Hellenistic period the city struck its own silver and bronze coins and also issued joint coins with Ephesus. The first stop for anyone visiting Dinar is Suçıkan. The provincial directorate of culture and tourism notes that Suçıkan Park, about one kilometre from the town, lies at the source of the Menderes river. According to researchers from Afyon Kocatepe University, this spring, known in antiquity as the Marsyas, emerges between Toptepe to the south and Üçlerce Tepe to the north. Ancient writers describe the waters of the Marsyas flowing through the middle of the city before joining the Maeander. In Greek mythology the music contest between the satyr Marsyas and Apollo is placed at this spring; Dinar's description of itself as the scene of history's first music contest is based on this legend. The most important visible structure of the city is the ancient theatre on the slope of Üçlerce Tepe, which is identified as the acropolis. A rescue excavation has been carried out here since 2017, led by the Afyonkarahisar Museum Directorate with the scientific support of the Archaeology Department of Afyon Kocatepe University. The excavations have begun to uncover the orchestra and the cavea, the section containing the rows of seats. Assessments reported in the press estimate that the theatre held around 7,000 people. The remains of a stadium and architectural blocks from ancient buildings on the same hill have also been recorded. The key thing for visitors to know is that most of the city now lies underground. The Cultural Inventory lists the site among buried archaeological sites, and the researchers running the excavation say that much of Apameia lies beneath present-day Dinar. So do not expect a standing city like Ephesus or Aphrodisias here. As the theatre is an excavation area, while work is under way you should only look at the site from the places where access is permitted. The five-year surface survey launched in 2019 also documented the rock tombs at Tavşan Tepe as one of the ancient city's cemetery areas. To see the city's movable finds you need to visit the Afyonkarahisar Museum. Wikipedia reports that a hoard of thousands of Apameia coins, found in Dinar and buried without ever having been used, was brought to the museum. Some of these coins show the Maeander river or Marsyas playing the flute. Looking at these finds in the museum before coming to Dinar makes the hills and the spring you see on site far more meaningful. Dinar is reached from Afyonkarahisar on the main road running southwest and by intercity buses; historically the town lies on the railway line running to İzmir. You can begin your visit in the morning at the spring in Suçıkan and then walk to the theatre on the slope of Üçlerce Tepe. There is little shade on the hills, so take water, a hat and sturdy shoes in summer.