A Selçuk Day Beyond Ephesus

Start the day at the Ephesus Museum, a short walk from Selçuk station; the museum is in the Atatürk neighbourhood on Uğur Mumcu Sevgi Yolu and is open every day of the year. Arriving in the first hour has two rewards: the halls are quiet before the tour groups, and you keep the afternoon for the three open-air stops. The museum goes back to a depot founded in 1929; the building opened as a museum in 1964, was enlarged in 1976, closed at the end of 2012 and reopened in November 2014 after a thorough renovation. Today the objects are arranged in themed halls: the Information Hall, Fountain Finds, Terrace Houses Finds, Coins, Ephesus Through the Ages, the Middle Garden, the Cybele Cult, Temple of Artemis Finds and the Imperial Cult. Radar's other Selçuk route ends at this museum; this time build your visit around the objects that connect to the other stops of this route, and leave the most famous hall for last.

Make the Middle Garden your first goal: here capitals, reliefs, statues, sarcophagi and stelae from the Archaic period to Eastern Rome are lined up in the open air. Look in the garden for the architectural pieces brought from the Belevi Mausoleum; you can study up close the marble work of the monument you will see at the last stop of the day. The monument's sarcophagus was moved to this garden in 1963 and stood here for sixty years; according to Aktüel Arkeoloji it was taken to the İzmir Culture and Art Factory in 2023, so look in the garden for the coffer, column and relief fragments rather than the sarcophagus. According to Wikipedia, examples of the lion-griffin statues from the monument's roof edge are also in the museum; ask the staff where to find them. Then move on to the Ephesus Through the Ages hall. This hall tells the whole story of the city in a single room, with finds from 7000 BC to the 7th century AD; the Neolithic pieces from Çukuriçi Höyük stand at the start of that chain. The hall's striking piece is the Resting Warrior, found in the excavations of the Pollio Fountain, half reclining with his shield and sword. These early layers make it easier to understand why Ayasuluk Hill, which you will climb at the second stop, is counted as the city's first settlement.

In the Fountain Finds hall the sculptural programmes of two monumental fountains stand side by side: Aphrodite, Hera, three Tritons and a satyr from the Fountain of Laecanius Bassus; Dionysos, Aphrodite and Androklos, the founder of the city, with his dog from the two-storey Fountain of Trajan. In the Terrace Houses hall you see the frescoes and small objects from the wealthy houses of Ephesus; the marble statue of Marcus Aurelius dated to the 2nd century AD and the head of Eros, a Roman copy of the famous work of Lysippos, are among the museum's highlights. Give a few minutes to the coin section; the economic history of the city is read here on small metal surfaces. The Cybele Cult hall recreates a cult area: votive stelae and Mother Goddess figurines are the trace in Ephesus of a very old Anatolian tradition. In the Temple of Artemis Finds hall, terracotta vessels from the 7th and 6th centuries BC come from the earliest phase of the temple. In the hall you have saved for last stands the statue of Artemis dated to the 2nd century AD, with her temple-shaped headdress and symbols of fertility; this is the museum's best known piece, and this time just greet it and move on. In the Imperial Cult hall the head and arm fragments of the statue from the Temple of Domitian show the scale of the imperial cult in the city.

The museum offers an audio guide; ask the staff about the conditions of use. For photographs the Middle Garden gives the best result in morning light; do not use flash in the halls. Take a short break in the garden and fill your water bottle, because the next stop demands a climb. When you leave the museum look north: Ayasuluk Hill and its walls stand above the town. The castle is entered through the gate of the St. John archaeological site; you reach this entrance in the İsa Bey neighbourhood in about ten minutes on foot from the museum. On the way the twin-minaret silhouette of the İsa Bey Mosque stays close by; that building is a stop on the other route, so this time pass in front of it and head for the hill.

Source: Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı, Türkiye Müzeleri; KVMGM Google Arts & Culture anlatısı; Aktüel Arkeoloji; Wikipedia, Ephesus Archaeological Museum.

The climb to the castle starts from the entrance of the St. John archaeological site, where the ticket office is; because access to the castle is possible within a narrower window than the general hours of the site, check the current hours on muze.gov.tr and do not leave this stop for the afternoon. After the entrance keep the basilica ruins beside you and follow the stone path rising toward the top; the inner castle is north of the basilica, at the highest point of the hill. According to the account of Selçuk Municipality, the inner castle stands right on top of the area that recent research has identified as the first settlement of Ephesus. The walls you see today are the work of three periods: Aydınoğlu and Ottoman repairs on a Byzantine foundation. The walls are built of stone, brick and mortar and are strengthened by fifteen towers; walking while counting the towers is the easiest way to notice which section was renewed in which period. The inner castle is entered through two gates, on the east and on the west, and these gates open directly to the outside without connecting to the outer castle; the visitor path brings you to one of them. Once through the gate you will see the narrow stairs on the inner face of the walls leading up to the bastions and the embrasures; do not go up where there is no railing.

Inside the castle there are stone-paved streets, cisterns of various sizes, a mosque and, at the highest point, the remains of a church. Follow the streets first to the Castle Mosque in the middle; this building recalls the period between 1348 and 1390 when the Aydınoğlu dynasty made this its capital and had many mosques, baths and hospices built on the hill, and on this route it is looked at only as a historic building. According to the sources, the restoration that began in 2008 first dealt with the west entrance of the castle and the minaret of this mosque. West of the mosque the remains of a building thought to be the castle bath have been identified; the museum records speak of a castle pavilion and bath here. Climb to the church ruins at the highest point of the hill: its apse was turned into a cistern with some additions in the Aydınoğlu period, so on the same wall you read the workmanship of two periods side by side. The list of structures in the museum records gives your visit a checklist: Byzantine and Turkish period cisterns, Byzantine aqueducts, the south terrace houses and the basilica-cistern. Do not go near the mouths and edges of the cisterns; some are deep and have no railing. The excavation has been carried out in the inner castle by the Archaeology Department of Pamukkale University since 2007; the article published by Mustafa Büyükkolancı in 2023 identified two more mosques with hospices south of the castle by means of 17th-century engravings and 19th-century photographs. Some areas may therefore be taped off for excavation; do not cross the tapes.

The hill saw continuous settlement from the Bronze Age to the Ottoman period; the city the Hittites called Apasa is believed to have been here, and in the 7th century, when the harbour became unusable, Ephesus withdrew to this hill again. The town's name also comes from this hill: the Agio Teologo of the Byzantine and Italian sources became Ayasuluk in the Arab and Ottoman sources and was changed to Selçuk in 1914. As you walk along the wall the view shows the rest of the route: right below, the body of the İsa Bey Mosque dated 1375, on the plain the flat ground where the Temple of Artemis stood, and to the south the valley running to Ephesus. If you have come before noon the sun stays behind you and the side of the mosque facing you is lit; for the general view choose a spot in front of the west-facing bastions of the hill. There is little shade inside the castle; keep your water with you and hold on to your hat on windy days. Ayasuluk Hill, together with the Basilica of St. John, the İsa Bey Mosque and the Artemision, forms one of the four components of the Ephesus World Heritage site; so do not move a single stone and do not write on the walls.

Use the same path on the way down and leave through the St. John site. From here walk back toward the station area; the town centre is the starting point for the minibus or your car to Çamlık. Çamlık is about 7 kilometres south of Selçuk and the road takes you into the valley through which the old İzmir-Aydın railway passed. Taking your lunch break in the town centre is the most practical choice; at Çamlık the afternoon light is good enough for the locomotives.

Source: Selçuk Belediyesi, Selçuk (Ayasuluk) Kalesi; Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı, Türkiye Müzeleri, Ayasuluk Kalesi; Kültür Portalı; TDV İslam Ansiklopedisi, Ayasuluk; DergiPark, Büyükkolancı 2023.

You come to Çamlık from the centre of Selçuk by minibus or by car; the museum is set inside the village on the old railway line and there is an entrance fee, so check the current hours and fees on the Ministry's Turkish Museums website or with the museum. This is the largest open-air railway museum in Türkiye and its story begins with the İzmir-Aydın line, the country's first railway, opened in 1866. Çamlık was a point on that line with a station and repair workshops; the station opened under the name Aziziye and closed when the line was realigned in 1991. The museum began to be prepared that same year and opened to visitors in 1997; the land, the buildings and the locomotives belong to TCDD, while the operation has been given for 99 years to the son of the station's former pointsman. Once through the gate, look first at the old station building: the rails of the 1866 line are still in place and the locomotives stand on these original tracks.

The heart of the site is the turntable: around this eighteen-road table about half of the locomotives are arranged like a fan, and the museum's best photograph is taken from here. Step into the middle of the table and turn a full circle; at the end of each road stands a machine from a different country. The sources give different totals, between thirty-three and thirty-seven; what is certain is that the collection is one of the largest in Europe and that the years of manufacture run from the 1890s to the 1950s. The locomotives were built in Germany, Sweden, England, the United States, France and Czechoslovakia; reading the makers' plates beside the boilers and sorting them by country makes a good game when you visit with children. The oldest is an English-built Stephenson wood-burning engine, and according to the Türkiye Tourism Encyclopaedia only two examples survive in the world. Another piece is locomotive number 45501, which was involved in the Yarımburgaz train accident of 1957; history stands quietly here. You can climb into the cabs of some of the locomotives; the ladders are steep and metal, so take care on wet days and do not turn the levers.

Then move on to the carriages: the museum has nine passenger cars and seven freight cars, and two of the passenger cars are wooden. The most special of these is the saloon car used by Atatürk; you can go inside, and its furnished state with bedroom, kitchen and bathroom has been preserved. Do not touch the objects inside the car and move in turn along the narrow corridor. Around the site station equipment such as the water tower, cranes and a hand trolley is also displayed; these pieces explain how a steam railway took on water and coal. The name of the village carries a story too: according to the Türkiye Tourism Encyclopaedia, Atatürk was impressed by the pine trees here in 1937 and named the place Çamlık. The museum is also a resting place in the shade of pines; on hot days you will find somewhere to sit under the trees.

For photographs the afternoon light comes from the side and gives volume to the black surfaces of the boilers; for a wide shot go to the far end of the turntable. Watch your step when walking on the tracks; the sleepers can be loose in places. Allow more than an hour here; wandering among the machines takes longer than you expect. On the way back, pass through the centre of Selçuk and head north to the İzmir-Aydın highway. Belevi lies some 16 kilometres northeast of the town centre, right beside the highway; the whole drive from Çamlık takes about half an hour. The minibuses to Belevi also leave from the town centre; if you are travelling without a car, change on your return from Çamlık. Aim to reach the mausoleum in the last light of the day; the rock core and the marble steps read best in the low sun.

Source: Wikipedia, Çamlık Buharlı Lokomotif Müzesi; Wikipedia, Çamlık Railway Museum; Turkish Museums (Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı); Türkiye Turizm Ansiklopedisi.

At Belevi the mausoleum stands north of the village, right beside the İzmir-Aydın highway, on a lone knoll leaning against the northern slope of the Aydın Mountains; the local people call it Yatık Kale, the reclining castle. By car use the turn-off visible from the highway; if you come by minibus, get off in the centre of Belevi and walk about a kilometre north. This is an open archaeological site; check the current visiting conditions on the Ministry's Turkish Museums website and come in the last light of the day, before it gets too late. What stands before you is the second largest tomb monument in Anatolia after Halicarnassus, and like it, it was modelled on the Mausoleum, one of the Seven Wonders. First read the monument from a distance, looking from the foot of the knoll: a square podium, a colonnaded storey above it, and all of it dressed in marble over a core formed by carving the natural rock. The side of the podium is about 30 metres, its height exceeds ten metres, and it rises on a three-stepped base. On the upper storey eight columns stood along each side; most sources describe them as Corinthian. The total height, according to Aktüel Arkeoloji, was 23 metres; because the monument was never finished, some researchers think the completed building would have been taller. For a long time the roof was assumed to be a pyramid, but research between 1998 and 2000 found no evidence for this, and the drainage channels suggested the upper storey may have been open.

As you walk around the rocky core, look at the marble blocks on the ground: they are pieces of the cladding, the columns and the ceiling coffers; do not sit on any of them and do not move any of them. Look for the burial chamber carved into the rock on the south face; the chamber was sealed from outside, and on the north face there is an unfinished false door. The lid of the sarcophagus found in the chamber carried the figure of a beardless man reclining on a kline, wearing a wreath and holding a bowl; beside it stood the statue of an oriental servant. The sarcophagus was found in the 1930s, moved to the garden of the Ephesus Museum in 1963 and, according to Aktüel Arkeoloji, taken to the İzmir Culture and Art Factory in 2023; the architectural pieces you saw at the museum in the morning are the cladding of this very monument. Along the edge of the roof there were lion-griffin statues facing stone vases, paired horses at the corners and painted panels in the ceiling coffers; the reliefs on the north face showed funeral games and the other faces a battle of centaurs. Some of these pieces are displayed in the Ephesus Museum and some in the museums of İzmir; on the spot only the core and the scattered blocks remain.

Who the monument was built for is still debated: most researchers think it was begun around 300 BC for Lysimachos, Alexander the Great's general and the Hellenistic founder of Ephesus; there are also views that the first design was for Antigonos Monophthalmos and that the building was later used as the burial place of the Seleucid king Antiochos II. The article published by Ali Bora in 2019 deals with this debate and with the coexistence of Greek and Persian elements in the monument; in this respect the monument is a document in stone of the transition from the Late Classical to the Hellenistic period. The monument has drawn the attention of Austrian researchers since the beginning of the 20th century; the first comprehensive publication belongs to Praschniker and Theuer. Consider its position too: it stands near the ancient Ephesus-Sardis road, on a slope that passers-by would see from afar.

For photographs the setting sun brings out the steps carved into the rock and the traces of the marble cladding; seen from the highway side the monument makes a silhouette on top of the knoll. Do not climb the core or the steps; the rock is loose, the marble is slippery, and the monument is a cultural asset that must be protected. There is no shade or water around; keep the visit short in the summer months. The route ends on this knoll. Those returning to İzmir by car drive north once they reach the highway; those going back by İZBAN return from Belevi to the town centre by minibus and take the train from Selçuk station with a change at Tepeköy. Now join the four stops of the day together: the marbles in the museum come from this slope, the castle from the first site of the city, the locomotives from the first railway across the plain, and none of them was seen by passing through the gate of Ephesus.

Source: Aktüel Arkeoloji, Belevi Mezar Anıtı; Wikipedia, Belevi Mausoleum; Wikipedia, Belevi Anıt Mezarı; DergiPark, Bora 2019; Selçuk Belediyesi; Visit İzmir.