The expression Panta rhei, which embodies the ancient Greeks’ resignation to this world's state of flux, was first used to characterise the thought of Heraclitus, a philosopher born in Ephesus.

And it is no wonder. His native town is a precise epitome of this wisdom.


Occupying Mount Pion (named Panayir Dagi, the Fair, by modern Turkish geography), about 6 kilometres away from the coast of the Aegean Sea, Ephesus was established about 30 centuries ago as a sea port. One of its main streets linked the amphitheatre with the wharves.

The combined influence of natural forces, religion, and politics managed to separate it from the sea with the wide valley of present-day Selçuk, transfer it several times, and finally terminate it.

The greatest credit goes to the Menderes – a slow, innocent-looking river, which for 20 centuries managed to produce such an amount of alluvial deposits that finally created a valley of 28 to 39 square kilometres. Several civilizations, which often combined their will for power with superstition, prejudice, or mere stupidity, also had their contribution.



The city was founded by Androcles in the tenth century BC at the mouth of the Menderes River. Legend has it that an oracle advised him to start a colony where "a fish and a boar" would lead him. He had been wondering for a while how to interpret these obscure instructions when on a pleasant evening by the shore of the Aegean long-awaited insight struck him.



While preparing his dinner in the company of some fishermen, a fish skidded from the fireplace and fell in the nearby shrubs, dragging down a live ember. The shrubs caught fire and a boar jumped out of them. "Eureka!" Androcles shouted in his pre-Archimedean language and on the site where the fish had fallen built a temple of Cybele, the goddess of nature, and a city around it.

The first conquerors of Ephesus, the tribes which ancient annalists called Carians and Lelegians, joined it to the Ionian confederation and started moving it up the river because the deposits had already managed to separate it from the sea. The new settlers remodelled the temple and dedicated it to their goddess Artemis, thus creating one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.

The next relocation was done by Croesus, the King of Lydia. He took advantage of the fact that the citizens of Ephesus, engulfed in the decoration of their streets and homes, had failed to build a city wall. Anticipating the attack, the citizens came up with an ingenious but unfortunately ineffective way to protect themselves: they stretched a rope from the Temple of Artemis (now about a mile away) to the city, hoping that the goddess would guard them.

Croesus, however, made a perfidious move: he won Artemis's heart by donating some of his notorious treasure to the temple and then burned to the ground the rest of the town. Then he relocated Ephesus again.

Later in the history of these lands Alexander the Great arrived. He wanted to build his own temple on the site of the existing one but was politely turned down. His general Lysimachus forced the inhabitants to relocate again by plugging up their sewage pipes and causing an extensive flood.



Over the next 300 years Ephesus prospered and acquired an amphitheatre, a stadium, and a number of gymnasiums. That is, until the seventeenth century AD when a big earthquake razed it to the ground.

The Romans started a new chapter in the life of Ephesus. They exchanged Artemis for Diana, made the city the capital of the province of Asia Minor, and their birth encouragement policy, from which the ruins of one of the first brothels remain, increased the population to 250,000.



During the period between the earthquake and the end of Roman civilization the local people led a blissful life.

Tiberius restored Ephesus, and after him Hadrian built a number of public buildings. Hellenistic architecture once and for all gave way to Roman. This is why most of the ruins we can now see on Mount Pion date from this era.

There is something typical of all ancient cities and Ephesus, in particular: because of the constant relocations, the remains of the abandoned houses are carefully recycled to build new ones. For this reason, just one pillar remains from the Temple of Artemis.



The amphitheatre is the only Hellenistic construction preserved in its entirety until the present day. The Romans improved its acoustics by building an ornamental wall behind the stage and enlarged it so that it could accommodate the whole population of the city: 250,000 people. (In comparison, today’s population of the nearby town of Selçuk numbers 23,000 people)

The library is one of the most remarkable remains from Ephesus' last migration. Its three-storey marble façade is the somewhat trivial emblem of the ancient city.

In the second century AD its stone niches sheltered 12,000 scrolls: the intellectual achievements of civilization guarded from the atmosphere’s harmful influence by a yard-long cavity between the outside and inside walls.

Apart from studiousness, everywhere the ruins on Mount Pion speak of prodigality, bustle, and the sweet life. The luxurious apartments were built on terraces one above the other and, according to the archaeologists that are still restoring them, this is the world's second chance after Pompeii to get to know what the everyday life of the Roman aristocracy was like.



Further uphill are the notorious public toilets: stone benches with holes on which about 30 people can sit at a time – an excellent place for conferences where you could easily prove the gluttony of your political opponents. Besides, the facility reminds us that the habit of getting the latest news while relieving oneself is rooted deep in ancient history.



It was probably not only political issues and social scandals that were discussed at these meetings: the remarkable statuette of God Priapus, a small man with a huge penis who grants coveted potency, was found here. He was the major deity for the local people, who reproduced him from clay, stone, in murals, pottery decorations, and bas-reliefs.



The bliss of the Romans, however also proved to be temporary. Their withdrawal in the sixth century AD marked the end of Ephesus as a settlement as well.

The former port city, relocated more than five times in its history, is now a batch of sun-scorched ruins over the dent remaining from the dried-up port. And if it carried a message for the future generations, it would be a paraphrase of the Greek Panta kineitai, everything moves.

Read more about Turkey on BalkanTravellers.com