 Beautiful
images
Turkey – ancient Asia Minor – preserves some
of the finest Classical sites in the Mediterranean. Their
ruined theatres and temples stand majestically among olive
groves and myrtle woods. Here, nature imitates art as orchids
and creepers twine among the delicate floral tracery of their
fallen blocks of masonry and daisies enhance the sculpture
of an ancient altar frieze.
 Past
glories
Where once a thriving Hellenistic city raised its Ionic facades,
there now lie fluted columns and carved capitals, amid air
scented with wild thyme, oregano and pine resin. Poplars grow
among the arches of Roman bath houses and wild figs now soften
the profile of Lycian and Carian tombs. The sites are the
stuff of dreams - a tangible link with the ancient world and
a worthy place to muse about things past.
Romantic echoes
Many cities of the cities of Asia Minor, modern day Turkey,
outshone Rome itself. In its heyday the great theatre at Ephesus
was capable of holding 28,000 people.Later they all came under
the Christian sway from the Emperor in Constantinople, when
churches replaced the numerous temples. Made more romantic
by the profusion of flowers, today their ecclesiastical remains
lie along the Turkish Coast, an echo of the liturgies of High
Byzantium.
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