Roman temple of Elaiussa Sebaste
Coordinates: 36 ° 28 ′ 46.7 " N , 34 ° 10 ′ 20.3" E
The Roman Temple of Elaiussa Sebaste is so far the only temple found in the area of the ancient city Elaiussa Sebaste in the modern village of Ayaş , east of Korykos in today's district Erdemli province Mersin in southern Turkey . Which deity he was consecrated to is not clear. In Byzantine times it was converted into a Christian church.
location
The building is located in the west of the ancient city on a rock spur protruding to the south east of the valley called Paşa Deresi , where it was clearly visible from both land and sea. It is not in the original urban area, which was on an offshore island or peninsula. Today the island is connected to the land, the modern road separates the old area from the urban expansion in the west, which also includes the theater, the agora and the extensive necropolis outside the city limits .
Research history
The temple was already described by numerous travelers in the 19th century. The first was the British captain Francis Beaufort , who explored the Cilician coast on behalf of the Admiralty in the years 1811-12. He was followed in 1838 by Léon Marquis de Laborde and in 1861 by the French orientalist Victor Langlois . The first scientific description of the temple with a floor plan was provided in 1931 by Josef Keil and Adolf Wilhelm. Between 1952 and 1954, the British archaeologist Michael Gough and his wife Mary carried out systematic excavations, during which they also discovered the underground chamber and the apse of the later church, which was decorated with floor mosaics . In the 1980s, Friedrich Hild and Hansgerd Hellenkemper visited the place on their trips to the Cilicia. A team from the Roman University of La Sapienza , led by Eugenia Equini Schneider, has been digging in Elaiussa since 1995 , also examining the temple.
Building history
After Archelaos of Cappadocia had been granted rule over parts of Cilicia by the Roman Emperor Augustus , he moved 12 BC. His residence after Elaiussa, which he renamed Sebaste in thanks - after the Greek form of the name of Augustus. The building of the temple is generally dated to his reign. Christof Berns holds a date before the middle of the 1st century BC due to the building ornamentation. For likely. Presumably in the late 4th or early 5th century, the temple was abandoned as a pagan sacred building. Soon after, after Gough at the end of the 5th century, a single-nave church was built across the plan of the temple in the area of the cella . After Hild and Hellenkemper, it was possibly used again in the high Middle Ages.
description
The temple is oriented approximately north-south with a slight deviation to the north-north-west. With the exception of substructures in the south made of Opus caementicium (Roman concrete), it is made of limestone. The 4.50 meter high podium above was made of limestone blocks. None of these has been found in situ ; their impressions can only be seen in the concrete that is now exposed in the southeast corner. The stylobate measures 17.09 × 33.42 meters. The rising structure was a peripheral temple with 6 × 12 columns of Corinthian order . Of these, three on the north side, one in the west and one on the east side at different heights as well as some Attic bases have been preserved. The fluted columns have a lower diameter of 1.20 meters, the reconstructed total height was 11.40 meters. The highest preserved height is 7.05 meters on the north facade. Some of the capitals that had fallen down were found. They consist of two workpieces, the lower one with two rows of acanthus , the upper one with caulis ( stem- like shafts), volutes and abacus .
The entrance to the temple was a monumental flight of steps in the south. From there you entered the cella , which had a deep pronaos . Its ante probably includes a fragment of a pilaster capital that was discovered during the excavations. The large distance between the ante and the pillars of the south facade leads the excavators to suspect another row of four pillars, roughly level with the third pillar from the entrance. This would make the building a pseudodipteros . The walls of the naos consisted of opus quadratum, i.e. ashlar stones, of which, according to the remaining finds, the lower layer was smooth and the upper layer was embossed . Due to the sparse finds, only limited statements can be made about the entablature of the cella and the peristasis . The architrave only fragments that were also reused in the Byzantine church exist. It had two fascia (horizontal stripes), a profile made up of a bulge and a fillet, and above it another fascia. Two pieces with pictorial representations were found from the temple's friezes. Their poor condition and the location of one part under heavy blocks make the interpretation difficult. You can see scenes of a so-called sea ethiasus , a grouping of different sea creatures, including a dolphin rider or a kind of sea monster, a hippocampus and nereids . This frieze is assigned to the outer peristasis. Other parts of the frieze with garland decorations probably belong to the cella. The garlands are of Niken or Cupids held it there are elements that are likely Bukrania represent. The backs of the two parts found form an architrave with two fascias. It remains unclear whether the garlands were directed inside the cella or outwards.
In the northeast of the cella a flight of stairs led down to a platform in a square hole, from where one could enter an underground chamber via another staircase. It is completely built in Opus quadratum, measures 4.14 meters square and closes in a barrel vault at the top . A window opened in the south wall, presumably to the pronaos. Since the chamber was used as a cistern in Byzantine times, there are no finds that could give any indication of a possible function of the room. Only the location and the access from the inside of the cella suggest a cultic reference.
In the late 5th century - after Gough as the immediate successor of the pagan predecessor - a church was built in the southern part of the temple. It was oriented transversely to the temple axis with the apse facing east. Since the population of the city had decreased as a result of the silting up of the port, the area required was significantly smaller than that of the temple. The church building had dimensions of 11.35 × 7.30 meters. To the north of this, on the east side, the columns of the temple were completely removed and probably replaced by a wall, while the western row of columns was retained as a portico . The northern area of the former temple was possibly used as the living quarters or lounges of the priests. In the southern part, all columns including the bases were removed and stairs were added to the podium in the south and west, so that an access area was created there for the faithful. The main entrance to the church was in the west, with two more doors in the north and northeast. The floor of the nave was mostly paved, the eastern part and the apse were decorated with a mosaic. Only very sparse remains of this are preserved today. Gough was able to document large parts of it in 1952. The theme is a Paradeisos , a popular motif in early Christian iconography. The image is framed by an ornamental band, in the actual picture numerous animals are shown, including a leopard, a bull, a duck, a bear, a ram, an ostrich, a dog chasing a hare, as well as other birds and fish, in between stylized plants. In the upper part of the apse the mosaic is disturbed by a semicircular row of stones. Gough suspects it belongs to a funeral. He does not appreciate the artistic value of the mosaic very high one, he describes it as "rural cousins" (country cousin) the known, later mosaics from Antioch . The animals are reminiscent of those from the martyrdom of Ayathekla at Seleukia on Kalykadnos , while the frames and backgrounds resemble Antiochene mosaics.
Based on a small column base with a lower diameter of 0.44 meters and some Byzantine capital fragments that were found in the vicinity of the church building, Gough assumes that the interior of the church was divided into a main aisle and two aisles.
South wall of the church, the right column marks the apse.
Apse with burial stones and remains of mosaics
Mosaic remains
No reliable statements can be made about the cult to which the temple was dedicated. Rudolf Heberdey and Adolf Wilhelm suggested Athena , Gough Poseidon because of the maritime depictions on the frieze . Hild and Hellenkemper thought Zeus was possible, and the imperial cult was also brought into play. The Turkish archaeologist Deniz Kaplan suspects that the building of Archelaos was built out of gratitude for Emperor Augustus and that the Seethiasos mentioned symbolizes a memory of his victory in the sea battle at Actium .
literature
- Michael Gough : A Temple and Church at Ayaş (Cilicia) In: Anatolian Studies IV, 1954, pp. 49-64.
- Christof Berns : On the dating of the temples in Seleukia on Kalykadnos and in Elaiussa Sebaste (Cilicia) In: Damaszener Mitteilungen Volume 10, 1998 pp. 135–154.
- Friedrich Hild , Hansgerd Hellenkemper : Kilikien and Isaurien. Tabula Imperii Byzantini Volume 5. Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna 1990, ISBN 3-7001-1811-2 , p. 401.
- Emanuela Borgia: Notes on the Architecture of the Roman Temple in Elaiussa Sebaste In: OLBA XVI, The Journal of Research Center for Cilician Archeology, Mersin 2008 pp. 249-276.
- Deniz Kaplan: A new cult proposal for the temple in Elaiussa Sebaste (Cilicia ) In: OLBA XVII, The Journal of Research Center for Cilician Archeology, Mersin 2009 pp. 23–32.
Web links
Individual evidence
- Jump up ↑ Sir Francis Beaufort: Karamania, Or, A Brief Description of the South Coast of Asia-Minor and of the Remains of Antiquity With Plans, Views, & c. Collected During a Survey of that Coast, Under the Orders of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, in the Years 1811 & 1812 . R. Hunter, (successor to Mr. Johnson,), 1817, p. 240-242 ( digitized version ).
- ^ Léon de Laborde, Alexandre de Laborde: Voyage de l'Asie mineure. Didot, Paris 1838, pp. 132-134 ( digitized version ).
- ↑ Victor Langlois: Voyage dans la Cilicie et dans les montagnes du Taurus exécuté pendant les années 1851-1853 ... B. Duprat, 1861, p. 231 ( digitized version ).
- ^ Josef Keil, Adolf Wilhelm: Monuments from the rough Cilicia. (= MAMA 3), Manchester 1931, p. 192 no. 221-222
- ^ Rudolf Heberdey , Adolf Wilhelm : Journeys in Kilikien 1891-1892 (= memoranda of the Academy of Sciences. Volume 44, 6). Vienna 1896 p. 61.