My recent Turkey trip!
Turkey is where Christianity was born. Geographically speaking, of course. St. Paul of Tarsus mainly travelled in the Aegean coastal regions of Turkey and Greece, supporting local communities and preaching. It was not our intention to retrace Paul's footstep or anything and yet we visited many ancient Ionian Greek communities.
Here is just a peek into my trip ... This is a short trailer movie I made using iMovie software.
My visits included ancient Greek cities of Didim, Pergamon and Ephesus. They are just ruins of typically Greek temples, theatres and public buildings. All you have to do, though, is to walk slowly and try to notice some details. Even after archaeologists and scholars have removed most juicy bits from these sites (the most prominent case is Pergamon, as the whole temple was shipped to Berlin!), as you would see signs that these Greek cities were inhabited by vibrant communities of Romano-Greeks who were the first Christians.
Ephesus
What remains of Ephesus is the most robust parts of public buildings in city centre. You can see what you would expect from Classical Greek city: theatres, agora, educational institutions, etc. When you don't see any church, you might think, of course, this is pre-Christian civilization. Well, actually, Ephesus was a functioning city of commerce well into late antiquity, when the Roman world was transforming itself into a Christian one. It is not very prominent, but these signs are there:
Turkey is where Christianity was born. Geographically speaking, of course. St. Paul of Tarsus mainly travelled in the Aegean coastal regions of Turkey and Greece, supporting local communities and preaching. It was not our intention to retrace Paul's footstep or anything and yet we visited many ancient Ionian Greek communities.
Here is just a peek into my trip ... This is a short trailer movie I made using iMovie software.
My visits included ancient Greek cities of Didim, Pergamon and Ephesus. They are just ruins of typically Greek temples, theatres and public buildings. All you have to do, though, is to walk slowly and try to notice some details. Even after archaeologists and scholars have removed most juicy bits from these sites (the most prominent case is Pergamon, as the whole temple was shipped to Berlin!), as you would see signs that these Greek cities were inhabited by vibrant communities of Romano-Greeks who were the first Christians.
Ephesus
What remains of Ephesus is the most robust parts of public buildings in city centre. You can see what you would expect from Classical Greek city: theatres, agora, educational institutions, etc. When you don't see any church, you might think, of course, this is pre-Christian civilization. Well, actually, Ephesus was a functioning city of commerce well into late antiquity, when the Roman world was transforming itself into a Christian one. It is not very prominent, but these signs are there:
The temple of Apollo at Didim, south of Izmir (Smyrna), near the Aegean coast:
Our guide informed us that they never completed the temple. He then just said that the settlement went into decline, but, you can see that perhaps the place survived into the Christian era:
Some signs are rather crude.. make me wonder if these are genuinely from late antiquity. But then again, who would carve these symbols with an intent of misleading those who visit these sites later? Local Turkish farmers, who were bored with pastoral life? Nineteenth century archaeologists who did not care much about fidelity of their findings? Or are they some kind of markings done by builders or something?
Well, it is quite fun to visit these places and think about possibilities when visiting these Greek ruins.
I wish to visit Nicaea and Chalcedon, where our Creed was decided, next time!
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