The Aegean Sea and its collection of beautiful islands
are framed by the coastlines of mainland Greece and Turkey.
Millions of tourists of all nationalities come here every year.
3,000 years ago, it was just as popular.
The ports of the Aegean would have been crammed
with families, workers, soldiers and kings,
travelling for trade and to fight.
The cities of ancient Greece were often at war with each other.
I want to find out more about this vast and complicated civilisation,
to dig out the real stories behind the myths.
And I'm not just going to the well-known tourist spots.
Of course not.
I'm headed off the beaten track.
I'm Alice Roberts,
and I'm travelling hundreds of miles
through what is now Greece and Turkey,
looking into the flowering of classical civilisation
from ancient Greece to the Romans...
Oh, my goodness! That's wonderful.
..to discover this region's vital role
as the birthplace of Plato, Socrates and Alexander the Great,
mythology, theatre and democracy.
I'm halfway through my adventure
discovering ancient Greek civilisation,
and I'm in the middle of the Aegean Sea,
on the beautiful island of Paros.
From Thessaloniki,
I've travelled down to Athens and Corinth
before taking a five-hour journey on a ferry.
And now Paros will be my base
as I travel to the islands around it
to learn more about ancient Greece in this stunning part of the world.
Islanders here have been travelling by boat for thousands of years.
This morning I'm heading to Delos.
It's virtually uninhabited...
..but the ancient remains there are a big draw for the tourists.
Every day this ferry does a round trip
from Paros to Delos and Mykonos,
and then back to Paros again.
Whoo!
So this is the sacred island of Delos, sacred to Apollo,
where representatives from all over Greece came in the 5th century BCE
to sign up to the Delian League
to promise to Athens
that they would form an alliance against the Persians.
And that also involved paying quite...
..paying quite a hefty tribute to Athens as well.
This is a central meeting place for all of the Greeks.
There is that sacred nature to it.
But also it was just geographically right in the middle,
so everybody could come together here.
And they did regularly anyway.
There were Delian Games,
which brought people together from all over the Aegean.
As we know, the Greeks really enjoyed coming together
for festivals and games.
Wow!
Oh, my goodness, look at this. It's just all there.
Look at that.
We are just coming in to the ancient port of Delos,
and the archaeology is right up to the shoreline.
It goes all the way up the hill here.
It's enormous.
Oh, the best approach to an archaeological site anywhere, surely.
Although it's one of the smaller islands in the Aegean,
Delos was considered deeply sacred in antiquity.
And there's evidence that people have been living here
for at least 5,000 years.
1:30 departure time. OK?
1:30? 1:30.
Lovely. Efharisto. Parakalo.
I'm meeting Maria, an archaeologist who's been working here on Delos
for the past nine years.
Maria.
Hi, Alice.
Welcome to Delos.
Kalimera. Kalimera.
What an incredible approach to an archaeological site.
Yes, indeed.
I've never experienced anything like it.
And it's wonderful.
You know what you experienced?
What you experienced is what the ancient people did.
Yeah. Right from the ship.
You know, coming from Naxos and Paros
to visit the great sanctuary of Apollo on Delos.
Yeah. It's exactly the same.
They were coming with the boat,
you know, and visited the great sanctuary.
Where should we start then, Maria?
Let's go and visit, I think, the sanctuary of the god.
In the 1st millennium BCE, Delos grew into an immensely prosperous port
and a religious centre.
With a famous sanctuary to the sun god, Apollo,
who, according to mythology,
was born on the island
alongside his twin sister, Artemis, the moon goddess.
Pilgrims came from all over Greece to worship Apollo here.
So what are we entering here, Maria?
Here we are inside the sanctuary of the temple.
And, actually, this is one of the earliest buildings.
This is called the Oikos of Naxians, the House of Naxians.
Yeah.
We don't know if it was a temple of the god or not.
Right.
But we know that it is the first building
that it had marble roof tiles.
Because marble tiles were invented by the Naxians.
It seems like quite an unusual style.
I mean, you've got a rectangular building...
With a central... ..with a central row of columns.
This is because it is very early,
and the people were afraid that the roof is going to fall down.
So they had the central column...
Because of the weight of it with these marbles tiles.
Exactly, exactly.
I haven't seen that before. I haven't seen that central row of columns.
Well, if you go to Naxos, you are going to see it.
We have some tiles like that. We're not going to Naxos.
(LAUGHS) Oh. Next time. Next time.
Oh, no. Next time. On your next trip.
Yeah.
And here the Naxians,
besides the temple, they have dedicated a huge kouros.
A huge colossal kouros.
This is the base of the statue?
This is the base of one statue measuring like 10 to 11 metres.
And this base, was that originally one slab of stone, Maria?
Exactly. There was one stone.
That's huge. Yes.
You see this inscription?
This is archaic scripture.
And the Naxians were boasting that they made the statue
and the base from the same marble block.
Oh, my goodness.
That was really an achievement for the...
Yeah, yeah. ..for the period.
And in the 15th century,
we have some travellers coming here and designing, you know.
And we know it was almost standing OK.
As late as the 15th century? It was standing in the 15th century.
But then the travellers have started coming
and each one was coming, was trying to take a part of it.
Oh, no!
Until 1671, it had its head, the kouros had its head.
Then we lost it with a ship around 1673.
So somebody had taken it? Yes.
I hope it's in a museum or in a house somewhere,
and not in the bottom of the sea.
At the bottom of the sea. Yeah.
But... How extraordinary.
Over there, where you see the green trees?
Yeah.
It used to be the sacred lake.
And the lions are looking to the sacred lake.
We are going to see them right now.
So we are still inside the sanctuary.
So it's huge, this sanctuary.
It's huge.
So there are the lions.
You can see them.
Yeah.
You can see, they were guarding the road
from the sanctuary to the birthplace of the god.
Yeah.
How many do you think there were originally?
So, there were from 9 to 17 lions made of Naxian stone,
dated to late 7th century BC.
They were guarding the road here
and they were watching the sacred lake.
Yeah.
You don't see anywhere other... ..anywhere trees.
This is where the water is.
Because underneath there was water.
It was dried out in the '20s, '30s, something like that,
because there was malaria on the island.
The workers had malaria.
So that's why... that's why they dried it out.
Yeah. Yeah.
So that's the lake... That's the lake.
..where, in legend, Apollo and Artemis were born.
In the middle of the lake, there used to be a palm tree.
Yeah.
And there Leto grabbed the palm tree and she gave birth to the twins.
Yeah.
Artemis first, when it was still night, and then Apollo.
And when Apollo was born, day also started.
Ah, so that's interesting,
because Apollo is kind of a sun god as well.
Exactly. Yes, exactly.
And Artemis is associated with the moon.
And Artemis is the moon goddess. Yeah.
So where now? To the city?
Yes.
Delos was a hugely successful commercial hub in the Mediterranean,
and many rich merchants chose to make it their home,
building themselves palatial houses.
Around the atrium there are rooms.
In the ground floor, there are no windows to the street
because the street is full of noise, full of smells.
Can you imagine 20,000 people packed living here?
OK. It must have been a very... And security as well.
And security, of course,
because these people were obviously wealthy.
Fabulously rich. Fabulously rich.
Yeah. OK.
But on the second floor...
And we know that there is a second floor
because there's a staircase over there - you're going to see it.
On the second floor are probably the rooms of the family.
And these rooms, they had the view to the sea.
Yes. OK. And windows and view to the sea.
And here you can see the staircase,
climbing up to the second floor.
But the second floor started after the columns ended.
So the ground floor... the ground floor was 560,
because these columns are 560.
So the ground floor was like a double floor of today architecture.
Absolutely stunning.
It would have been magnificent.
It is magnificent still.
Yes, it is, it is. Yeah.
Can we walk out here? Yes, we can.
This Hellenistic period of the city is so beautiful.
Yes, it is.
Gorgeous to walk through. It's gorgeous.
And we're seeing Delos at the height of its powers.
But, yeah, you do wonder how it got there.
Exactly. How did it start? Yeah.
What happened that it became the centre of the Cyclades,
the centre of the cult of Apollo?
And so economically important - politically and economically.
And economically.
Still plenty of questions here. Every time.
And the more we know, the more questions we have.
Yeah, yeah.
We'll see. The future will show us.
Are you hopeful?
Of course we are hopeful.
You have to be as an archaeologist.
Yes. It's the... Yeah. Yeah.
Next on my tour is the Greek island of Mykonos.
A complete contrast with Delos.
In many ways, Delos's success was its undoing.
In Roman times it was attacked by enemies of Rome and pirates,
and then it was abandoned and fell into ruin.
Beautiful windmills.
Mykonos, on the other hand, is full of life
and has grown into the most popular tourist destination in the Cyclades.
It's a different world here on Mykonos.
It's so populated compared with Delos,
and we've got all these restaurants and cafes and shops
coming right down to the waterfront.
But what we have to do is imagine what Delos was like 2,000 years ago,
2,500 years ago,
because it would have been just like this.
Just as bustling and vibrant and colourful as Mykonos is today.
And then it became abandoned.
And it means that the archaeologists
have really been able to understand it in its entirety.
And, of course, here on Mykonos,
if we were to get down underneath these buildings,
their foundations will be medieval.
Underneath that, Roman. Underneath that, Hellenistic.
Civilisation just keeps on going.
I'm back on the ferry, returning to Paros.
I've a meeting this evening with a man who wants to preserve
ancient island life against a tide of modernisation.
But before then, I have a couple of hours to kill,
and the sea is calling me.
As much as I like travelling by train,
this is my favourite mode of transport.
The Aegean islands, including this group, the Cyclades,
are full of ancient history,
good food, good wine,
and the beautiful, beautiful Aegean.
It's not surprising that thousands of tourists come here every year.
In fact, Paros attracts half a million visitors every year.
Tourism is a booming industry in Greece, a mainstay of the economy.
But traditional island life is under threat.
Farmland owned by generations of the same family
is being scooped up by developers for apartments and hotels.
I'm on my way to meet Pandelis
at his traditional farmhouse in the highlands of Paros.
(DING!)
Pandelis.
Hi, Alice. Welcome. Kalispera.
Welcome in my humble place.
So lovely.
Is this a mulberry tree?
Yes, it is a mulberry tree.
And just now they start the fruits.
But come to see the garden, please.
Ooh, yes, please.
Can I go through here?
Pandelis's farm has been in his family for 250 years,
but now it's just down to him to keep the traditions going.
He welcomes visitors to his home
to experience the old ways of Greek island life.
And this is your garden. So what have you got growing here?
Just, uh...wheat.
I will start to cut it in the next week.
Yeah, I was going to say it must be nearly ready.
By hand. It's totally handmade. Yeah.
And under it's a vineyard, and down it's about 30 olives.
Yeah. What about animals? Do you keep any animals?
Not anymore.
I have only chickens
because I focused mostly in the vineyards and in the olives.
Yeah. And in the vegetables.
Because I have some guests and I like to offer them something
from this place.
We can cut some zucchinis. Yeah? OK.
Come.
Pandelis is also insisting that I try his homemade wine
and locally made cheese.
But first, we're taking a look at his vineyard.
So, do you live here all year round?
Well, mostly.
Here it's my sanctuary.
Yeah. And it's nice to keep it going, isn't it?
So these are grapevines?
Yes. It's a local vines.
And they're round bushes. They're not...
Yeah... They're not on wires.
It's the carp system.
This is the traditional...
Yes. The traditional. It's very old.
They follow this method here. Yeah.
Because the people work the ground by the hand in the past.
Yeah.
Sometimes they used to plough with the animals.
Yeah. With donkeys or mules.
But mostly they do by the hand.
Right. Yeah.
All... Thousands of hectares. All the Paros.
Because all the Paros, it was like old, old.
Yeah, yeah. Even up there.
This, the top of this hill,
it was vines everywhere.
Really? Yeah.
So it's all gone?
Across there, where now you see bushes or forest,
it was filled with... with a...with a barley.
I remember as a kid.
Now it's bushes. Really? Yeah.
And now...
You can still see all the walls, can't you?
Terracing it up the hill.
The walls now they fall down. Nobody's cared, of course.
And now they try to clean it.
I don't know if they do it sneaky or by the licence,
because now it's a forest because probably they're going to build...
Yeah. ..up there.
Yeah. It was the system here.
Because the people, they need to produce food, not money.
Yeah. They focus to produce food.
They have wheat, barley for the bread.
They have the vines because they make wine, and plenty of wine.
The wine that goes every day on the table.
Yeah. It was there all the time.
Yeah. But maybe there's something...
We feel a nostalgia for the past.
But I think it's really interesting what you're doing here,
that you're...you know, you're trying to keep it going.
Yeah. I try to keep a small example.
Yeah. First for me and after...
Yeah. Well, it's lovely to see as well.
And it's really interesting to think about
how much the landscape has changed in just the last few decades, really.
Yeah. Yeah, very, very fast.
I mean, the Greek style of life, to enjoy the life...
Yeah. ..does not exist anymore.
I believe at 2000, 2005, '10, it was OK.
But after start to change faster.
Now everybody's live to support the tourism, the big machine.
Are there other people like you who are resisting that?
It's some people like me. Yes. A few...
Yeah. Yeah. ..only in Paros.
But I know some people who it's younger of me.
And this is very hopeful.
But it's not so many.
So it means we disappear sooner or later.
Yeah, I hope not. I hope you don't disappear completely.
Maybe more people will see what you're doing and try to...
I hope, I hope. I hope to stay a few. (LAUGHS)
Yeah.
I put a sign on the main road.
Yeah. In the Greek letters.
'Home-made wine'. But they never come, Greeks.
Yeah.
They started to come Germans, English or...
The English sign works. Yes.
People who they know 'krasi', it's mean 'wine'.
And it starts like that.
The people discover me and...
Let's taste some wine.
Ah, that's a lovely, lovely looking zucchini.
Thank you, Pandelis.
This is my olives.
Your olives? Yeah. From my trees.
This is a very local cheese,
actually, from the last lady here in the village who made this cheese.
Yeah. What's it called?
They call it xynomyzithra.
And it's an old style of cheese.
Maybe from the most ancient type of cheese, where they make the people.
I will bring a little bit of bread and we'll taste the wine. Alright, lovely.
This is my bread.
It's your bread as well?
From the wheat?
Yes.
Yeah. Yes.
Lovely.
Shall we try the wine?
Welcome. Nice to meet you.
Nice to meet you too.
To the future.
And the past.
That is lovely.
That's a really nice wine.
This is so delicious, all of it.
And I can see why you are such a proponent for the simple life.
I mean, the tastes here,
the flavours are just... are just beautiful.
And we're sitting here in this gorgeous place,
listening to the grasshoppers.
We don't need much to be happy, I think.
A little bit of wine, a few good friends.
So, cheers.
Yamas! Yamas!
I really hope that Pandelis can find a successor
to maintain his traditional Greek farm.
It would be such a shame
to see this remaining rural idyll disappear forever.
Tomorrow I'm heading to another island
to catch up with my archaeologist friend Yannos,
who's going to show me the ancient Greek temple
he's been working on for over 25 years.
Yannos. Hi.
I think I can see the temple already.
Yeah, you can see the temple. Yeah.
Shall we hop on, then? Yes. Let's go.
Yannos has to be the busiest archaeologist in the Cyclades.
Kalimera!
And he's taking me to see a passion project
which has taken up the last 25 years of his life.
It's two short boat trips from Paros to Despotiko
to see the ancient Greek temple of Apollo.
But the times aren't scheduled.
And in early spring there are only a few boats available.
So, that, we have huge buildings here.
So this is a very well protected harbour.
This is the reason that they built this sanctuary
in this precise position.
Was there a city?
Mmm... This is a big problem.
We don't have a city city.
We have a small settlement. Right.
We have a lot of buildings. 25 buildings until now.
Yeah. So it's not a...it's not a settlement with a temple.
Actually, no. It's a temple site.
It's only a temple site,
with a lot of buildings to help with the sanctuary.
And is that something you find across the islands?
Do you find special spaces
which are kind of purely religious sites in this way?
Exactly. Right.
So, is anybody living on Despotiko today?
Uh, nobody.
We have a shepherd and around 800 goats.
Right. Nothing else.
So there's fewer people here today than there were in ancient Greece.
Exactly.
Yorgo... See you in a bit, Yorgos.
Thank you. Efharisto. (SPEAKS GREEK)
So this is the boat of the shepherd.
Ah.
Apollo was a very popular god in ancient Greece.
I've already seen temples to him at Delphi, Corinth, and on Delos.
And here's another one, on this tiny island of Despotiko.
That's it. That's the temple.
It's wow.
Oh!
That's lovely.
So we have the temple,
and next to the temple we have the estiatorion.
And now you're going to see the whole temple.
And this is a Doric temple?
It's a Doric temple with Ionic elements.
Right. So what age are we talking about, then, if it's Doric?
6th century BC. Yeah.
So this has been reconstructed?
Yes.
You're impressed?
It's beautiful.
And I like the reconstruction.
I like that it's...it's not complete.
You've just given people an idea.
No, it's not a Disneyland.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
We took permission from the Ministry of Culture.
I'm an employee of the government for 38 years.
It was not so easy to do the reconstruction.
Yeah.
And did you largely have the foundations of the temple
and you knew what it looked like?
We knew.
First they built the temple. Yeah.
And I'm going to show you from the other side the...
They knew that they wanted to add the estiatorion.
So... And what is the estiatorion?
Estiatorion is the dining rooms. OK.
They had to sacrifice the animals in the altar.
They had to consume the meat. Yeah, yeah.
So they need a place where you consume the meat.
Right. It's a feast for the worshippers.
Yeah. Come.
The sanctuary was built around 2,500 years ago
and continued in use right up to the Roman period.
So you see, this wall exists before,
and then they add the stylobate.
So the column is outside the temple wall?
There's a wall down here.
Yeah. There's an earlier wall because then they add the stylobate.
So this is in the area of 550 BC.
OK. It's all marbled.
So there's not a solid wall behind these columns?
No, this is a corridor...
You'd walk through the columns into this open space.
We have the original threshold.
Actually, we had to create... Can I step down on that?
What? Can I step on it?
Yes. OK.
You're with me so you can do whatever you want.
(GASPS) OK.
So they went through this doorway. Yes.
And what are we entering here?
So, this is the temple.
Oh. So that's... that's just the atrium.
Exactly. That's just the opening. Yeah.
The corridor, the prodromos, how we call it in Greek.
Yeah. The proston also, we call it in Greek.
So this is the cult base. OK.
And this is a pedestal?
Exactly. The cult base of the statue.
Can you help me? Yeah, yeah.
It's quite heavy, yeah?
What are we doing with it?
Turn it.
Turn it... That way.
This way?
OK. OK.
That goes here. Oh, I see. Yeah. Yeah.
So this year, the marble technicians,
they're going to add that.
Yeah.
So, the plinth, this is the base of the statue.
The statue was going here. Yeah.
And so that would have been a statue of Apollo?
Exactly. Yeah.
Or Artemis. But... You didn't find it?
We have two pieces of the statue.
Yeah. It's in Paros Museum.
OK. Can you help me to put it back? Yeah, lift that back.
OK.
So, actually, you can see it from here.
Yeah. Yeah.
And we're very lucky to find it inside the room.
Yeah, yeah.
I'll show you also the dining rooms. OK.
Come.
This is the original floor.
So a cobbled...cobbled floor.
Yeah, but there was a plaster on top. You see it here?
So these are the rooms that people are feasting in?
Yes.
And why we say that,
how were they eating...
Look here what we have.
This is for the cleaner, for the beds.
Right. Yeah, yeah.
How they were eating... The couches. Yeah.
So is it a continuous bench all around?
Exactly. Benches.
And they had to have light.
So we have openings east and west.
Yeah. Both sides.
Yeah. Yeah.
Meanwhile, for the temple only east.
So this is west.
Do you think worshippers would have come and stayed here as well?
Yes. Would they have slept overnight?
We have a lot of buildings here that you're going to see around.
Yeah. Oh, yeah. It all carries on up there.
We have a lot of buildings. (LAUGHS) Yeah.
28 until now.
It's a really precious opportunity to look at not just a temple,
but everything else that goes with it.
You didn't expect something like this, huh?
No, I did not.
You asked me about where the visitors were,
the priests they were staying?
Yeah, yeah. OK.
We have a lot of rooms and a lot of buildings.
You are impressed? I am...
It's wonderful to see the context of this temple.
Now you're going to be really impressed here.
It starts to feel like a monastery, doesn't it?
Yes. Yeah.
With a lot of buildings, a lot of things.
Now I'm going to ask you something.
See this and then get inside this small building.
So there's a big pot there.
OK. In the ground.
This is a threshold.
Yeah.
This is a paved area.
What are those?
Are they quern stones? Are they quern, for...
I'm not going to show you,
but probably you understand what is this.
(LAUGHS)
If you want to do pee pee or poo poo.
Is it latrines? It's not latrines! Exactly.
Then you have to wash your...
This is a bathtub.
Oh, my goodness.
Then there is a channel that brings everything out.
Yeah. We have the holes.
So let's say the water was going here.
Then from here it goes out.
There is an inclination, you see?
There is another channel that brings everything outside the building.
Oh, my goodness. Yeah.
When does this date to?
When?
Archaic - 6th century BC.
So this is the first latrine that we have.
This is really sophisticated. (LAUGHS) Of course!
This is the kind of thing that you expect to find the Romans doing.
And we're next to the temple. Yeah.
So people, the worshippers,
but they have to be clean.
Yeah. Yeah. What the Muslims do?
They wash... Exactly. Yeah, yeah.
Where does the water come from? Is there a source on the island?
There is, yeah.
We have up in the mountains,
but we have the cisterns now
that you're going to be very impressed with that.
It's not a small site.
It gets bigger and bigger.
Every year.
Oh, my goodness. Look at that!
So this is a cistern?
Yes.
For clean water.
And when does this date to?
Archaic - 6th century BC.
Again?! Really early. Again.
All the pottery and all the...
And the construction of the wall.
Yeah. That's incredible.
It's six metres deep, eh?
Is there water flowing into it naturally?
Yes. Naturally? Of course.
From these two systems for the purification of the water.
Yeah. Then we have a channel of 30 metres.
There is another round system.
And probably there was a fountain or a spring up in the mountains
that was bringing the water, fresh water.
What are these triangular channels in that wall?
For the water to come inside.
And this part, unfortunately, is destroyed.
Probably we have another channel here.
You see this slab?
So probably there was another...
Are they letting...
Are they letting silt settle out of it?
Exactly. Yeah. Yeah.
To clean the water before it goes to the big cistern.
Probably it was covered with roof tiles,
because we found a lot of roof tiles.
I am impressed by the temple.
I don't want you to think that I'm not impressed by the temple,
but I have seen other temples.
I have never seen anything like this.
This is incredible.
After Delos, I said you have to see more here.
OK. What do you see here?
Uh, a round...
OK. ..area.
Uh, is it another cistern?
It's another cistern. Yeah.
This is the bedrock.
And what's this?
OK. Probably the four holes...
Yeah. This is limestone.
Right. They want to control the water.
Mm.
So a kind of sluice, basically? Exactly.
How far up the hill do you think this goes?
Uh, actually, we want to excavate, but it's very difficult.
There are more construction here. Yeah.
And probably they found the spring is up in the mountains.
So we've just got a series of tanks and channels all the way down
the mountain.
To bring the fresh water. Yeah, yeah.
But from here you have a great view of the harbour.
And the temple.
Look, this you have to take.
The goats. The goats are running out.
That is brilliant.
It's great. It's almost 800 goats. So happy.
Yeah, yeah.
But it's a wonderful place, huh?
It's absolutely gorgeous.
Look at the colour of the sea.
Inside the harbour and outside.
It's turquoise... When it's rough...
..and blue out there.
And the sailors would be safe. They could take water, food to proceed.
From here you can go to Asia Minor.
You can go to Crete, Egypt, Syria,
Palestine, North Greece.
Having come here and done your sacrifice to Apollo or Artemis,
to make sure you're going to be safe.
Give all the votive things for Apollo.
Yeah. And then continue.
Is that our boat coming?
I think so. Yeah.
Maybe we need to get back down.
We need, because he's going to leave us here.
Yeah.
Well, I'd quite happily stay here.
This is all about... No. (LAUGHS)
We can swim. We can do whatever you want.
I mean, it is, you know, it's like a monastery with a church.
It's a monastery. Exactly. And all the associations.
This is a good parallel. Buildings...
A monastery.
Thank you so much, Yannos. That was amazing.
You're welcome. It was my pleasure to have you here.
What a brilliant site.
Hope to see you back.
I might have to come back and dig. Perfect.
Thank you. Bye. Nice to see you.
Bye-bye!
Bye!
What an incredible site!
Absolutely wonderful.
I wonder what they're going to find next.
Ancient Greek culture spread far and wide around the Mediterranean,
and I'm on the move again,
to another country and another continent.
I've left the Cyclades behind,
and I'm headed now into the northern Aegean,
and then on to the coast of what was Asia Minor.
The coast of the Ionians,
who were connected with everybody else around the Aegean
through their language and their culture.
From the Cyclades,
it's 126 miles and two ferries to reach the coast of Turkey.
I've arrived in Turkey
on the final leg of my tour around the ancient Aegean.
And I'm really excited
because I know that some spectacular sites await me,
including one that I've always wanted to go to.
My first stop is the ancient Greek Temple of Artemis,
located near the town of Selcuk.
I've made some notes about the Temple of Artemis here at Selcuk.
So I'm going to try to draw it.
And these notes are drawn from ancient writers,
people like Pausanias, Pliny,
Antipater of Sidon,
who listed the Temple of Artemis
as one of the Seven Ancient Wonders of the World,
and he was very impressed by it.
He said, "I've set eyes on the wall of lofty Babylon,
"on which there is a road for chariots,
"and the statue of Zeus by the Alpheus,
"and the Hanging Gardens,
"and the Colossus of the Sun,
"and the huge labour of the high pyramids,
"and the vast tomb of Mausolus.
"But when I saw the house of Artemis that mounted to the clouds,
"those other marvels lost their brilliancy.
"And I said, 'Lo, apart from Olympus,
"'the Sun never looked on aught so grand.'"
So, as far as he was concerned, Antipater of Sidon,
the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
was the most glorious thing in the ancient world.
We are given the impression of a huge temple.
Absolutely huge.
And estimates of its dimensions,
in terms of the number of columns it had, vary.
It had eight or nine columns across the short side,
and then 20 or 21 down the long side.
And apparently some of the columns were decorated too.
And remember, we're only seeing the outer columns,
that there are, in fact...
..double rows of columns on each side,
and then there are more columns inside.
The Temple of Artemis, going back 2,000 years ago,
according to Antipater of Sidon,
the most magnificent wonder of the ancient world.
I'm meeting up with Azime, a local tour guide.
Riding and cycling...
I mean, it twice goes through the villages...
And stopping at a cafe?
Yeah.
Now, listen, I want to know all about this Temple of Artemis,
because there's very little of it left now.
But it was one of the wonders of the ancient world.
Exactly. Yeah.
I mean, it was the biggest temple of its time.
Yeah.
And doubling the size of the Parthenon in Athens.
Double the size of the Parthenon?! Yes.
I mean, that's enormous.
That's absolutely huge.
Yeah, it is, it is huge.
So when's it first built?
Um, the first temple was built 6th century BCE.
Then it was burnt down by a guy called Herostratus.
I've heard this story.
He climbed up into the rafters and set fire to it.
Do you believe it? Do you think...
Do you think that's a... Do you know what I believe?
I believe there was a gang,
I mean, helping him.
Yeah. You know why?
Because, I mean, the Temple of Artemis was not only a temple,
it was also one of the first banks in the world.
Oh! Yeah. So...
So you think it was a heist?
Yeah, I think so.
Because there was a huge, I mean, immense treasure
kept in the Temple of Artemis.
Yeah. Everyone used to...
..I mean, give their belongings, precious belongings, money,
jewellery, etc, etc, to the Temple of Artemis.
It's the safest place to put it.
Yeah. Yeah.
They believed so, but they lost it.
So after this burning down, then, it's then rebuilt?
Yeah. It's rebuilt.
And do you know who wanted to sponsor...
..who wanted to be sponsor for that rebuild?
Yeah. Who's that?
Alexander the Great. Yes.
And apparently they said no... Uh-huh.
..because we can't...
"A god can't make a temple for a god."
Yes, exactly.
That sounds like something Alexander... Ephesians were smart, you know.
Yeah, but that sounds like something Alexander would have said, doesn't it?
Yeah, he was flattered, and he gave up the idea.
And there's a link with Alexander as well,
in terms of the burning down,
was meant to happen at the time he was born?
Yes, exactly. It was burn...
It was burned down like 356 BC.
Mm.
It's the exact year when Alexander the Great was born.
Also, the date is the same - 21st July.
So, I mean, there was a rumour, the Ephesians said,
"How come goddess, mother goddess, like, Artemis,
"couldn't, like, protect her temple?"
You know? Yeah. Yeah.
And they said,
because since she was the goddess mother, goddess of fertility,
so she was in charge of the birth of Alexander the Great in Macedonia.
Oh, so she wasn't here in her temple?
She'd gone off to help with the birth.
Yeah, that was the excuse.
It's brilliant, isn't it? It's amazing myth making.
And tell me about Artemis herself, this goddess.
Ephesian Artemis, she is famous for her fertility AND virginity.
Hang on a minute. Yeah.
Yes. That's interesting, isn't it? It is, it is. I mean...
Fertility and virginity at the same time.
Actually, it's the same with the Egyptian goddess Isis,
or Kubaba, the mother goddess of the Hittites.
They all are virgin, but they all represent the fertility.
At the same time? At the same time. Yeah.
And please think about Virgin Mary.
She is virgin, but she gave birth to Jesus.
And when it comes to the postures,
we see the similar postures again
in the statues of Mother Goddess Artemis and Virgin Mary.
Like this, arms stretched.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
It's interesting because even though you think it's different religions,
there's elements of it that flow through time, I think.
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah. Yeah.
A succession of temples to Artemis were built on this site
before it was eventually abandoned.
And very little of this once magnificent monument has survived.
Imagine these columns.
They were all 18 metres high.
Absolutely enormous.
Yeah, exactly.
And now you can see we only have one column left from the temple.
With a stork at the top.
Yeah. A stork's nest.
We have really cute storks.
They keep coming here every year.
And there's not much of it left, actually.
I mean, it looks like a lot of this stone was robbed out
by the time it started to be buried.
Yeah, exactly.
On the left side of us, there is the Basilica of Saint John.
Yeah.
They used the recycled material from the Temple of Artemis
to be able to build that basilica.
And also for all the other constructions surrounding here,
since marble was expensive.
Yeah. It is still expensive, though.
So, yeah, people took the marble here.
So when did this eventually fall out of use?
I mean, is that to do with the rise of Christianity?
Actually, yeah.
I mean, 4th century AD,
Roman Empire accepted Christianity as their official religion.
But before then, they were all pagans.
So here was a pagan pilgrimage centre, you know.
With some Christians in the city in Ephesus.
We know that it was an important early Christian centre.
Yes, exactly. But it's still majority pagan?
Yes. Majority pagan. Yeah.
We had Jews, 50% of the population, they were Jews.
Oh, really? OK. Yes.
As long as you pay your tax,
you are free to believe in whatever you would like to believe in.
But then it becomes intolerance.
You know, Christianity becomes the state religion of Rome.
And, actually, there's an intolerance there
and other religions are not allowed.
Yeah, that's why... And especially pagan religions are not allowed.
That's why they needed to get rid of this pagan temple as well.
So it's effectively decommissioned at that point?
Yeah, exactly.
Please imagine the pillars, the... I mean...
That's been reconstructed, hasn't it?
Yeah. You see, it's in pieces and pieces
because it was collapsed because of the earthquakes happened here.
Here we are on a fault line, actually.
Right. OK. Actually...
So it's falling into ruin...
You know, going back into antiquity,
it's falling into ruin even before Christianity comes to the fore?
Yes, exactly. Yeah.
But we're kind of lucky that, because, I mean,
after the temple was collapsed...
Yeah.
..it was all covered with soil and earth.
So it was preserved by Mother Nature.
And how was it covered up?
I mean, are we talking about occupation?
Are we talking about occupation levels
piling up on top of the temple?
It was silted up, actually. It was silted?
Yeah, it was silted up.
The Temple of Artemis and the Basilica of Saint John,
they were all sea front 3,000 years ago.
And now the sea is miles away.
Yeah, four miles away.
Four miles away? Yeah.
So it's just silted up, silted up, silted up...
In 3,000 years, yeah, it was silted up.
And then the rest of it just falls into ruin and then gets covered up...
Yeah. ..for centuries...
Yeah. Exactly. ..until it's rediscovered.
It was waiting...
They were all waiting for it to be discovered for many years.
Artemis is still here.
Yeah. (LAUGHS) Yeah.
Next time, I'll be taking the train along the Aegean coast northwards,
in search of more evidence of ancient Greek culture.
I'll take a novel mode of transport to reach another acropolis.
Look at that!
Oh, my goodness!
I explore the legendary city of Troy...
So the battle would have taken place down there?
Exactly. Thousands of ships, you know, coming here.
..and track down another wonder of the ancient world...
That is beautiful.
..at Ephesus.
WOMAN: It's really a masterpiece.
Captions by Red Bee Media (c) SBS Australia 2025