Into Turkey– Part Thirty-Eight

We may thank the Austrian archaeological team for investing millions into the excavating of the houses of the uber-wealthy in Ephesus, and that includes a million dollar protective roof on the site.  This is probably the most expensive dig ever in Turkey. And it reveals there were a goodly number of very wealthy persons living in their condos on top of condos right downtown in Ephesus. Even the street leading into this small section of town in front of the high end shops was made out of mosaics, not the usual limestone.  Here’s what the street usually looks like here…

And here’s the mosaic street in front of the shops leading to the slope houses…

There were in fact not only homes on this hill, there was a basilica or meeting hall where big social events could be held  and another large room on the first floor where meetings and religious activities could transpire, and the floors were mosaic and the walls had a marble facade of various colored marble….

What a jigsaw puzzle to put all that back together from small and large pieces..

There were private baths with piped in hot and cold water, and fountains near the large rooms…

Notice the pipes in the walls….  and no need to go outside in the heat when you can paint your walls so you can pretend to have an indoor garden…

And then there are the homes, at least five or six floors of them, with painted walls and mosaic floors…

Here’s a private toilet off one of these rooms…

Many of the mosaic floors are largely intact…

and did you notice all the columns to hold up the rooves, not least because there was a house on top of their house in most cases..

Here’s a description of just one of the more posh palatial houses…

or compare this one…

I could go on and on showing you room after room, a few of them look quite ordinary compared to the above, and plenty of them reveal there’s lots of reassembling work still to be done….

There is more to see…. but we must move on…..