ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITE OF ASPENDOS

History. Aspendos was conquered by the Spartans, the Persians and Alexander the Great, before becoming part of the Seleucid kingdom, which was soon absorbed by the kingdom of Pergamon. Under Roman rule, the city became an important commercial center and maintained its prosperity during the Byzantine era. Then, it is controlled by the Ottomans and remained inhabited until the ^18th century.

The site today. The Roman theater of Aspendos was built in the ^2nd century AD by the architect Zeno. Atatürk, impressed by its beauty, gave the order to preserve it and to use it for artistic events. Its excellent state of preservation makes it possible to imagine what the 15 000 spectators of the time saw. The arena was filled with water for naval battles, the naumachia. Cloths attached to wooden pillars protected the spectators from the rain and the sun. Ivory or metal tokens were engraved with the number of the place and the rank. Leaving the theater, a path leads to the acropolis, on a hill. Then, the ruins of several buildings and the nymphaeum. Below, in the plain, you can see the Roman aqueduct which channeled water from the mountains to Aspendos.

It is precisely the theater and the aqueduct that are at the origin of a legend according to which, the king of Aspendos, father of the too beautiful Belkıs, had difficulty in choosing a husband for her. So, he launched a contest at the end of which he promised to give the hand of his daughter to the one who would realize the most beautiful and useful work for the city. Two architects surpass themselves: they are two brothers, they are rivals and both bear the name of Zeno. One of them realized the theater and the other the aqueduct. This last work combining beauty and major utility makes the unanimity and impresses strongly the king. However, he goes to visit the theater, and while he wanders in the upper gallery, a voice whispers to him: "The daughter of the king must be mine". He turns around, but sees no one around him. He then notices a young man alone on the stage, it is Zénon. The king is amazed by the acoustic qualities of the theater and gives his daughter to her designer.

Another outcome to this story exists, it is based on a representation of Belkıs carved in marble. The latter appears cut in two. The king, reputedly very fair, would have decided to cut his daughter in two to offer a piece to each of the two laureates.