Oenoanda or Oinoanda lies only some 60 kilometers from Fethiye,
right next to the modern village of İncealiler. It is
one of those untouched sites, clearly off the beaten path of which there are
many in Turkey.
Such places are always very rewarding to be discovered and to be explored. It
is so remote that even a seasoned archaeologist like Cevdet
Bayburtluoglu strongly recommends not to venture there by yourself but
to take a caretaker or a villager with you to be safe from sheepdogs. These
dogs are fiercely defending and protecting the flock of sheep and goats they
are supposed to guard and they readily attack any intruder. No kidding!
The climb up
from İncealiler to Oenoanda takes about an hour over rough terrain. It seems that,
apart from a few days in 1997, the Turkish authorities never allowed the city
to be excavated. Yet, that does not make the site less exciting because one can
discover it as we walk on.
The most
striking feature in the landscape is, as always, the theater that sits higher
up the hill overlooking the valley below and offers a dramatic view of the Taurus Mountains. It has been cut out of the rock and its
plan closely resembles that of Myra
or Phaselis,
for instance.
Inside the city
walls, of which many stretches are easily spotted, we find the remains of the ancient
city. Unfortunately, these have not been properly documented and only the most
striking features catch the eye.
A well-recognizable avenue leads from the theater to the Agora. It has been compared to
Harbor Street
at Phaselis
as it is bordered by two steps on either side. The Agora, which is entirely
paved with marble, is another prominent feature. The surrounding buildings have
not been identified although we may presume based on the broken columns and stones
that there was at least one temple erected alongside as is customary. A series
of three distinct arches has been identified as belonging to a Library.
Otherwise, bits
of columns, capitals, architraves, cornices, pedestals and stones of all sizes with
or without inscriptions are scattered around in great numbers. Another
recognizable element in the rubble is the broken pipes and remains of an
aqueduct that must have run all the way to the Baths in the northeastern corner
of Oenoanda.
The origins of Oenoanda are rather obscure but based on its name which contains the letters “-nd” the
foundation could go back as far as the 2nd millennium BC. In any
case, it has been documented that Oenoanda was part of a tetrapolis
annexed to Lycia.
Together with Kibyra, Oenoanda became part of the Lycian
League which was formed in the early 2nd century BC and they
acquired two votes each. The six main cities: Xanthos,
Pinara,
Tlos,
Patara,
Myra,
and Olympos
were the administrative, judicial, military, financial, and religious centers
and each received three votes in the meetings of the League.
Pending serious
excavations, no evidence has been found about the pre-Hellenistic Era of Oenoanda.
The city gained
importance it seems, after the severe earthquake of 144 AD, when they received
10,000 denarii from Opramoas
of Rhodiapolis (see: Opramoas
of Rhodiapolis) to construct a Bath. It may sound strange because its own
citizen, Licinius
Langus of Oenoanda donated
10,000 denarii to Myra
in order to rebuild their theater and its portico. He could have invested in
the reconstruction of his home tome in the first place, no?
Another famous
citizen of Oenoanda was the wealthy philosopher Diogenes, who spent his entire
fortune on an Epicurean inscription. He had found peace of mind in the teachings
of Epicurus and in
order to show the people in Oenoanda the road to happiness, he commissioned an inscription 80 meters long and more
than 3 meters
high which set out Epicurean doctrines in about 25,000 words. The huge
inscription was placed in the agora and its large inscribed letters were painted
- nobody could miss seeing them. At that time, in 120
AD, it would have been the largest ancient inscription ever found. The text
included a number of instructions, letters, and epitomes defining the basic
principles of Epicuraeism. In other words, a guide to happiness.
Unfortunately,
the wall disappeared. It may have been deliberately destroyed or hit by an
earthquake, but the scattered blocks were mostly reused as building material
elsewhere. The wall with whatever remained of Oenoanda fell into oblivion,
probably during the 9th century AD.
During the 19th
and 20th centuries, many fragments of this precious inscription were
found, analyzed and partially put back together like a giant puzzle. That is a
gigantic task that is still ongoing.
Oenoanda is surrounded by necropolises on all sides. Rock graves typically
appear on both the east and west sides of the city and from the road between İncealiler and Oenoanda many sarcophagi, mostly of the Lycian type, are easily spotted in the
landscape.
