Anatolian Civilizations and Historical Sites - TEDA

ANATOLIAN CIVILIZATIONS:10x19 antik kentler 8/1/11 10:52 AM Sayfa
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uncovered in the excavation work. Just as most of these stamp
presses were communiqués, some of them had to do with customs
procedures. Consequently, it is understood that there was once a
customs office here. In 256 AD the city was assaulted by the famous
Sassani King Shapur I, who burned and destroyed everything in sight.
The city was never to make a recovery; it was annexed by the
Byzantines in the 5 th century and later on was razed to the ground
once again, this time by the Arabs in the 7 th century. The wrecked
city became the small settlement of Abbasid during the 10 th
centuries. Belk›s Village is established in the 17 th century. Spread out
over 20,000 acres of land, the city is divided into three parts; A, B and
C. The cliffs towering 300 m. over the Euphrates were utilized as
residences. The Temple of Tyche, the Goddess of Good Fortune, is
found in the acropolis over the cliff. The acropolis was divided by the
necropol in the south and west, districts to the east and north east as
well as the city's administrative area to the north. Concurrently this
was also the Legionnaire region as well. While the first excavation
work at Zeugma was conducted in the necropol section in 1987, this
was halted until 1992 when an illegal excavation at the site uncovered
a mosaic. Around this time the issue of the construction of Birecik
Dam was under discussion. Because a section of Zeugma is slated to
be lost forever under the dam waters, around 100 archaeologists from
11 countries have been working at feverish pace to save what they
can.
In 1992, a priceless floor mosaic panel depicting the wedding of
Dionysos and Ariadne was uncovered in the guestroom of a 2 nd
century villa with columns belonging to a rich Roman. The daughter
of Minos and Pasiphae, Ariadne fell in love with Theseus who came to
Crete to slay the Minotaur, a monster with the body of a man and a
head of a bull. After slaying the bull, Theseus departs Crete with
Ariadna only to abandon her on the island of Nakos. The God
Dionysos finds her on this island is a state of despair and takes her off
the island. They married later on and the panel depiction shows their
wedding scene sitting on a throne in the center with Eros, the
goddess of Love, extending them a bowl full of love potion. There are
10 figures positioned on this 730x350 cm. panel. Five of the figures
were removed from their settings and smuggled out of the country. It
is understood that the mosaics found at the site in 1993 were
removed from their settings much earlier and smuggled. Depicting a