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I. The site and its environs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 December 2013

J. M. Cook
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Extract

The site of Old Smyrna lies on a low spur at the foot of the Yamanlar Daği, or Mountain of Unco Things, at a distance of 450 metres east of the present coastline. The spur is 365 metres long on a north-south axis, with a maximum breadth of 250 metres. On the north-east and east its outline is marked by a bank, revetted in large part by a high terrace wall of small stones. The elevated north-west corner of the site is encircled by superimposed terraces leading up to a circular platform or belvedere, which dominates the site, at an altitude of 21·3 m. above sea-level (Plates 2c, 6a, Squares G–Hix). On the west side the spur is bounded by a cart road leading inland to Bornova, and at the south tip it merges into the low-lying pasturage by a sluggish stream. The terracing of the hillock, which in the north-west presents a picturesque aspect, is believed in the main to be the work of a landowner named Turlita in the nineteenth century. A zone along the north side of the site, corresponding in width to the main sector of our excavations there, is planted with olive trees, of which we were obliged to cut down a score; there is also a narrow fringe of olives along the eastern edge of the site. The greater part of the surface of the hillock is divided between two vineyards, the upper on the north and the lower on the south, separated by a bank which is bordered near its east end by a row of fig trees (Squares Nxvi to Gxix); there is also a smaller vineyard of triangular outline on the slope between the upper vineyard and the Bornova road.

Type
Old Smyrna, 1948–1951
Information
Annual of the British School at Athens , Volume 53 , November 1959 , pp. 1 - 8
Copyright
Copyright © The Council, British School at Athens 1959

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References

1 This road is shown on the coloured site-plan as a broad stripe leading from the bridge in Square Mvi.

2 İzmir Mus. no. 712. Cf. pp. 16, 31.

3 A description, with plan, by Weber, G., AM x (1885) 212 ff.Google Scholar; cf. Akurgal, , ‘Smyrne à l'époque archaïque et classique’ (Belleten 1946) 79, with figs. 9–10.Google Scholar See also the recent observations of G. E. Bean in his article on the Hellenistic defences of Smyrna, (Jahrbuch für Kleinasiatische Forschung iii. 47 f.)Google Scholar.

4 Cf. Cadoux, , Ancient Smyrna 17 n. 1.Google Scholar

5 Spon and Wheler noted some foundations and columns here and believed the site to be that of Old Smyrna. The fort has not been accessible in recent years.

6 JHS i. 63. Cf. Sayce, ibid. 86.

7 Ramsay, , JHS i. 64 ff.Google Scholar, apparently saw these walls in a good state of preservation; he also, with Dennis, noted another plateau lower down to the east with ‘clear traces of a Hellenic city’ (ibid. 67). Cf. Cadoux, , Ancient Smyrna 44.Google Scholar

8 Ibid. 64.

9 Ibid. 66.

10 Most recently Bean, G. E. has described this site, giving a plan (Jahrbuch für Kleinasiatische Forschung iii. 43 ff.Google Scholar, with figs. 1–4). Cf. also p. 7 n. 29.

11 Cf. Cadoux, op. cit. 183 n. 5.

12 İzmir Mus. no. 331.

13 The ‘Kastraki’, Cadoux, op. cit. 44 no. 9; cf. Akurgal, , ‘Smyrne à l'époque archaïque et classique’ (Belleten 1946) 78 n. 37Google Scholar, where a late date is urged. The tile fragments, apart from the modern ones, seem to be late Roman or post-Roman.

14 ÖJh xxvii, Beibl. 144 ff.; cf. Cadoux, op. cit. 43 f.

15 The most recent and complete account is that of Miltner in ÖJh xxvii, Beibl. 130 ff.

16 In the left centre of Miltner's plan, op. cit. 131–2, where it is shown as having a length of c. 38 m. Ramsay, remarked that it ‘might be placed inside a respectable English dining-room’ (JHS i. 67).Google Scholar

17 Cf. Miltner, ibid. 132

18 Ibid. 142, fig. 68.

19 Ibid. 137–8, fig. 66. Miltner, 139 n. 13, declares that it must be a buttress, not a round tower.

20 Op. cit. 131–2, fig. 64.

21 Op. cit. 133–4.

22 The foregoing description of the ‘Acropolis of Old Smyrna’ has been provided by Mr. Nicholls, who investigated the structure in 1952.

23 Ibid. 145.

24 Miltner, op. cit. 146 ff.; Cadoux, op. cit. 41. We were not able to visit this monument.

25 Ancient worked blocks, small unfluted column shafts, and some fragments of tiles; the area, shown by stippling on the plan, Plate 1, has some modern habitation also.

26 SIG 3 1262; cf. Cadoux, op. cit. 190.

27 Jahrbuch für Kleinasiatische Forschung iii. 49 f., with figs. 7–8; also a tower at Çobanpinari, ibid. 50.

28 See the description by Bean, G. E. and Duyuran, Rüstem, JHS lxvii. 128 ff.Google Scholar

29 The outer defences of Hellenistic Smyrna are discussed by Bean in the article cited n. 27, which did not appear in time to receive full consideration in the text of the present report. Bean rightly stresses that in large part the fortifications here considered constituted the defensive system of Hellenistic Smyrna, but Akurgal's pre-Hellenistic dating of the earliest remains at Akça Kaya and Bel Kahve seems to me justified.