Didim's colossal, world-historical Temple of Apollo
A walk through the history -- of the eastern Aegean's most spectacular temple site.
Last Christmas I visited Athens, a lifelong dream of mine.
Growing up in the United States, Athens had been the lens through which I viewed the entire Greek world. After all, when westerners think of a Greek temple, the Parthenon comes immediately to mind; a Greek philosopher would be Socrates or Plato; a Greek fort must be The Acropolis (and there can only be one, right, hence the capital letters?).
One realizes, however, living on this side of the Aegean, that the truly impressive sites are here in present-day Turkey.1
Ancient Greek culture in the Eastern Aegean
Don’t get me wrong. While I was in Athens, I visited The Parthenon, along with three other amazing temple sites: the Temple of Zeus, the Temple of Poseidon on Cape Sounion, and the array of shrines to Apollo at Delphi. Each of these places is as pretty as a postcard. But I can’t help but feeling that Greek culture reached its apogee on the other side of the Aegean.
Consider the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Other than the Hanging Gardens of Babylon and the Great Pyramid of Giza, the other five were located in the Greek world. But beside the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, the other four were located in colonies and three of them along the eastern shore of the Aegean: the Colossus of Rhodes, the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, and the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus (the fourth is the Lighthouse of Alexandria, an Egyptian city founded by the Macedonian emperor, Alexander).
Today, of course, these ancient wonders are gone. Barely a trace remains. But the eastern Aegean still boasts three colossal temple sites: the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus is worth a visit, even though only one of its 127 pillars remains standing in a swampy field today (about 3 meters shy of its full height, no less). The Temple of Hera on the island of Samos also boasts a single, huge, truncated pillar on its site near Pythagoras. The best-preserved of these huge temples is the Apollon in Didim, Turkey (Δίδυμα or “Didyma,” as it was known in ancient times).
The “Apollon” held an oracle that was a destination for pilgrims for 1000 years, second only to Delphi in reputation for its prognostications. Its endurance as a place of Christian worship for another 1000 years is the reason so much more of it remains than its sister temples in Samos and Ephesus.
The Apollon was the 2nd largest of these eastern three. Only the Artemision of Ephesus was larger and taller (this temple served as a model for the Didyma structure, so the Apollon echoes the Ancient Wonder while not surpassing it). It was the only decastyle Greek temple ever built — decastyle is a width of ten columns. It had 120 19.7-meter Ionic columns, of which three remain standing: double rows of 21 columns along the long southern and northern sides. Twelve columns marked the proanos or entry way of the temple, lying between the top of the eastern steps and the entry to the cella or sanctum.
The grandeur of this historic edifice is matched by its amazing history as a site of pilgrimage and prophecy.
The Archaic Temple
The Temple of Didyma began in a rural meadow. Legend held that a shepherd, Branchos, had there been given the gift of prophecy by Apollo. He guarded a spring which transformed from watering his sheep to fueling his prophecies.
The largesse of the temple came from the nearby city of Miletos, about 18 kilometers away. Miletus was THE city of the eastern Aegean in the Bronze Age, founded by colonists from Mycene or Crete and indengenous Luwian or Carian peoples. With two harbors and access to the Mediterranean, Miletus was ideally situated for trade and eventually founded colonies of its own spanning from the north coast of Egypt to the shores of the Black Sea.
The wealth of the Miletians fueled advances in science, led by the pre-Socratic philosopher, Thales, but it also funded development of the temple in the countryside where the shepherd and his descendants, known as the Branchidae, drank the spring waters and answered the hopes and fears of pilgrims and donors from all parts of society.
One question posed to the oracle at Didyma came from a young man in a sailing family: “Is it honorable to work as a pirate?”
It’s a fair question. My own son, at this very moment, is finished with university, searching for the right place and role in which to enter the workforce. The oracle’s answer was “the honorable thing to do is to be as your fathers.” One hopes that the boy’s ancestors had been traders or fishermen. Not pirates.
Miletus came under the influence of the Lydian empire and its fabulously wealthy king, Croesus. Croesus invested heavily in temple projects, and he endowed the Apollon to its height of luxury in the Archaic Era, endowing a huge, bronze sculpture of the god and completing the building of the archaic temple in 550 BCE.
As Croesus’ empire grew, he bumped against the burgeoning empire of Cyrus the Great in the east. Famously he asked the Oracle at Delphi if he should engage with Cyrus: “You will destroy a great empire,” was the oracle’s enigmatic reply. Croesus attacked Cyrus, and his own empire was destroyed in 547 BCE.
No record exists of Croesus asking the oracle in Didyma (or Klaros — north of Ephesus) for an answer. Had he stayed closer to home — in Asia — he might have gotten a more cogent answer; he may have preserved his own, great empire.
The Persian and Hellenistic Eras
By the end of his conquests, Cyrus’ empire stretched from the Aegean Sea to the Indian Ocean. After 50 years of Persian rule, Miletus led a rebellion known as the Ionian Revolt against Darius the Great. A naval engagement at the Battle of Lade (494 BCE) crushed the resistance of the coastal cities.
Retribution was swift and brutal. A Persian force occupied Miletus and forced a costly tribute. It moved to Didyma and destroyed the temple, taking the temple’s treasures — the bronze statue of Apollo among them — back to Persia, along with every last member of the Branchidae family who had served as oracles there since its founding. Local lore claims that the spring dried up as the Persian attackers entered the temple and began hauling loot away.
It would flow again.
In 334 BCE Alexander the Great advanced down the Aegean coast after the Battle of Granicus. He laid siege to Miletus — it was an important resupply point for the Persian navy — and ventured to Didyma to seek omens for his conquests.
As Alexander entered the Apollon, the spring began to flow. The oracle drank its water and promised success in the emperor’s next engagement with the Persians, which would occur three years later in the Battle of Issus a few months later (333 BCE).
Alexander would never return to the Apollon. His conquests would end at the Indus River, and his life would end in Babylon.
There is a fascinating side-story to Alexander’s conquests that connects to Didyma. In Bactria — modern-day Afghanistan — his army encountered a group of people who spoke Greek. Upon questioning, he learned that these were the descendants of the Branchidae family who had left Didyma over 160 years early in the wake of the conquering Persians.
Alexander had the family destroyed: its men were killed, women and children were sold into slavery. No doubt family’s betrayal had been described to him in Didyma. He remembered, and he wrought a terrible revenge on the traitors’ ancestors.
In 300 BCE Seleucis I Nicator, the Macedonian general who became ruler of the Persian realms conquered by his commander-in-chief, found the bronze statue of Apollo in the Persian city of Ecbatana and returned it to Didyma.
A new temple was begun at this time, the temple that we can visit today. It’s architect was the greatest of his day: Paionios of Ephesus, one of the builders of the Artemision “wonder” there. Remember, Miletus was still one of the wealthiest cities in the region. They could afford the brightest architects and the biggest projects. Still, the Apollon remained unfinished until the rise of a new empire.
The Roman Era and the Christians
The temple oracle made another correct prediction around 80CE. The son of the local Roman governor had paid a visit and, like the sailor above, wanted to know about his career path.
“You will one day rule the world,” came the answer.
When that boy, named Trajan, became Roman emperor in 98 CE, he endowed the Apollon with many gifts: completing Paionios’ structure, begun 400 years earlier, and paving the “Sacred Way” along which pilgrims journeyed the 18 kilometers from Miletus to the temple site.
Under Trajan, the Roman Empire reached its greatest extent. In the centuries after, it faced invasion from all sides. In 262 CE Ostrogoths invaded Anatolia, burning the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus, sweeping through Miletus, and laying siege to Didyma, where defenders held out inside the Apollon. The story goes that the spring miraculously flowed two days into the siege, allowing the defenders to withstand the Goths.
Forty years later one final emperor would visit the oracle at the Apollon: Diocletian (303 CE) sought advice on dealing with the rising sect of Christians in the empire. The oracle, perhaps feeling the pressure of the new faith on its own fortunes, recommended a persecution of Christians, which raged for the next eight years. I have seen references to this persecution in Ephesus as well as here in Didyma.
This led to one final act of revenge. When Constantine the Great adopted Christianity as the state religion, he shut down the Apollon and had its priests executed for their part in what had been the final spasm of state violence and pagan dominance.
Theodosius I (393 CE) shut all pagan temples in the empire. The Apollon became a Christian church, meeting in the huge adyton or inner courtyard. In one corner of the sanctuary, the ancient spring continued to flow.
An earthquake leveled the building in 1453, the same year as the the fall of Constantinople snuffed out the last traces of the Roman Empire.
Visiting the Apollon today is one of the best experiences a lover of history can have in western Turkey. “Humans built this,” I often have to remind myself because the colossalsize seems more like the work of gods or cyclopes. The huge columns aren’t the only impressive things about the temple: the carvings at the bases of the columns, the huge limestone blocks of its walls, the carvings of its friezes. They are all monumental. Awesome.
I’ll lead the visitor on a walking tour of the site in my next Didyma blog. I just wanted to begin with the history, which includes so many of the great names from history — Cyrus, Thales, Alexander, Trajan, to name a few.
One disappointing element of touring temples in Greece is the fact that they are all roped off. I never got closer than the steps. Visitors to Turkey can enter any temple and walk around. I love to touch the fluted columns and the carved scrolls on their capitals. The only sites closed off are those with active archeological digs.