Antiphellos Ancient City (Kaş Theatre)

About this place

In Kaş you do not visit the ancient city; you live on top of it. Antiphellos, the old Lycian port, was never buried and never fenced off into a museum. Its remains are scattered among the cafés, the alleys and the hillside behind the town, all of them open round the clock and none of them ticketed. You can drink your coffee a few metres from a sarcophagus twenty-four centuries old, which is exactly what sets Kaş apart from every other Lycian site. The centrepiece is the Hellenistic theatre about 500 m west of the harbour: twenty-six rows of stone seating for a few thousand spectators, restored in 2008. What makes it special is what it lacks. It was built without a stage building, so the opening stays exactly as it was, with the seats facing the Mediterranean and the Greek island of Kastellorizo (Meis) on the horizon. This is why locals and visitors climb up just before sunset and sit in near silence until the sun goes, and it is by far the best time to come. A short climb above the theatre, on the edge of the acropolis hill, is a cube-shaped Doric tomb cut from the bedrock in the fourth century BC; its frieze of dancing girls holding hands is on the wall inside the chamber, so put your head in to see it. In the centre of town, at the top of the Uzun Çarşı bazaar street among the silver and carpet shops, stands a fourth-century-BC Lycian sarcophagus known as the King's Tomb or Lion Tomb. Two lion heads jut from the lid, and its inscription in the Milyan language has still not been fully deciphered; all that is certain is the owner's name. Rock-cut tombs line the cliffs behind the town, reached from Likya Caddesi, one of them carrying both a Lycian inscription and a later Latin one. Near the harbour the lower courses of a small first-century-BC temple are still visible. The whole circuit is walkable from the harbour in one to two hours. The theatre road is a moderate uphill walk and pushchair-friendly; the rock tombs need steps and proper shoes and are not for small children. At midday in August there is no shade at all, so make it a sunset or early-morning walk. Do not expect colonnades or paved streets. If you want a complete ancient city, go to Xanthos or Patara; the pleasure here is that the ruins are part of a living town.