Temple of Zeus Olbios
Thirty-six columns still standing from around 300 BC, in one of the earliest known Corinthian temples.
Yılmaz Kilim — CC BY 3.0 · Dosseman — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Dosseman — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Dosseman — CC BY-SA 4.0
At roughly 1,200 m in the Taurus, a small Turkish village goes about its business between thirty-six columns that have been standing for some twenty-three centuries. They belong to the Temple of Zeus Olbios, built around 300 BC and probably endowed by Seleucus I, one of the earliest known temples in the Corinthian order, and today chickens and fig trees press up against it on every side. This is Uzuncaburç, Diocaesarea to the Romans, and it is less a fenced archaeological park than a village that grew up inside an ancient city and never left. The story predates Rome by a long way: this was a sanctuary ruled by the priest-kings of nearby Olba, and the settlement that grew around it was made a city and renamed Diocaesarea under Vespasian. The walk takes you through the city gate and along a colonnaded street, past a monumental ceremonial gate, to the Temple of Zeus (converted to a church in the fifth century) and on to the Temple of Tyche, whose five columns are each cut from a single block of stone. There is also a Roman theatre from the reign of Marcus Aurelius (listed as closed for restoration in the ministry's latest update, so do not count on it), a rock-cut necropolis and a 23 m Hellenistic tower, the 'tall bastion' that gives the village its Turkish name. Four kilometres east at Ura lie the ruins of Olba proper, aqueduct included, worth an extra half hour if you have it. You come by car and only by car: about 110 km and two hours from Mersin, the last thirty of them a winding mountain climb up from Silifke, with next to no public transport. It pairs naturally with Silifke and the Cennet-Cehennem caves on the coast, giving you sea and mountain in a single day. The site is open and almost shadeless, but the altitude makes it several degrees kinder than the coast in August; in winter it can snow, so check the road before heading up. Admission is just €3 for foreigners, Müzekart is accepted, and there is rarely a queue. The ground is rough earth and stone, so a pushchair is useless, but walking children will enjoy scrambling among the columns and the village itself. Food is limited to a simple village café or two, and do not leave without the local carob or grape pekmez or a jar of pickled kenger, about the only souvenirs the place sells.
Thirty-six columns still standing from around 300 BC, in one of the earliest known Corinthian temples.
Five monolithic columns, each carved from a single block, carry what remains of the temple of the goddess of fortune.
A 23 m Hellenistic tower gave the village its name, and its houses and fields thread through the ruins with no fences between them.
Uzuncaburç Mahallesi, Silifke, Mersin
Do not drive up for it alone; make it the mountain leg of a day that starts at Cennet-Cehennem or Silifke castle and then climbs. The columns of Zeus and a village threaded through the ruins are something the busy coastal sites cannot give you, but it is small and ninety minutes is plenty, so if you have only one day in Mersin the coast comes first.