Ancient City of Ephesus

Ancient City

A UNESCO World Heritage Site — capital of the ancient world, home to the Library of Celsus, the 25,000-seat Great Theatre and the Temple of Artemis that gives our hotel its name.

Ephesus, founded by Ionian Greek colonists in the 10th century BC and grown to some 200,000 inhabitants as the capital of Roman Asia, is one of the largest and best-preserved ancient cities in the world. It was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2015.

The symbol of the city is the Library of Celsus, built in the 2nd century AD by a son in honour of the Roman governor Tiberius Julius Celsus, serving as both his monumental tomb and a library. Its magnificent two-storey façade fronted what was the third-largest library of the ancient world, holding close to 12,000 scrolls. The four statues on the façade personify Wisdom (Sophia), Virtue (Arete), Knowledge (Episteme) and Judgement (Ennoia).

Carved into the hillside, the Great Theatre seated roughly 25,000 spectators, making it one of the largest theatres of antiquity; by Christian tradition, Saint Paul addressed the crowds here. Ephesus is also sacred to early Christianity: the nearby House of the Virgin Mary is believed to be where Mary spent her final years and is venerated by both the Catholic and Orthodox churches, while the tomb of Saint John lies close by.

Beside the city stand the ruins of the Temple of Artemis, once one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World — and it is Artemis, the goddess of that very temple, who gives our hotel its name. With its marble streets, the Temple of Hadrian, terraced houses and a carved stone thought to be one of the oldest known advertisements in the world, Ephesus is an open-air museum you walk straight into history — easily a full day's discovery.