Historic sites
Halikarnas Mozolesi
The tomb of King Mausolus in Bodrum, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.
The Turkish encyclopedia
Historic sites
Ancient cities, castles, caravanserais and rock tombs across Türkiye that are worth the detour without being on the World Heritage list.
11 pages in this category.
Historic sites
Kaunos
An ancient Carian port whose temple-fronted rock tombs look down on the river at Dalyan.
Historic sites
Kayaköy
A hillside town of empty stone houses near Fethiye, left behind after the 1923 population exchange.
Historic sites
Stratonikeia
A Carian and Roman city near Yatağan, lived in from antiquity to the Ottoman era.
Historic sites
Bodrum Kalesi
A castle of the Knights of St John on Bodrum's harbour, home to the Museum of Underwater Archaeology.
Historic sites
Knidos
An ancient Dorian city at the western tip of the Datça peninsula, with two harbours and a round temple.
Historic sites
Labranda
A mountain sanctuary of Zeus above Milas, the ancestral shrine of the Carian ruler Mausolus and his family.
Historic sites
Beçin Kalesi
A hilltop castle near Milas that became a medieval Turkish capital, now a quiet field of ruins.
Historic sites
Tlos
One of the oldest cities of Lycia, on a rocky height near Saklıkent, known for its rock tombs.
Historic sites
İasos
An ancient harbour city on the Güllük gulf near Milas, once an island, lived in since the Bronze Age.
Historic sites
Euromos
A Carian city near Milas whose temple of Zeus still has sixteen columns standing.
Questions
How is this different from the UNESCO pages?
Only by the list. A World Heritage inscription is a formal designation a country applies for, and plenty of remarkable places have never been nominated or are still on the tentative list. Those are the ones gathered here.
Why does Türkiye have so many ancient sites?
Because almost everyone came through. Anatolia was Hittite, Phrygian, Lydian, Greek, Persian, Roman, Byzantine, Seljuk and Ottoman in turn, and each layer built on what it found, which is why one hill can hold nine cities stacked on top of each other.
Are these places open to visitors?
Most are, though the smaller ones keep shorter hours and some are simply a field with a sign. Each page says what is actually there now, rather than what was there two thousand years ago.