The Museum Hotel with a view of the magnificent discoveries. (Credit: The Museum Hotel official website)
In the province of Hatay, a strip of land wedged between Syria and the Mediterranean, Antakya is a small Turkish town that might seem regular today. In Greco-Roman times, however, it was a famous city that rivaled the glorious Alexandria.
In 2010, workmen digging the foundations of a hotel in the town stopped the excavators dead in their tracks, discovering an archaeological site. The excavations carried out by the authorities revealed the ruins of the ancient city of Antioch, on which the modern city is built.
The archaeological site discovered before the hotel was built. (Credit: The Museum Hotel official website)
Part of the city walls of Antioch, founded in 300 B.C. by Seleucus I Nicator, a general of Alexander the Great, were unearthed, as were marble statues, the ruins of Roman baths and thousands of artifacts from the Hellenistic, Roman, medieval Byzantine and Islamic periods. Two thousand years of history make up an exceptional archaeological park, with a total surface area of 17,132 m², spread over five levels.
There, since the fourth century lies the largest single surface of mosaic ever discovered. It is 1,050 square meters large and is mostly intact, despite a few undulations or folds formed by ground movements resulting from the earthquakes that shook the city in 526 and 528 CE.
According to archaeologists, the pavement — with its geometric and figurative patterns made from thousands of small stone tesserae — probably belonged to a public building in ancient Antioch. Placed under state management, the site is now the Necmi Asfuroğlu Archaeological Museum, named after the businessman and hotel owner who built his establishment on steel pilings to protect the mosaic on the ground.
A number of UNESCO heritage sites were severely damaged by the devastating Feb. 6, 2023 earthquake. But the museum, which reopened last June, survived the disaster. The remains were unharmed despite the strong tremors.
The magnificent sculpture of Silenus carrying Dionysus in his arms. (Credit: Bigstock)
Motifs in old mosaics
At the end of the First World War, the defeated Ottoman Empire was dismantled, and Hatay and Antioch (formerly capital of Roman Syria) came under French protectorate. In 1939, the city became part of the fledgling Turkish Republic, making it “the most Syrian province in Turkey."
But in the meantime, the archaeological expeditions carried out between 1932 and 1939 by a consortium of five American and French museums, led by Dr. C. R. Morey of Princeton University, unearthed a large number of coins and ceramics, and some exceptional mosaics, which were dispersed between the Hatay Museum of Archaeology, the Princeton and Baltimore museums, as well as the Louvre.
However, the oldest mosaic discovered in Antioch is the Education of Dionysus, attributed to the second half of the first century AD. This fragment, preserved in the Louvre, features a magnificent figure of Hermes carrying the haloed child. According to art historian George Wicker Elderkin, the size of the figure (almost two meters tall) standing out against the background without any decoration, the stylization of the face and draperies and the shrinking of the feet all point to the arrival of new influences and are already reminiscent of Byzantine mosaics.
On the other hand, the mosaics of Antioch marked the arrival of Eastern influences in the Mediterranean world. By the end of the fifth century, many mosaics were purely decorative: Flowers, leaves and doves became stylized motifs. Later, these motifs were to be found in Umayyad mosaics. It was perhaps in Antioch that they first appeared in Hellenized countries.
In addition, a mosaic dating from the third century BC stands out for its “Carpe Diem” theme from Antakya: Discovered in 2012, it depicts the skeleton of its patron, in relaxation mode. With a silver cup, an amphora of wine and two loaves of bread, as well as an inscription in ancient Greek that says, “Be joyful and enjoy life!”
The mosaic dating from the third century BC, distinguished by its “Carpe Diem” theme from Antakya. (Credit: Creative Commons photo)
In "Le Monde de la Bible," Estelle Villeneuve, a French archaeologist specializing in the biblical Near East, wrote that the idea of death, perceived as the assumed condition of life, was happily invited into worldly conversations. “In fact, Greek legends describe a guest as 'joyful,' leaning back on his cushion, glass in hand. Even in death, he seems to say, life will remain a pleasure!"
The central painting adds a touch of caricature to this cheerful philosophy: A young man rushes to lose his sandal, pointing at a sundial at dinnertime. His name, Trechedipnos (“dinner course”) was the nickname, instituted by Greek comic literature, of the dinner-party freeloader.
Here, he is followed by a bearded man with grotesque features, Akairos (the personification of “contretemps”) who vainly tries to hold him by the coat. All that remains of the third painting, on the right, is the head of a black-skinned figure, wearing a hat and brandishing two sticks. "By comparison with other mosaics,” Estelle Villeneuve explained, ”H. Pamir and N. Sezgin suspect that this is a slave assigned to the baths, in an erect posture that lends itself to laughter. Thus, the mosaic would read from right to left: 'Hurry up and finish your toilet and come to the table! Dinner is a pleasure that cannot be delayed!'"
This article was originally published in L'Orient-Le Jour, translated and edited by Yara Malka.
