Climb to the upper rows of the theatre at Ephesus and a long, marble-paved street runs west below you. It once led down to the harbour. The sea is now kilometres away, and the harbour has silted up into farmland. That view is a good way into the idea of an ancient city. What survives is more than old stone. It is the outline of an arrangement that once let thousands of people live together, and you can still read it on the ground.
A short definition
An ancient city is an urban settlement founded in antiquity, roughly before the Middle Ages, whose remains survive. In Türkiye the term is used mostly for Hellenistic, Roman and Late Antique (Early Byzantine) cities. Older capitals such as the Hittite Hattusa are described the same way.
Large ruins alone do not make a city. What counts is evidence of urban order.
What makes a settlement a city?
A village differs from a city less in population than in organisation. When several of the following appear together, archaeologists treat a site as a city:
- Walls and gates mark the city's edge and control who goes in and out. The Lion Gate at Hattusa is a well-known example.
- Agora: the market and public square, where trade, announcements and everyday politics happened.
- Civic buildings: the bouleuterion was the council chamber. The prytaneion housed the city's sacred hearth and its magistrates.
- Temples and sanctuaries: a city's identity was often tied to a deity. Ephesus was the city of Artemis, and Aphrodisias took its name from Aphrodite.
- Theatre, odeon and stadium were built for performances, races and large gatherings. The stadium at Aphrodisias is about 270 metres long.
- Water works: aqueducts, monumental fountains (nymphaea) and baths show that a city could bring water from far away. That took organised government.
- Necropolis: the word means "city of the dead". Cemeteries lay outside the walls, usually lining the roads.
Ancient city, mound, archaeological site: are they the same?
The three terms are often mixed up, but they mean different things.
| Term | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Ancient city | An old city with planned buildings and institutions. | Ephesus, Priene, Pergamon |
| Mound (höyük) | An artificial hill built up by settlements rebuilt on the same spot for centuries. | Çatalhöyük, Troy (Hisarlık) |
| Archaeological site | The general term for any place with remains: a city, a temple, a fortress or a single building. | Göbekli Tepe |
A mound can contain a city. Troy is the clearest case, with nine city layers stacked in the hill at Hisarlık. Çatalhöyük, on the Konya Plain, is a Neolithic settlement going back to about 7400 BC, known for houses with no streets between them, entered through the roof. It did not yet have urban order in the classical sense. Göbekli Tepe near Şanlıurfa is no city either. It is a monumental gathering place where hunter-gatherers raised T-shaped pillars about 12,000 years ago.
How were ancient cities laid out?
Most early cities grew to fit the terrain. Streets followed the slope, and buildings went wherever there was room. In the Hellenistic period the grid plan spread. Its streets cross at right angles and divide the city into equal blocks, a system often linked to Hippodamus of Miletus.
Priene, refounded on the slope of Mykale around 350 BC, shows the grid clearly. Its streets keep to the grid despite the steep ground. Pergamon shows the opposite approach. The Attalid kings built their capital on a steep hill, so the theatre leans into the slope and the buildings step down in terraces.
Why were they abandoned?
Most ancient cities emptied slowly rather than in a single disaster. The main reasons were these:
- Silted harbours: alluvium carried by rivers such as the Büyük and Küçük Menderes cut Ephesus and Miletus off from the sea. When sea trade ended, the cities shrank.
- Earthquakes: Anatolia's restless ground forced many cities to rebuild, and sometimes the rebuilding stopped.
- Shifting trade routes and epidemics thinned the population of many cities in Late Antiquity.
- Modern dams: much of Zeugma on the Euphrates now lies under the Birecik reservoir.
Abandonment had an unexpected upside. Where no new town was built on top, the city plan survived almost intact. Sagalassos, built at 1,500–1,700 metres in the Taurus Mountains, is counted among the best-preserved cities of Asia Minor for this reason.
Examples in Türkiye
Anatolia holds city remains from every period from the Bronze Age to Byzantium. Several are on the UNESCO World Heritage List:
- Hattusa: the stone-walled capital of the Hittite Empire, listed since 1986.
- Troy: nine city layers, inscribed in 1998.
- Hierapolis: a city founded in the 2nd century BC beside the Pamukkale travertines, listed since 1988.
- Pergamon: the capital of the Attalid kingdom, inscribed in 2014.
- Ephesus: a harbour city known for its sanctuary of Artemis, listed since 2015.
- Aphrodisias: a Carian city known for its marble sculpture workshops, inscribed in 2017.
Cities off the list matter just as much. Priene, Sagalassos and Zeugma are among the best places to understand city planning and daily life. For earlier periods, see Çatalhöyük and Göbekli Tepe.
What to look for on a visit
At first sight the ruins can look like scattered stone. Find the main street first, since in most cities the theatre, agora and baths connect to it. Then climb to the highest point. The top of the theatre or the acropolis shows the plan like a map. Carved column capitals and the style of the masonry are clues to a building's date. Opening hours and entry conditions change, so check each site's official page before you go.
Frequently asked questions
Is "ancient city" the same as "ancient town"?
Broadly, yes. "Ancient city" is the usual term in archaeology and travel writing, whatever the settlement's size.
Who decides that a place was a city?
Excavation and survey do. When they find traces of civic institutions and a planned settlement, the place is described as a city. In Türkiye such areas are also protected as archaeological sites.
Which is the oldest ancient city?
There is no single answer, because definitions of a city differ. Neolithic settlements such as Çatalhöyük are very old, but full urban order, with walls, squares and civic buildings, takes shape in the Bronze Age.
Have all ancient cities been excavated?
No. Even at Ephesus and Pergamon, work has gone on for more than a century and only part of the site has been uncovered.
Can I take a stone or fragment home?
No. Removing even a small piece from an archaeological site is prohibited. Any find must be handed to a museum.