Miletus

Around 57 AD, Paul decided to finish his 3rd M trip. He was on his way back to Jerusalem to face his detractors. He knew he would face trouble but he wanted the chance to share the gospel with King Agrippa and with Caesar. Paul decided that it would be too hard to stop in at Ephesus and say goodbye. It seems that Paul felt he may be executed (although this did not happen for a further ten years). So he called the elders from Ephesus to meet him at the port city of Miletus to the south (about 50 kms south of Ephesus) for a sad farewell. Miletus was also a large and important city. There is not a lot left today, but there is an impressive theatre. I have spared you the picture this time as I have shown a couple theater pictures already (Ephesus and Hierapolis). Miletus also saw silt build up in the harbour, which led to its eventual economic decline.


Some centuries later circa 500 AD - 1000 AD the Byzantines built a rampart behind the theatre at Miletus. Today this rampart has a Turkish flag on top of it. It is funny how patriotic the Turks are, putting their flag up all over ancient ruins that they had no hand in building at all.



You can see in this picture the silt build up. The land is completely flat. This is something of an anomaly in Turkey. Most of Turkey is quite mountainous, the entire peninsula is one big mountain range, with some valleys. All of the silted land you see is ancient sea. In the background you can see the theatre of Miletus, which was on the seashore.



The Eucalyptus tree is of course Australian. My friend Hector back in Russia said "we have them in Argentina too." He believed them to be native to Argentina also. They are native to Australia, but some have been exported to Turkey too. I thoroughly enjoyed the shade of this Eucalypt and could not resist a pic.



While at Miletus we bumped into Vadim from Moscow. We had a good chat and encouraged him in his faith.