Kusadasi Sights

There are many ancient sites of interest within a short distance of Kusadasi.

Ephesus

Ephesus is the best-preserved classical city on the Mediterranean,and perhaps the best place in the world to get the feeling for what life was like in Roman times. As a strategic coastal gateway to the Eastern World, this Ionian refuge grew to be the second largest city in the Roman Empire, the site of a Christian shrine, and one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Legend has it that the Virgin Mary,accompanied by St. Paul, came to Ephesus at the end of her life,circa 37-45 AD. Renaissance church historians mentioned the trip, and it is said that local Christians venerated a small house near Ephesus as Marys. In 1967 Pope Paul VI. visited the site, where a chapel now stands, and confirmed the authenticity of the legend. Also the Basilica of St. John is located near Ephesus. St. John is said to have lived the last years of his life here and after his death, a shrine was located over his grave.

Ephesus is the largest and most complete ancient city in the Eastern Mediterranean. Founded in the 11 th century BC Ephesus became renowned as a place of pilgrimage to Artemis, the goddess of fertility. In Roman times the city was the capital of Asia Minor. Almost all the excavated buildings date from this time ( 1 st to 5 th centuries AD).

Meryamana (Marys House)

This is the house where our Lady lived with St. John the Evangelist in the city of Ephesus after our Lords Ascension, until the end of her own earthly life. This is on the coast of the Aegean Sea in what is, at the present time, the nation of Turkey. In the time of our Lady it was a large and important city, selected by Rome to be the capital of the Roman province of Asia. A modern writer says that Ephesus was the point from which the Apostles first began the spread of Christianity, some years before St. Peter relocated his work of evangelization in Rome.

The modern agreement by scholars on the authenticity of Marys house is an amazing confirmation of the visions of Anne Catherine Emmerich. The house was altogether unknown to the world until the great visionary described it. This simple peasant girl who had never attended school was forced to leave the convent she had entered when one of the great French armies unleashed by the anti-Christian revolution swept through the west of Germany. But when she was removed from the seclusion of her convent to live in a private house, her exceptional spiritual gifts, her stigmatic wounds, and her visions became known to devout Catholics.

Lying 7 km out of Selcuk is Meryemana (the House of the Virgin Mary). This is an important shrine for Christians and Muslims. In 1967 the site gained Vatican approval when its authenticity was confirmed by Pope Paul VI and it is also recognised by the Greek and Russian Orthodox Churches.