It was an immense pleasure to welcome a friend of many years back to Didyma last weekend, wrote Glenn Maffia. His absence had been necessitated by the pandemic and then work commitments, but after four long years his arrival was most welcomed and the conversation flowed as if there had been no pause.

Diminishing returns

The close connections he has with members of the German Archaeological Institute (DAI) often supply interesting snippets of the institute’s current mode of thought.

Whereas merely whispers were emerging for the best part of the last calendar year now a meeting between the DAI and its Turkish counterpart earlier this month has resolved that the DAI shall relinquish further responsibilities upon this particular site due to increasing costs, and no doubt diminishing returns.

They have failed to uncover any new finds since the almost square Hellenistic foundation, upon a hill to the southeast of the Temple, in 2015.

Hellenistic foundations 2015

Much excellent work in preservation has been attained upon the Temple, especially using the traditional Roman techniques in arresting the alarming cracks appearing at the summit of the three standing columns, but exciting finds have been thin upon the ground.

I remain convinced there are many more finds to be unveiled, but the change of law prohibiting excavations upon private land, unless one purchases that land, and the decreasing areas of promising public land have conspired to render the site uneconomical.

Conflicting aims

I have no doubts about the competency of the Turkish archaeologists but, as I have written prior, they appear to be under a philosophy to rebuild these ancient sites to supplement commercial tourism. A revenue of crucial importance within the country and an avenue of reservations from me.

A date of mid-June has been earmarked for the commencement of the DAI’s final work in Didyma after a period of 117 years. It shall be sad to see them leave, even though in recent years I have had differences of opinion with Director of Excavations.

An early German excavation team

I feel that it would be most fitting if some memorial recognition of their sterling and enlightening work, over so long a period of time, should pay homage to their endeavours.

We certainly would not have the accumulated knowledge of the Temple that has been amassed in great detail and with fine scrutiny which informs us all of the sheer wonder of this quite unique temple.

If there is a failure then it is that this conclusive team has not left the site with a final, comprehensive, guidebook with which to lead us back through the millennia. Though, who knows, we may have one final gift arriving our way.

An intellectual oasis

Another prospect which presents itself, in my mind’s eye anyway, is the realisation of a Didyma Museum. This is a proposition I have heard aired by local Turkish friends in both the history and tourist disciplines.

It struck me as being mutually beneficial to both and a focal point for interested visitors to the town, whereas currently that ground lays sparse.

Upon visiting the ‘Excavation House’, where the archaeologists reside for the duration of their stay during the digging season, the gardens there are littered with column fragments, pristine column bases, some capitals and all manner of architectural sundries.

Collapsed hospital/small finds house

Added to this impressive collection reclining under the summer sun are the contents of the ‘Small Finds House’. The Greek village hospital or doctors house, opposite the Mosque, which is now in a dilapidated state of repair after torrential rains caused the inevitable collapse of the roof and one exterior wall. The Germans kept fragments of architectural items stored here. Items stored quite jealously by the last Director of Excavations, she frowned upon senior members of her team giving selected public viewing time to these small items of curiosity.

I believe that this now forlorn structure is owned by Didim Municipality. Possibly, after a detailed excavation to determine what resides below the building, it may be feasible to realise a museum of modest size.

Personally, I have an inkling that the foundations of a ‘gate’ from the, still closed, Sacred Road into the Temple complex could be located within this vicinity. Conjecture, but worth a look before this structure is once again realised, in whatever guise.

It is not only my visualisation of embellishing Didyma into an alluring prospect of enlightening the area into an intellectual place of learning but to pay due homage to the testimony of the DAI’s thorough toil upon the scorched land, for longer than the Republic of Türkiye has existed. That is history in itself.

Architectural fragments in the Excavation House Gardens