Ephesus - Street of the Curetes

Southeast of the Lower Agora in Ephesus the marble-paved street, flanked by numerous impressive public buildings, continues as the Street of the Curetes, climbing uphill towards the Upper Agora. At the point where the Street of the Curetes bends southeast are the bases of the Propylaion, a gate of the second century A.D. from which a street, continued by a stepped lane, led south to Mount Koressos.

On the east side of the Propylaion is the Octagon, a monumental tomb with an eight-sided superstructure, surrounded by a Corinthian colonnade, with a stone bench, on a square marble base.

Higher up the slope of the hill a group of terraced buildings are in the course of excavation. On the opposite side of the street is a house which is assumed to have been a brothel. Beyond this is a small temple, much restored, which an inscription shows was dedicated to the Emperor Hadrian (117-38). Beyond this are the remains of the Baths of Scholastica, once of several storys, which were originally built in the second century A.D. and were rebuilt about A.D. 400 by a Christian woman named Scholastica.

Higher up, on the south western slopes of Mount Pion, can be seen a two-story rotunda on a square base, with Doric half-columns round the lower story and free-standing Ionic columns round the upper story. Probably this, like the Octagon, was a hero's tomb.

Past the Fountain of Trajan (nymphaeum) and the Gate of Hercules, the street bears right to enter the so-called Square of Domitian. Above the square rises the massive substructure of the Temple of Domitian, erected by the province of Asia in honor of the Emperor (A.D.81-96). In the basement of the temple is the Museum of Inscriptions.