"Alytarch's Stoa"
The remains of the so-called "Alytarch's Stoa" are on the south side of Kuretes Street (on the left as you go down), in front of the modern building enclosing the Terrace Houses. A 53 metre long row of twelve shops or workshops, built of brick, was fronted by a colonnade 4.7 - 5.5 metres wide, supported by unfluted columns standing on bases.
The stoa has been named after a fragment of an inscription on an epistyle (inscription IK Ephesos 447), dated to the late 4th or early 5th century AD, stating that the building was financed by an alytarch (ἀλυτάρχης, alytarches), a state official responsible for enforcing the rules during athletic competitions (see also the statue of Proconsul Stephanos on Selçuk gallery 2, page 8).
One of the stoa's columns is inscribed with a letter from F. Tauros Seleukos Kyros Fl. Maximus and Fl. Valentinos Georgios Hippasias to the proconsul Flavius Heliodorus, dated to around 440 AD. It is not clear whether the stoa was built at this time or, like many other buildings and monuments in Ephesus, restored, perhaps following eathquakes or the sack of the city by the Goths in 262/263 AD.
Because of the steep slope of Kuretes Street, the stoa was built on two levels. The east section (on the left as you face the building) is above the level of the street and was entered by steps. The walls of some of the shops were decorated with frescoes, and the floor along entire length of the stoa (area 285 square metres) was covered with polychrome mosaics, mostly with geometric and plant motifs, parts of which can still be seen in situ. |
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