722
KPHESUS
EPHESUS
it was somewhat troublesome to ascend the channel to the harbour ; and ships which were trading be- tween the N. jEgean ports and Syria, avoided E., unless the exigencies of loading or discharging freight req uired them to enter the harbour (Ac 20"").
While the road up the Cayster valley towards the East was too difficult to be a commercial route, it afforded decidedly the shorter path from E. to Pisidian Antioch and the East in general ; and naturally foot-passengers, to whom precipitous crescents causea no difficulty, would prefer that road to the longer but more level route by Apamea and Laodicea. The Cayster route leads over higher ground than the other, and does not descend into the low coast valley till it comes nearer E. ; and this also would make it preferable in the summer. Hence St. Paul, jouxneying from Pisidian Antioch to E., preferred the Cayster route, and traversed the higher-lying districts (i-d dvi^fpiKi. iiipri, Ac 19') ; * and the statement of Ac on this point is confirmed by Col 2', which shows that the apostle had never visited Colossae or Laodicea (which were situated on the great high- way). He had doubtless entered on the same path in his second journey, when, after re\-isiting Derbe, Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch, he advanced into Asia, but found himself ' forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia' (Ac 16').
The lower end of the Cayster valley is di\nded from the middle valley (called the Caystrian plain) by the projection of the bounding mountain ranges, for Mt. Gallesus on the N. stretches down towards the S., as if trying to reach across the valley to Mt. Messogis (the part of which overlook- ing E. was called Pactyas), and forces the Cayster to wind southward, when it is coming near the sea- level. Below this narrow pass, the valley opens again to form a low marsny plain, raised very little above the sea, from wLicn the hills spring very sharply, as Mt. Coressus, the outermost peak of Pactyas, overhanging the site of E., extends in a long sharp ridge westward towards the sea ; and the Cayster turns again sharply to the W. through this 13 miles long plain to the sea. In the open plain, about 5 miles from the sea, on the S. side of the river, stands a little hill, close on the W., above the modem raOway station ; this hill has always been the religious centre of the valley ; below its S.W. slope stood the sacred precinct of the Asian goddess, who was identified by the Greeks with their own Artemis (see DiANA) ; on the hill Justinian built one of his greatest ecclesiastical foundations,t the church (whose ruins, projecting out of the hill, can still be traced) dedicated to St. John the Evangelist (6 (S7105 BeoXbyoi, from whom the hill and the little village beside is still called Ayo-soliik or Ayas-saliik, i.e. Ayo-tholog) ; and between the two was built a fine mosque, formerly one of the most exquisite monuments of late Arab.- Pers. art, now seriously dilapidated (founded prob- ably by one of the Seljuk princes, who reigned and coined money with Lat. inscription X at Ayo- soliik). Round this religious centre the earliest and the latest inhabitants have congregated ; whereas, in opposition to the religious foundation, the Gr. colonists built the city of E., at a distance of 1 to 2 miles S.-W., partly on the slope of Coressus, partly on the low ground at its foot, and
* In this senUnce we speftk onlv on the ' South Galatian ' theory (Ramsay, Church in Rom. 'Bmp. p. 93 f., esp. ed. 2 or luter editions); those who hold the 'North Galati&n' view may omit tills one sentence.
t It IB brielly described by Procopius, ^dific. t. 1, as etjualling In size and magnificence Justinian's great foundation in Con- atantinople, the Church o( the Holy Apostles. Justinian built it in place of an earlier church 00 the same site, dedicated to St. John.
1 Mimtta qua fit in theologo. Several of these coins were among a find made In the soil, a little to the north of the t«mple, by ilr. Wood. The coins had been buried about 1370.
partly on a low isolated hill, called Pion or Prion (about 500 ft.), which rises in the plain.
The history of E. turns, to a ^eat extent, on the opposition between the Greeks, the party of progress and freedom and maritime enterprise, and the non-Gr. population, centred at the temple, and championed by the priesthood, the party of stagnation and ignorance and Asiatic submission. The Lydian conquest by Croesus for a time en- slaved the city to the temple ; the new founda- tion of E. by Lysimachus in B. C. 295 again redressed the balance ; * but the proximity of the temple gave it always an immense power in the city. The city owed its pre-eminence in the province in part to the temple, for the temple was the greatest and most influential in Asia, and the city boasted of the title 'warden of the temple of Artemis ' veuKbpot r^t 'Apri/uSot, Ac 19^, lit. ' temple-sweeper,' in KV 'temple-keeper,' in AV 'worshipper.' The title ' Temple- Warden ' is more commonly applied to E., and to many other Asian cities, as warden of a temple of the imperial cultus ; in the time of St. Paul, E. was warden of one such temple, and later she became warden of two temples, and finally of three temples of the imperial religion (Sis, rpis, peuKipo!) ; and when the Eph. Neocorate simply is mentioned, that is the sense in which it is ordin- arily to be understood, t But the ref. to the Eph. Neocorate of Artemis in Ac 19^ is justified by an inscription of the 2nd cent., in which E. is said to be ' doubly temple-warden of the Emperors, and warden of Artemis ' (Sis i/euKo'pos rir Se^acrrwi' /tai feuKdpot T^s 'kprtiuSos, Wood, Appendix Inscr. vi. 6, p. 50) ; and coins of the 3rd cent, have the legend 'Eipeaiuv rpU vecjKdpwv Kal ttjs ^Apr^fuSoSj i.e. ' triply temple-warden (of the emperors), and (temple-warden) t of Artemis.' The festivals of the goddess were thronged by pilgrims and de- votees from the Cayster valley and from the whole of Asia. The crowds which attended these festivals contributed greatly to the wealth of the city ; many trades were mainly dependent on the pilgrims, who required entertainment, food, amusement, victims to sacrifice, otlerings to dedi- cate, curiosities and images for worship to carry home.§ The order of events during St. Paul s long residence in E. of 2 years and 3 months (Ac \9^- '", called 3 years by the apostle himself, Ac 20^', in the usual ancient style of reckoning an intermediate period by the superior round number) illustrates in a striking way the relation of the priestly centre to the preaching of Christianity. At first there was no opposition ; for new religions, which were often brought in from the east, had never been found prejudicial to the influence of Artemis and her priests. Then the missionaries were brought into collision with the practisers and votaries of magic ; E. was one of the great centres of magical art, and a kind of magic formulae,