Early Byzantine Churches in Olympos

Abstract

Owing to the presence of the nine churches located in its city centre, Olympos has a great importance regarding Early Byzantine religious architecture studies. However, only three of these ninechurches have been subject to individually published researches until the present day, while the others have only been mentioned within the general publications introducing the city as a whole. Theincreasing academic interest in the Early Byzantine Archaeology of the Aegean and Mediterraneanregions of Asia Minor together with the growth of data collected from the archaeological excavations carried out at Olympos brought forth the need to write this paper. The aim of this paper isto collectively present and evaluate Early Byzantine churches in Olympos. In line with this aim, eachchurch was assigned a number and its general characteristics presented. Although these churchesmay be evaluated within a vast geography spanning from Eastern Mediterranean to the Adriatic Seain terms of structural and decorative features, they also carry unique characteristics. In the conclusions chapter, firstly the status of the churches during the urban transformation in Late Antiquity andrelated function suggestions are discussed. After that, the structural and spatial features, construction techniques and decoration elements are evaluated and the place of the Olympos churches in theEarly Byzantine period outlined. Accordingly, it is concluded that the churches of Olympos were builtsometime between the second half of the 5th century and the middle of the 6th century in coherence with the Olympos’ Roman era town layout and configured appropriately to Christianizationprocess of the city.