Roger Short Memorial Fund Travel Diary – Thomas Freeman (2022, Ancient and Modern History)

I travelled in September 2024 with fellow Roger Short scholar, Rufus Jones. The pair of us study Ancient and Modern History – with a strong emphasis on the Ancient – and so remain immensely grateful for the opportunity to travel to Turkey to experience the ancient world first-hand. Our trip took place over the course of two weeks, and three core locations: Selçuk, the town closest to the ancient metropolis of Ephesus, the coastal town of Bodrum, and the incredible Istanbul. I am immensely thankful to the family and friends of Roger Short for making this trip possible. I doubt I shall ever stop talking about my time in Turkey, the places we visited and the people we met.

11 September – The Email from Hell
For me, the real fun of the trip actually started on the day before we were due to fly out when I received the exciting email with the subject ‘Your Flight Has Been Cancelled’. The second leg of our Manchester-Istanbul-Izmir flight was no more, with zero alternative scheduled. So, I called up Rufus in a panic and immediately booked a second flight with a different airline from Istanbul to Izmir, figuring that if that didn’t work out, at least we’d be stranded in Turkey rather than Manchester. The rest of my evening was spent frantically phoning the airline and various booking companies in a desperate attempt to get any more information on whether we’d be able to get these separate flights with our baggage, or even get any money back for our cancelled flight. I went to bed with little information and hope.

12 September – Izmir
Reeling from the stressful email of the night before and several more fruitless phone calls with our booking company, we arrived into Manchester with a sinking feeling. However, after several discussions with various staff members at Manchester and Istanbul airport, we eventually landed in Izmir very late at night with all of our luggage. What a success.

On a future trip, I would like to explore Izmir more thoroughly. Our time there consisted of a very late taxi through the city revealing a stark contrast between chaotic-looking residential neighbourhoods of small, single-storey homes, and the high-rise buildings of the city centre. Reflecting on this fascinating city was made difficult by our exhaustion, the late hour and the hilarity of Rufus opening his suitcase upside-down in the hotel and dropping all of his belongings on the floor. Our hotel was very reasonable but appropriately dingy, smelling faintly of cigarettes everywhere we went. The people there however were absolutely lovely, and we were warmly greeted both by the reception staff and the resident kittens in the lobby.

13 September – Journey to Selçuk and St. John’s Basilica
With our travel stresses now behind us, our trip could begin in earnest. An early start, breakfast in a local café and train down to Selçuk had us in high spirits. Particularly powerful to me was seeing the Mediterranean landscape of the ancient world spread out before me – it’s rather easy to become detached from the events that can only be accessed through ancient texts and stuffy legal documents etched in stone two thousand years ago. Hurtling through the beautiful Turkish countryside I reflected that I was looking at the same mountains and fields as Alexander or Pompey several thousand years on. This was only partly diminished by the very angry drunk man arguing with the ticket vendor a few seats away.

Our arrival in Selçuk was similarly impressive, with the colossal remains of a Byzantine aqueduct looming above the train station. We hurried to dump our bags in our lovely hotel then eagerly headed to the first historical site of our trip: St. John’s Basilica. This beautiful castle dates back from the time of Justinian and proved a fantastically peaceful beginning to our tour of the ancient world. We enjoyed taking in the impressive views of the surrounding landscape in the early evening light before heading for a restaurant, pausing to admire the various remnant carvings and inscriptions in the archaeological park there. That evening we explored the town, and found the people there fantastically friendly, offering to help with translating the menu at the restaurant and warning us not to pet any of the dogs we encountered – clearly, they had been shaken by past travellers in our position.

14 September – Ephesus
We wasted no time on our first morning in Selçuk, heading to the remains of Ephesus the ancient metropolis early in the morning. A short dolmus ride later, we were in the heart of ancient Ionia and buzzing with nerdy excitement. I think the main takeaway from Ephesus for me was the sheer scale of the place – as you walk in through the south entrance, the first sight you are afforded is that of the enormous theatre cut into the side of the hill. Other highlights included the famous Library of Celsus, brilliantly reconstructed in the 1970s to the end that, standing in its shadow, one feels transported back to Ephesus’ imperial glory. There was also the modern ‘experience museum’ there, where you’re handed headphones and walked through a series of rooms with projected videos on every wall, immersing you in the history of the city in what I found was a surprisingly fascinating and accessible way. We spent hours and hours in Ephesus, with so very much to see, and were so enraptured by the scale of the city we could almost ignore the bustling tourists and sweltering heat. Later that afternoon once we’d cooled (and calmed) down, we headed to the Ephesus Archaeological Museum in Selçuk. The statues here were fantastic and must have been very comfortable considering the number of cats asleep in various comical places upon them.

15 September – Kusadasi
Taking a rare break from our journey through ancient Turkey, on this day we headed to the nearby beach town of Kusadasi. A welcome break from the rather tiring exploration of Ephesus the day before, we spend the day exploring the town and her various beaches. For me, the highlight was meeting the friendly Usman when we’d stopped for a drink in a local bar. He works in one of the nearby hotels and explained to us the issues that the increasing frequency of cruise ships caused for his industry. Quick with a joke, he complained that those with the ‘boat faces’ would come in for three days rather than staying in the hotels, and that they wouldn’t have the time to make the most of the local businesses in the town as they’d be ferried off to the nearby Ephesus. He then bid us farewell, stating that he had to go and hide from his mother. Alas, we didn’t get the opportunity to explore that further.

16 September – Aphrodisias
Refreshed from the more relaxing day before, we embarked upon perhaps my favourite expedition of the trip. We got up early and headed on the first train we could heading inland, east towards Nazilli. We were hoping to get to Aphrodisias, a supposedly incredible ancient site that was approximately a three-and-a-half-hour drive from our hotel in Selçuk. We had planned our journey based on a blog I’d found the night before, that handily explained which towns to get a dolmus between to end up there – yet the detail was sparse. We eventually found our way to the town of Karacasu, and we were approached by a kind stranger shortly after getting off the bus who had clearly marked us as history buffs from our appearance alone. He pointed us in the right direction to the bus station, yet our journey there was hindered by the large and very lively market taking place. Once we’d eventually found the bus station, we enquired about getting to Aphrodisias and interpreted the driver’s gestures as saying he’d leave in half an hour. Heading to a nearby shop to resupply, our errand was cut short by the same driver chasing us and shepherding us onto the bus. The entire journey thus far had been successful entirely as a result of the kindness of strangers. This kindness was most apparent on this final dolmus – the other passengers seemed delighted to have us on board, with one man (in a very thick looking woollen jumper!) insisting we eat some of his food, and all of them making sure we got off at the correct stop. The driver gave us a time that he would return to collect us – we had made it!

As for the city itself, it exceeded even our lofty expectations. It was fantastically preserved, and practically deserted at a very sharp contrast to Ephesus. Particular highlights for me included walking on the stage at the theatre and attempting to have a conversation with Rufus at opposite ends of the huge stadium. You can just about make him out walking away in the centre of the photograph I’ve attached.

The journey back was simpler now that we knew how to retrace our steps. I had a lovely chat (through the seemingly divine power of Google Translate) with a lady on the train back to Selçuk who was kind enough to help us find the correct platform. She told me all about her son who had just been admitted to university in Istanbul, and also talked about the economic troubles the country was facing. She was surprised and impressed that Rufus and I were staying in each place for so long at a time – clearly, she too was concerned about the fast-paced tourism Usman had complained about the day before.

17 September – Artemision
Our final day in Selçuk was spent exploring what else the town had to offer. Our morning was spent walking just outside the town to the site of the ancient Temple of Artemis, one of the seven Wonders of the Ancient World that had put Ephesus ‘on the map’ as it were, being rebuilt countless times over the centuries. Now, little remains other than some chunks of stone and one reassembled column, build to the same height as the temple would have once been, as a form of memorial. Standing underneath even this ghost of the temple’s ancient grandeur was awe-inspiring and overwhelming. The scale of this should be made clear by my tiny figure underneath the column in the photograph attached, which also demonstrates the incredible views of St. John’s Basilica in the background.

We spent that afternoon wandering around the town, spending time in the market there and making the most of its cafés. Reflecting on the first leg of our trip, I was particularly fond of Selçuk – a small town dominated by its proximity to the tourist-attracting Ephesus, I was shocked and awed by the friendliness of the people there.

18 September – Journey to Bodrum & Mausoleum of Halikarnassos
Thus began the second leg of our trip – the coastal town of Bodrum. We were up early and easily found our coach, with a fairly unhindered journey to follow. The only minor disruption was the coach getting stopped and searched by police dogs at a checkpoint as we headed south. Handily, neither Rufus nor I had committed any crimes, and as such our progress into Bodrum was unimpeded.

We found our hotel easily, and soon discovered that we were not alone there – we had a roommate in the form of a small bird who had made her nest in one of the air vents connecting our room to the outside world. She wasn’t too disruptive, if a little cheeky glaring at us when using the bathroom.

We spent the afternoon exploring Bodrum and found it couldn’t have been more alien to the quiet town of Selçuk. Here was a town which thrived from bustling tourism, particularly in the late summer when we were there. Those that we met were largely other tourists or were advertising their various shops and bars. We eventually found our way to the remains of the second Wonder of the Ancient World of our trip, the Mausoleum at Halikarnassos. This once-grand monument dominated the coastline for centuries, until successive earthquakes brought it down and its remains had been cannibalised to fortify Bodrum Castle in 1494. Nevertheless, the site remained impressive, especially with the very accessible museum onsite. There was however at the museum a lack of any particularly significant statues or artifacts – as they’re all in the British Museum. The opinions of those in Bodrum was made clear by the gaps left for statues upon their hopeful eventual return to Greece.

19 September – Kos
Today we took the opportunity to expand our trip across country borders, taking the ferry over to Kos for the day. After a lengthy customs line, we were somewhat disappointed to find the castle closed for repairs. However, we managed to visit I think every other place of historical significance – we toured the various archaeological parks, which were a lot of fun, with a myriad of carvings and frescoes to be found amongst what was otherwise essentially rubble. The agora in particular was vast. We visited the tree of Hippokrates, under which he supposedly taught his students nearly 2,500 years ago. Sceptical, we soon discovered that the tree there cannot have been older than 500 years, but perhaps was descended from the original…? We also visited the archaeological museum there, with its own myriad of statues and mosaics to admire from across the centuries. I then dragged Rufus around a reconstructed Roman villa, talking him through the various rooms as I had learned them for my GCSE Latin many years ago. We also made sure to make the most of our trip to Greece by eating a (rather overpriced) gyros wrap on the way home.

20 September – Bodrum Castle
Perhaps tied with our trip to Aphrodisias in terms of excitement and amazement, Bodrum Castle was one of the major highlights of my time in Turkey. Constructed from 1400s to house the Knights of St. John, the castle is now home to the Museum of Underwater Archaeology. Thus for two history buffs this was perhaps one of the greatest buildings of all time – walking through a castle, learning about the various conquests of the order of the knights that lived there, then entering another room and exploring an ancient shipwreck. These exhibits were incredible in their own right, offering an exclusive insight into the everyday world of ancient trade and fishing – but also fascinating was the story of how the process of underwater archaeology developed in the 1960s. Also to be found in the castle was a variety of friendly peacocks, a mosque that had been built over an ancient graveyard, and some breath-taking views of Bodrum harbour from the top of the castle. I also found it particularly impressive that one can actually see the remains of the Mausoleum at Halikarnassos that were taken to reinforce the castle in 1494 at various points in the wall. Attached is a photo of myself and Rufus at the very windy top of the castle, and of a section of the Mausoleum within the castle walls.

21 September – Milas
Wanting to escape the tourist-flooded Bodrum for the day, Rufus and I headed to the bus station with the intention of finding a random Dolmus and seeing where we ended up. The answer to that question was the nearby Milas. Once there we headed (unsurprisingly) to the archaeological park. When we got there, however, there was something of a language miscommunication – we were shepherded into a reconstructed Ottoman house rather than the remains of an ancient mausoleum. The house however was interesting in its own right, and we were pursued on our tour of it by a very small young man who was very excited to share with us the English he knew (he bid us an excited “goodbye!” numerous times). Eventually, we found the archaeological park and found the mausoleum there – older than its successor in Bodrum – much better preserved. The museum there taught us much about the various kings of ancient Caria before Alexander the Great’s conquest of the area. Our journey home was made all the more exciting by walking into a wedding celebration happening on the street – not wanting to hang around in the way, we only had a few moments to appreciate this. We had learned in the Ottoman House earlier that day of the traditional wedding ceremonies in Milas, walking the streets with music, dancing and food on offer, and were somewhat astounded to find the practice still thriving 200 years on.

22 September – Journey to Istanbul
And thus began the final leg of our trip – a short flight up to Istanbul and lengthy walk to our hotel in Galata. This journey was, thankfully, far simpler than our flight into Istanbul a week prior, and we landed in the early afternoon. Our hotel sat in the shadow of the majestic Galata tower, and we spent that evening admiring the streets nearby. Galata was wonderful – we found underground bookshops, coffee shops on every corner, and music playing on every (steep!) street we went down. There was also a variety of vintage clothing and antique shops here, and the winding streets felt wholly safe and rather cosy. Throughout our time in Istanbul, I also was delighted to eat as much as I possibly could of the simit and grilled corn-on-the cob on offer from various food stands and carts. I suspect I possibly irritated Rufus by constantly running off to buy such snacks, but in my defence they were delicious and profoundly affordable.

Perhaps now is also an appropriate time to mention one of the major phenomena of our trip – Rufus’ fascination with the cats of Turkey. I myself have owned several cats in my lifetime and enjoyed their company on the streets of Selçuk and Bodrum wherever we went. I was also impressed by the ‘community pet’ culture that seemed ubiquitous in Turkey, with food and water left out for the cats outside nearly every shop and café we came across at all points of the country. Rufus however went above and beyond, taking the time to pet every single cat we saw on the trip. I need not emphasise to my fellow recipients of the Roger Short scholarship the number of cats we encountered, and as you can imagine, petting every cat took a great deal of our time in the country. I have compiled a tiny fraction of these interactions with our furry friends here.

23 September – Blue Mosque & Theodosian Walls
We rose early, eager to explore the wonderfully chaotic and restless Istanbul, and headed to the major historical site: the Hagia Sofia. We had however underestimated the length of the queues there, and so determined to return tomorrow with better planning and determination. We turned instead then to the nearby Blue Mosque, and after a lengthy admission queue spent the morning admiring the incredible ceiling and domes of such an architectural masterpiece. I particularly enjoyed the story that after Sultan Ahmed I had built the mosque’s six minarets, he was criticised as this was a feature then unique to the Ka’aba in Mecca – so his solution was to simply build a seventh minaret in Mecca.

We also visited the stunning Fatih Mosque. We were pleased that Istanbul has a fairly ‘open-door’ policy with her magnificent mosques, allowing in all visitors for free outside of prayer times. This allowed us a rare insight into a culture that Rufus and I were largely unfamiliar with, having grown up in the UK where, for example, there aren’t regular calls to prayer echoing across the city. Many of these mosques had websites you can visit to find more information about their construction and history that was an invaluable resource to two uneducated fellows such as us.

Later this day I dragged Rufus to the old walls of the city, those built by Theodosius II and which had defended Constantinople across the centuries (until they obviously didn’t in 1453). We decided (for the most part) to walk around Istanbul rather than using the various public transport systems – this gave us the opportunity to walk on the less-travelled roads of Istanbul and attempt to look ‘behind the curtain’ to everyday life. We also visited Istanbul’s only ‘cat museum’ (at the insistence of Rufus, unsurprisingly) which took the form of an art gallery exclusively showing art depicting cats. Rufus was beside himself.

That evening, we were lucky enough to be invited to meet with the lovely Victoria Short on the roof of her apartment building. The breath-taking views across the Bosporus were made all the more spectacular by the rather generous gin and tonics we had the pleasure of drinking. It was fascinating to hear how the city had changed over the last couple of decades, in particular to hear that the Galata that we had come to love with its bookshops and coffee-houses was an industrial hotspot only a few years before. As the night drew to an eventual close, we wandered to our nearby hotel in high spirits and with plenty of food for thought.

24 September – Hagia Sofia
Having learned from our mistakes the day before, we rose early and rushed to the Hagia Sofia to queue at the door for its opening. The experience of the place was breath-taking. Architecturally speaking, it was awe-inspiring and beautiful, still dominating the city skyline as it has done for well over a thousand years. What I found to be most amazing though is the way that this building served as a cultural melting-pot for so many cultures thoughout history. Nowadays, the building is a working mosque, and the grand Ottoman décor remains. The byzantine mosaics depicting various Roman emperors and biblical characters however are largely still there, either hidden behind loose cloths or concealed around corners where they would be otherwise hidden. The major moment of historical awe was the discovery of viking graffiti on one of the parapets on the second level – in the late first millennium, a viking by the name of Halfdan carved the viking equivalent of “I was here” into the marble. For me, this served as the perfect example of the historical significance of Hagia Sofia – even a viking from Scandinavia made his way to what was then the centre of the world and was clearly awed in a similar manner to me. Rest assured though; I did not copy him in vandalising such a sacred spot. One impressive feature of the visit (and of many of the historic places in Istanbul) was the fact that you didn’t need to pay extra for audio guides like you would in the UK – you simply found the relevant webpage on your phone, and it gave you all of the information and points of interest you needed.

With our ticket we also got the opportunity to visit the Hagia Sofia museum, which was rather similar to the Ephesus experience museum in that it took the form of several rooms with projections surrounding you, physically immersing you in the history of the place. It’s a form of museum that I’ve not encountered before and was pleasantly surprised – I found it a very exciting and accessible way of learning that didn’t require studying pots in glass cases, and for the majority of visitors was a perhaps more engaging way of exploring the past.

That afternoon we also took the opportunity to explore the Grand Bazaar and, as I’m sure everybody who has ever gone in there has, we got entirely lost within the maze of shops and services there. That evening we visited a local restaurant where I ordered a mysterious drink that I had noticed on many menus over the course of our time there – the ‘Churchill’. This was perhaps the most revolting thing I have ever tasted, made exclusively from lemon juice and copious amounts of salt. Our lovely waiter giggled as he served it to me and revealed after I had tasted it that it was usually drank as nothing more than a hangover cure. Perhaps being adventurous isn’t always the best thing.

25 September – Exploring Istanbul
Our final day in Turkey was spent attempting to visit as many places as we possibly could. This began with the atmospheric basilica cistern, which once held the drinking water for the entire city of Constantinople and now serves as a sort of art gallery. The main attraction for me here was the way that it was constructed – designed to be away from human eyes underwater, clearly the architects had simply reused building materials from other places. This led to some bizarre columns, for example those supported by Medusa’s head, or plastered with inscriptions for services long dead.

We then headed to St. Stephen’s Church, a Belgian Eastern Orthodox church made entirely of prefabricated cast iron pieces. Besides being beautiful in its own right, visiting this church opened my eyes to the now-dead practice of the British Empire sending prefabricated iron churches to far-flung colonies rather than having to build them there. We then headed to the Palace of the Porphyrogenitus, a rather quiet spot that held an excellently preserved Byzantine fortress and allowed us some fantastic views over the city.

The highlight of this day, for me, was our trip to the majestic Kariye Mosque. A seemingly small church in an out-of-the-way spot, this had the most beautiful and best preserved frescoes and mosaics of the early Byzantine church of the trip. History was quite literally written on the walls, with faces scratched out over the various iconoclastic phases in byzantine history and walls of plaster that had been erected by Ottoman authorities removed to reveal the hidden majesty beneath. We spent hours wandering this small church, attempting in vain to take in all of the fantastic artwork on offer.

We finally visited Istanbul’s ‘Museum of Innocence’, a museum that has seemingly sprung right out of the pages of Orphan Pamuk’s novel of the same name. It offered, in a very modern artsy way, an interesting look into the life of an upper-middle-class person in 1970s Istanbul, and provided some welcome contrast to the ancient and Byzantine architecture we had been surrounding ourselves with. We ended our final night in Turkey with a ferry trip crossing the famed Bosporus as so many heroes from ancient history have done before us.

Thus concludes my narrative of our trip. Our time in Turkey therefore proved to be far, far more significant than merely an exploration of the ancient world. Through our lengthy rambles through the backstreets of Istanbul, our long journeys in rather stuffy minibuses full of strangers, and occasional stops for tea we experienced a welcoming, beautiful, and diverse country that I’m sure we will be returning to as soon as we can. I would like to thank again the generosity of the Roger Short Memorial Fund for making this possible, and Victoria in particular for being such a gracious host. I look forward to future dinners where I can plague next year’s travellers with recommendations and stories from my own trip and finding as many excuses as I can to visit this beautiful country again. I was overwhelmed by the kindness and generosity of everyone we met there and, to be honest, part of me wishes I’d never left.

Published: 7 February 2025

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