Gocek is one of the ancient Lycian settlements found between those of Fethiye and Caunos. Regrettably there are only a few ruins remaining from ancient Kalimche. The main settlement area is unknown; therefore no further excavations have been made to search further. Gocek is still keeping its secrets, as historical writers have not disclosed the region’s assets and history in detail. Examples of rock tombs, monuments and baths can be found in the bays and along the Fethiye highway. There are also some ruins on the Tersane islands belonging to both ancient and recent history. One can well imagine the Daidalos and Ikarus legends to be true for Gocek if its geographical situation is examined.

The locations of the ancient cities of Krya, Lisai and Lydai can be found on the Kapıdağ peninsula that can be reached by boat. Boat trips to these places operate regularly and although the region has not been excavated fully, several objects have recently been recovered from these settlements.

Origin of the Gocek name

The historical name of the region is Daidala. Gocek was named when nomadic people stopped and settled here. There are two different theories as to how the name of Gocek originated. Many local people will confirm these variations.

The first version is Köçek. Köçek means a male belly dancer dressed in women’s clothing that danced with musical instruments. A male belly dancer would be employed for wedding ceremonies and for other celebrations in this region. The male belly dancers would entertain people from as far away as Rhodes. This type of entertainment was used for so long in this region that the village became known as Köçekli (meaning ‘with male belly dancers’) by the surrounding villages. The villagers were so displeased with this name that they stopped using male belly dancers for their celebrations. The surrounding villages started mocking the village name and for this reason the name was changed to Gocek.

The second version is Göç (meaning migration). The region’s people had a nomadic life-style, they would move to the plateau with due ceremony in the spring and return back in the autumn. When the time came to move they would discuss the number of people and the date on which the move should take place. Preparations would be made and, after completion, they would contact each other the day before the planned travel. In the dawn of the morning the animals were loaded and the villagers would say to each other “göçek” (meaning it’s time to move from here) or “Gocek” (meaning let us move from here).

This is the most probable origin of the name and one that local inhabitants believe to be more likely. The important point is that by its very nature the name Gocek describes the facts of its historical association.

The South West coast of Turkey

The road from Mugla to Fethiye is scenically among the most beautiful in Turkey, owing chiefly to the splendid Carian pine-forests. It is also quite comfortably passable for a private car. A night-stop at Köyceğiz is not unattractive, if only for the lovely view over the lake. South of Köyceğiz the road crosses low and mainly level country as far as Dalaman, then turns sharply eastward and climbs high into the mountains, with fascinating glimpses of the sea by Gocek far below. This is the border country between Caria and Lycia. There is then a winding descent to the plain of Fethiye.

After passing the turning to Caunus the road, in about 6 miles, crosses by a modern bridge over the wide stony bed of the Dalaman Çayı. This is the ancient Indus, a very considerable river. Pliny says that it rises in the hills above Cibyra and receives as tributaries sixty perennial rivers and more than a hundred torrents. The first statement is correct; it does in fact rise south of Cibyra and fiows for a good hundred miles to the sea, bearing today at least five different names in its various parts. The sixty perennial affluent however, are certainly an exaggeration, though the map suggests that the hundred torrents may not be far from the mark.

Some 6 miles beyond the bridge is the village, formerly a nahiye of Dalaman, notable only for a large State Farm. The village is now officially Karaçalı but the familiar name is Dalaman From here a pleasant excursion can be made to the large medieval site on the coast at Baba Dağ to the south-west The road is dead flat across the plain, but there are two rivers to be crossed, and the traveller should know in advance how he proposes to manage. The Dalaman Çayı is usually fordable on horseback in summer, though not always without difficulty. The other stream, the Sarısu, is much less considerable; there is a İskele at its mouth where a boat is normally available.

'The site itself is remarkably extensive and utterly deserted among the woods. The very numerous buildings, many of them in good preservation, are of inferior masonry and clearly of medieval date. Among them are a Christian church with apse and aisles, a high fortification wall, and a reservoir. Near the centre of the site is a large pond holding water even through the summer. It is probable that these ruins represent the medieval town of Prepia mentioned in the Italian portolans. At the same time there is evidence that an ancient town previously stood on the site. At its northern end is a rectangular fortress of square blocks which appears Hellenistic, and near the centre, especially between the pond and the reservoir, are a number of column- drums and other ancient stones, one bearing an inscription in honour of the emperor Julian. The name of this earlier town remains uncertain; the most probable suggestion is perhaps Pisilis, which Strabo seems to place between Calynda and is much less considerable; there is a Caunus.

Near the Sarısu landing-stage, a short distance offshore, is the small island of Baba Adası. This is crowned by a remarkable pyramidal structure, of which about half is preserved, built entirely of brick. It is in two storeys, the upper consisting of a circular room divided into four compartments by cross-walls ; at the point where these cross is a round brick pillar three feet in diameter. The building has been variously understood as a mausoleum or a lighthouse; in view of the divided upper storey the latter suggestion appears more probable.

Just 4 kilometers, about 2| miles beyond Dalaman an abundant spring issues on the right of the road beside a disused coffee-house On a hill directly above this are the ruins of an ancient city which general opinion, including the present writer's, accepts as Calynda though it is not actually identified by coins or inscriptions. The place is now called Kuzpınar.

Calynda was a city that lived its good days early. In 480 B.C. It supplied a single ship to Xerxes' fleet at Salamis, but this had the misfortune to be rammed and sunk by a ship of its own side commanded by the Carian queen Artemisia.1 in the Delian (l for this curious incident see Turkey beyond the Masonder p.103.)

Confederacy Calynda (in the form Claynda) paid a tribute twice as large as that of Caunus But as Caunus increased in importance Calynda correspondingly declined. Until 200 B.C. it was still an independent city, but before 164 must have fallen under Caunian control, since in that year it is said to have revolted from Caunus and to have been given by the Roman Senate to Rhodes. By the first century A.D. it was probably incorporated in Caunus but when the province of Lycia-Pamphylia was finally established by Vespasian, Calynda, unlike Calms, was included in the Lycian League. Until then it had been reckoned as Carian As a member of the League the city was eligible for a donation of 9,000 denarii from the millionaire Opramoas of Rhodiapolis.

The hill at Kozpınar is of no great height; it is ascended by a gentle slope on the west, the other sides being much steeper or even precipitous. The upper part is encircled by a fortification wall of polygonal masonry from 7 to 9 feet thick; the style varies, but in part is of the 'coursed polygonal' variety which dates to the early Hellenistic period. It stands in places up to 3 or 4 meters in height, but this is partly due to a late addition in roughly squared blocks with cement. At the north corner is a tower or small fort of good regular Hellenistic masonry, divided into two clambers; it has a small door with a 'corbelled' arch, formed by cutting the top course of the jambs obliquely and closing the gap with a cap-stone. In the interior the whole site is strewn with vast masses of building-stones, cut or uncut; foundations of houses are discernible, but nothing is standing.

Great tales are told by the locals of the treasures of gold and silver found on the site, and a good deal of illicit digging has been done, but as usual none of the treasures are forthcoming.

The ancient evidence for placing Calynda on the map consists of two passages, from Strabo and from Pliny. Strabo says it is sixty shades, about 61 miles from the sea from Kozpınar to the coast is 6 miles Pliny records in order from south to north: Crya the river Axon, the town of Calynda the river Indus. On the map the first river after Crya is the Kargın Çayı a modest stream which passes close under the Kozpınar site ; between this and the Dalaman Çayı (Indus) there is no ancient site. It seems almost inevitable, therefore, that the Axon is the Kargın Çayı and that Calynda stood on it; in this case Strabo's figure leads exactly to Kozpınar.

From Kozpınar the road continues eastward. Near the village of İnlice at a point just beyond the sign marking 'Fethiye 29 km.' close beside the road on the left, is an interesting tomb cut in a rocky knoll. It is in the east face of the rock, and the traveller going towards Fethiye must look back in order to see it; from the other direction it is in full view. Rather unusually, the tomb is in the Doric order. Three steps lead up to the porch, which has two columns between pilasters; the columns are of one piece with the tomb, cut from the rock. That on the right is reduced to a foot or two at the top. Much of the Doric ornamentation survives on the right-a triglyph frieze with a dentil frieze above and mutules below. The pediment carried three acroteria of which that on the right is lost. There is no inscription. The entrance to the main chamber is broken wide open; the interior is a single room with stone benches round all three sides on which the corpses were laid, and a flat rather rough roof. As a whole the tomb does not appear to be very highly finished.

A little further on the attentive traveller may just discern, high up in the hills to the left, a group of pigeon-hole tombs cut in the hillside; they appear as tiny black squares. These mark the site of the city of Daedala. Here again the identity is not proved by inscriptions or coins, but the position agrees with the ancient notices and is generally accepted. The site requires a considerable effort to reach, and has in fact very rarely been visited. It is known as İnlice Asarı. The steep acropolis hill is surrounded on three sides by a wall of respectable ashlar masonry; the west side is too precipitous to need a wall. On the summit is a small fort. Also on the acropolis are rock-cut steps, foundations of houses, and a circular stucco-coated cistern sheet in diameter. A lower summit to the east was also included in the city. But the principal remains are tombs. Three of these are typical Lycian rock-tombs, and there are a few sarcophagi, but most are of simple pigeon-hole type, cut in the rock-face and in many cases quite inaccessible. These are especially numerous to the west of the acropolis.

Strabo gives Daedala as marking the boundary between Caria and Lycia, and both he and Livy describe it as belonging to the Rhodian Peraes (2) this is confirmed by an inscription found on the island of Tersane in the gulf of Fethiye, but stated to have come from a tomb at Daedala. It is a dedication by a, Rhodian governor of the second century B.C., and the form of the wording shows that he was functioning on territory actually incorporated in the Rhodian state, not merely subject to Rhodes. No other such territory is known between here and the bay of Marmaris. There is some uncertainty whether the stone came from the Doric tomb by the roadside described above or from one of the Lycian tombs in the city itself; but in any case it appears that there was around Daedala an isolated enclave of the incorporated Rhodian Peraea.

From Gocek an excursion may be made to the islands of the gulf of Fethiye (ancient Glaucus Sinus), of which Tersane is the largest. Here there was formerly a prosperous Greek village, but following the exchange of populations after the First World War. Ancient remains include a ruined watch- tower and a handsome built tomb partially preserved. It is possible, though quite unproved, that the ancient name of Tersane was Telandria, an island on which, according to Pliny, there was a town which had already perished in his day. On most of the other islands, or islets, there are various remains of the Byzantine age, but they are not of much account.

More interesting is the site on the west coast of the gulf at a spot called Taşyaka (formerly Charopia) to the north-west of Tersane. Near the shore is a group of temple-tombs a good deal damaged but remarkable because one of them carries an inscription not in Lycian but in Carian. As this language is not yet understood, it remains unknown what Carian dignitary was buried here. There are also some pigeon-hole tombs in the Clio- face. From the shore a rock-cut stairway led up the steep hill may be made to the islands of the Glaucus Sinus), of which Tersane is the gulf of Fethiye (ancient largest. Here there was it is now deserted. That is Rhodian territory on the mainland.

The matter of the inscription is not free from uncertainly. The statement that the stone came from a tomb on the mainland may not be reliable; it is a dedication to Good Fortune and Aphrodite, which a governor would hardly set up in a tomb. It must have come originally from some other place altogether.

To a tiny acropolis on the summit, barely 40 yards long and half as wide. It is enclosed by an early wall of mixed ashlar and polygonal masonry. In the interior are the foundations of a, tower or small fort some 30 by 20 feet, and a large cistern. These scanty remains almost certainly represent the city of Crya. Yet again no inscriptions or coins have proved the identity, but the position agrees exactly with the notice in the Stadiasmus(4) which places it a, little over 5 miles north of Lydae. Very little is in fact heard about Crya in the ancient writers. Pliny calls her 'Crya of the fugitives', but the reason for this curious title is not known. She is said to have possessed islands in the gulf, two of which are named as Carysis and Alina but it is quite impossible to identify these. Crya was never more than a very modest city, and her citizens are very rarely met with in the inscriptions, so that a small site like that at Taşyaka seems perfectly suitable.

In the hill country to the north and east of Gocek are a great number of small ancient sites, but they are hard to reach, mostly unidentifiable and unrewarding when reached.


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