Xinhua
Ankara, July 31 (Xinhua) Two ancient piers belonging to the first centry A.D. have been discovered by archaeologists in the ancient city of Aphrodisias in western Turkey, the semi-official Anatolia news agency reported Thursday. The nearly 2,000 year-old piers were discovered by a team of archaeologists led by Roland Smith, a professor of the Oxford University, during their excavations in the ancient city located near Karacasu town in Aydin province.

The news agency quoted Smith as saying that the team found pieces of a beautiful arch and two piers during this year’s excavations in the ancient city.

“The piers were decorated with a lion head placed between two bull heads,” he said.

Aphrodisias was a small city in Caria, in the ancient western Anatolia or Asia Minor region that comprises most of modern Turkey. Aphrodisias was named after Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of Love.

The city was built near a marble quarry that was extensively exploited in the Hellenistic and Roman periods, and sculptors in marble from Aphrodisias became famous in the Roman world.

Many examples of statuary have been unearthed in Aphrodisias, and some representations of the Aphrodite of Aphrodisias were also discovered from other parts of the Roman world.
Xinhua