the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus

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 This, the Artemision or Temple of Artemis in Ephesus, was the first building constructed entirely of marble and one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

Plan of Temple of Artemis in Ephesus

Artemis, the goddess of nature and fertility, had been combined with Cybele, the local mother goddess. In its first phase the sacred site had an altar. In about 560 B.C. a temple was built over the remains of the altar, which lasted about 200 years but, in 365 B.C. it was deliberately burnt down. The Ephesians rebuilt it to exactly the same plan but upon a 3 metre high pedestal because the site was marshy ground.

The sacred inner portion was rectangular with its main elements being a semi-external porch and a sanctuary of two parts. This was surrounded by a forest of fluted Greek columns of the ionic order including columns inside the porch. The interior of the Artemision was unroofed but the statue of the goddess had a protective canopy or baldachin over it. Being one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World it was the pride of the city, admired near and far.

It was this replacement temple which would have been seen by St Paul when he stayed in Ephesus for about three years. Although he may not have visited the temple its influence upon the city could not be ignored. On one occasion those silversmiths who made money selling shrines of Artemis, and other followers of her cult, caused a riot against St Paul. They shouted in the theatre and the streets and chanted, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians”, so that Paul was forced to leave town (Acts 19:21-41 and 20:1). When he sailed past again he asked the leaders of the Ephesian church to come to meet him at Miletus, perhaps to prevent further trouble in the city (Acts 20:16-17).

The army of the Goths invaded the area and destroyed Ephesus in 262 A.D., including the Temple of Artemis. Today one solitary column stands in a swampy field outside the city and some of its ivory carvings and decorated marble elements are held in the British Museum and the Istanbul Museum.

I have just mentioned the theatre. Soon I hope to consider what other great buildings there were in Ephesus when St Paul visited it in the mid-1st-century. I have also written about the Library of Celsus and the Temple of Hadrian there, but neither had been built that early.

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