Guide
Syedra lies about 20 kilometres southeast of Alanya within Seki village, and it is both a mountain city and a coastal one — a position that made it among the most strategic in the region, holding the western edge of Cilicia.
Unlike most sites of its kind here, it has been arranged for visitors. Entry is through the monumental gate still standing on the west, and a timber walkway runs from the reception area to the colonnaded street, 250 metres long, which was once the city's social centre. Niches survive in the wall along the north of that east-west street, and at its western end steps lead up to a heroon.
East of the city stand the baths, a substantial ruin with patches of mosaic on the floor, and adjoining them the gymnasium, where athletes trained and contests were held — among the better preserved buildings here. Many inscriptions found in the ruins record those games and contests, and it is from inscriptions that the ministry knows the city was a centre for important competitions and that its most splendid years fell between the second and fourth centuries AD.
Settlement goes back to the ninth century BC, and traces of life continue, the ministry says, to the thirteenth century AD. The ancient name Syedreon first appears on coins struck under Tiberius in the first century AD. The living quarters lie in the Upper City on the slope, walled around, cut across by two broad streets with stepped lanes running down at right angles to them.
