Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
Adalya, sa.26, ss.233-255, 2023 (AHCI)
A large number of remains have been uncovered during the excavations carried out by the Hatay Archaeology Museum in Epiphaneia since 2006. One of the excavated buildings is the Temple Church first mentioned in 1892. The church lies on an ancient structure, presumably a Roman temple, situated about 40 meters south of the Colonnaded Street. It is a three-aisled church terminated by a semicircular apse with flanking chambers to the east and probably by a narthex to the west. Since only the lowest courses of the building are extant, it is difficult to ascertain the original appearance of the walls. Likewise, the majority of the architectural plastics have been lost. However, partly preserved remains at least show that most parts of the church were paved with mosaics while in other places paved with opus sectile, marble, and brick. The most extraordinary group of the finds is the architectural terracotta fragments. Based upon the forms such as dentils / geisipodes or cyma recta and various ornaments such as staurograms, crosses, swastika, acanthus, eggs and dart-like / ionic cymation and bead and reel-like motifs, these terracotta pieces are examined under three main types. Although no comparable in situ example was found in the Byzantine Empire, similar stone pieces from the early Byzantine and especially the Roman periods indicate that these architectural terracottas were a part of the entablature of the church. Archaeological finds demonstrate that both the church and the terracotta are dating from the fifth or sixth century.