Les hautes terres de Carie

The part of southern Caria which stretches from Mugla and Yesilyurt (ancient Pisye) to the Gulf of Keramos was the subject of a series of reconnaissance missions carried out by a Turko-French team (from the University of Ankara, later from the University of Antalya, and from the Centre Ausonius of University Bordeaux III) between 1989 and 1993. The area is hilly and supposed to be both hard to reach and fairly poor in ancient remains. A systematic investigation showed that the story is rather different.

In this landscape of mountains and Karstic plateaus, a series of small plains allowed human communities to establish themselves with reasonable resources at their disposal in antiquity just as in modern times. The ancient remains have been examined as thoroughly as possible, and the inscriptions have been exhaustively studied (many unpublished texts have emerged). This work has opened the way to a completely new history of the region. Several inscriptions of major interest allow us analyze the political structures of an area which lived under the shadow of Rhodes until well on under the Roman Empire.